For those of you who’ve seen Bethany House Fiction on Instagram, you know we’ve been busy this month. Today marks the end of our “For the Love of Books” Instagram challenge. We posted a picture on a particular theme every day, and readers joined in with over a thousand entries during the month of February! We were stunned by your creativity…if you haven’t yet, you should take a look at all the bookish images we got to enjoy.

We’ll be choosing winners among the Instagram participants tomorrow after February is officially over, but here’s a special giveaway just for our blog readers to celebrate a successful Instagram challenge.

Just go to our Instagram profile and look over our February posts. Pick one that you especially liked, then come back and comment on this blog post with the reason why. We’ll choose a random comment on Monday, and that reader will win their choice of one of the books in the Instagram post they selected. (This is open to US and international readers.)

Thanks so much to all who participated…it’s been an extra-fun February with all the book love you put out there!

Here at Bethany House, we love books…and we know all of you do too! That’s why we’re launching our first-ever Instagram challenge. We’ll be posting a pretty bookish picture for every day of February based on a particular theme. You can see the lineup below.

Follow us on Instagram if you want to see what we come up with, and join in on whatever days you like by tagging us in your own bookstagram photos. (Find out how to do so by reading our original IG post.) We’d love to see social media feeds filled to the brim with great books.

On a personal note, I’ve been helping our lovely copywriter, Rachael, take several of these pictures. They’re SO FUN.

Hope you’re staying warm with a good book, readers!

Regular blog readers will notice that we didn’t post a Reading Challenge as we usually do in January. That’s because our friends at Hope by the Book, who love Christian fiction, came up with one of their own. I liked it so much that I wanted to direct all of you to it. They have fun checklists (including different “levels”) for readers to participate in, along with some social media fun and interaction. You can check it out here.

 

In honor of this challenge, I thought we’d do a giveaway. Visit the Hope by the Book checklist, then come back here and recommend at least one book that fits one of the Avid Reader categories. (It doesn’t have to be a Bethany House book.) Next week, I’ll chose three commenters to win their choice of our January or February new releases to help them get started on their 2019 reading goals.

I’ll make a few suggestions first:

• The Curse of Misty Wayfair by Jaime Jo Wright received a HBTB Bookmarked Review.
• Dead Drift by Dani Pettrey was an ECPA bestselling book in 2018.
• If you like your sports figures fictional, Becky Wade’s My Stubborn Heart or Falling for You have athlete heroes.
• Our nonfiction team highly recommended Your Powerful Prayers by Susie Larson for the Christian Living checkbox.

I could go on for days, but now it’s your turn. Look at the categories in the list and start recommending below. Be sure to tell us which category it fulfills!

 

Last week’s Christy Awards and Art of Writing conference were jam-packed with moments that warmed my heart, from seeing readers meet some of their favorite authors for the first time, to hearing testimonies from author legends that moved me to tears, to celebrating a legacy of storytellers through Sarah Arthur’s tribute to Madeleine L’Engle for the 100th anniversary of her birth.

But my favorite part of all was cheering on our two winning Bethany House authors, Becky Wade and Jaime Jo Wright, as they received their Christy awards.

Our sister fiction division, Revell, also had two well-deserved wins as well. (Every now and then we have a bit of a teasing rivalry when our books face off against each other in contests like this, but we’re always genuinely happy to celebrate our authors’ successes.)

Here are the Baker Publishing Group winners. Be sure to add them to your TBR List!

First Novel

Missing Isaac by Valerie Fraser Luesse

Plot Summary: When a black field hand disappears, a wealthy white boy he has befriended sets out to find him. But Pete McLean discovers more than he bargained for—including unexpected love and difficult truths about race and class in 1960s Alabama.

Mystery/Suspense/Thriller

The House on Foster Hill by Jaime Jo Wright

Plot Summary: Fleeing a stalker, Kaine Prescott purchases an old house sight unseen in Wisconsin, which turns out to have a dark history: a century earlier, an unidentified woman was found dead on the grounds. As Kaine tries to settle in, she learns the story of her ancestor Ivy Thorpe, who, with the help of a man from her past, tried to uncover the truth about the death.

Historical Romance

The Lacemaker by Laura Frantz

Plot Summary: On the eve of her wedding, Lady Elisabeth Lawson’s world is shattered, as surely as the fine glass windows of her colonial Williamsburg home. In a town seething with Patriots ready for rebellion, her protection comes from an unlikely source—now if she could only protect her heart.

Contemporary Romance AND Book of the Year

True to You by Becky Wade

Plot Summary: After a broken engagement, genealogist Nora Bradford decides focusing on her work and her novels is safer than romance. But when John, a former Navy SEAL, hires her to help find his birth mother, the spark between them is undeniable. However, he’s dating someone, and Nora is hesitant. Is she ready to abandon her fictional heroes and risk her heart for real?

There were a good number of readers attending the awards gala who I had the privilege to meet—if you can make a roadtrip to Nashville next November, we’d love to see you there too!

For those of you who couldn’t make it, if you’d like to check out the livestream posted on the Christy Awards Facebook page, you can do so here. You’ll find lots of lovely talks and cheer-worthy acceptance speeches from your favorite authors.

Instead of throwing virtual confetti at you to celebrate (or mailing you some of the cheesecake served at the gala), I decided it would be perfect to host a giveaway here on the blog. All you have to do to enter is choose one of the books on this list and tell me why either the cover or plot description intrigues you and makes you want to read more. I’ll pick two winners on November 26, and both will win their choice of two of these four books.

Since schools all around the country have started up this month, it seemed like a great time to share some of our recent books that feature teachers of the past. These heroines might have a more exciting life than a local educator you know (hopefully things like kidnappings, secret identities, and natural disasters aren’t terribly common at your school), but they share the same love: helping students learn.

Playing by Heart by Anne Mateer

Plot Summary:

Plot Summary: Determined to prove herself, Lula commits to a teaching job for a year, even though the subjects—music and basketball—are ones she looks down on as a mathematician. When she reluctantly turns to the boys’ coach, Chet, for help, she’ll learn more than she ever expected about life and love.

Undaunted Hope by Jody Hedlund

Plot Summary:

Plot Summary: When Tessa Taylor arrives in Eagle Harbor, Michigan, she is dismayed to learn there has been a mistake—the town requested a male teacher. Mercifully, they agree to let her stay temporarily. As she settles in to her new life, two brothers begin vying for her hand, but an unknown danger seems to haunt her steps. Clearly, someone doesn’t want her to stay.

A Bride at Last by Melissa Jagears

Plot Summary: Silas and Kate both harbor resentment over failed mail-order engagements. When a common interest in an orphaned student leads to an interest in each other, they begin to think they can overcome their rocky start. But neither is prepared for the secrets that have yet to come to light. Can they move beyond past hurts and find hope?

Holding the Fort by Regina Jennings

Plot Summary: When dance hall singer Louisa Bell visits Fort Reno to see her brother, she is mistaken for the tutor that the harried Major Daniel Adams is waiting for. Between his rowdy troops and his two daughters, he has more responsibility than he can handle alone. Eager for the opportunity, Louisa sets out to show the widower that she is a perfect fit.

The Tutor’s Daughter by Julie Klassen

Plot Summary: Emma Smallwood and her father have come to the Cornish coast to tutor the youngest sons of a baronet—but all is not as it seems. When mysterious things begin to happen and danger mounts, can she figure out which brother to blame…and which to trust with her heart?

A Worthy Pursuit by Karen Witemeyer

Plot Summary: When a wealthy railroad investor hires him to find his abducted granddaughter, legendary tracker Stone eagerly accepts the job. But instead of a hardened criminal, he finds Charlotte, a teacher on the run determined to protected the child in her care. Will Charlotte and Stone decide to trust each other before they both lose what they hold most dear?

Where Courage Calls by Janette Oke and Laurel Oke Logan

Plot Summary: Inspired by her aunt Elizabeth, Beth Thatcher has accepted a teaching position in the rugged foothills of Canada. She resolves to put her trust in God and bravely face any challenge that comes her way. But the conditions in Coal Valley are worse than she’d feared. She is determined to make a difference…but how long can she last on the western frontier?   And to celebrate teachers, how about a giveaway? To enter, just comment below with the name of a favorite teacher and what you appreciated about him or her. I’ll chose three winners on Monday, September 17 to receive their choice of book from this list…and another to give to a friend or family member who teaches.

Since this August has a fifth Thursday, we thought it would be fun to shake up the blogging schedule and include a giveaway! As the lazy vacation days of summer slowly end, you might have to be more creative about finding a good place to sneak a few pages of your latest novel, but thankfully, reading is a year-round hobby.

We’d like to give away three prize package of all four of our August releases. There are three ways you can enter to win.

On Tuesday, September 4, we’ll pick one winner from our list of blog followers (enter your email in the sidebar to the left if you haven’t already)…

One from our Instagram subscribers…

And one from the comments on this post, answering the question, “What is a great book you read this summer?”

In the meantime, I hope you enjoy your Labor Day weekend, and maybe sneak a little reading time in as well.

At the RWA conference, several of our authors were honored with awards. We here at Bethany House love cheering them on in their successes!

Jaime Jo Wright won the Daphne du Maurier award in the Inspirational category for The House on Foster Hill.

Rachel Dylan won the Faith, Hope, and Love Reader’s Choice Award for Deadly Proof in the romantic suspense category.

And Tracie Peterson received a Centennial Award for more than 100 published romance novels. (Yes, you read that right, and that’s not including her novellas!)

Because we’re so proud of these authors, I’m hosting an impromptu giveaway on the blog. We’ll choose three winners to pick a book by one of the three authors above as their prize. To enter, “like” at least one of these authors’ pages on Facebook (Tracie Peterson, Rachel Dylan, Jaime Jo Wright), then come back to comment on this post with the answer to this question: “What’s a book you recently read that you’d like to give an award to?” (If you’ve already liked one of these authors’ pages, just comment. No need to say whose page you liked, we’ll just check that the winners have done so before contacting them.) Giveaway closes on Monday, July 30.

Hello, readers! Our archive room (the locked, mysterious vault where copies of all of our books are kept) has been getting very full. Because of this, our intrepid editorial assistant, Hannah, recently cleaned out several dozen audiobooks on CD and offered them to Bethany House staff for free.

Rather than keep the bounty all to ourselves, I thought I’d do a fun flash giveaway for you readers.

To enter, all you have to do is comment on this post by noon tomorrow (Friday, June 1), with an answer to this question: what do you like about audiobooks?

If you’re one of three randomly-chosen winners, I’ll contact you via email and ask you what genre you prefer, then send you a fiction audiobook in that genre (I may be able to find specific Bethany House authors, but no guarantees!).