Take Back Your Life: A 40-Day Interactive Journey to Thinking Right So You Can Live Right by Levi Lusko

Book description:

A forty-day interactive journey that will help you identify and fight your internal battles—so you can take back your life. 

Every person has a mission and a God-given potential to impact the world, whether they recognize it or not. But life presents challenges and traps us in a helpless, hopeless loop of anxiety and fear.

In Take Back Your Life, a blend of bestselling books Through the Eyes of a Lion and I Declare War, join Levi Lusko on an interactive journey to take back your life. With biblical truth and perspective, this step-by-step journaling process will help you:

get out of your own way by learning to think right so you can live right,
find purpose by discovering that God will do great things with your imperfect progress, and
learn that your pain is not an obstacle to being used by God but an opportunity to be used like never before.
This is more than a book; it’s an intimate self-analysis tool that will help you recognize what’s weighing you down or holding you back, and equip you to embrace it head-on as you become the best version of yourself. Start thinking right, so you can live right.

My review:

  I am familiar with this author, but have never read anything by him until now. Take Back Your Life is a devotional type book, but that is an interactive kind of devotional.

 There are 40 chapters, intended to be done over a period of 40 days. Each chapter starts out with a Bible verse, followed by the devotional part. That is followed by a short prayer, then the "Breathe, Think, and Live" part. It consists of several questions to answer, and often some actions to do.

 I didn't do all 40 days, as I didn't have enough time to do them all one day at a time, but I like what I read. The book is Biblical, and if the reader answers the questions and does the exercises that are in the book, I can see it would definitely be a help. Lusko has a great and interesting style of writing, and relates a lot of personal anecdotes throughout the book. As I glanced through the parts of the book that I didn't read yet, it is obvious there is a lot of depth to the book, and it can be a valuable tool for anyone who needs to change their thinking about themselves.

Disclosure (in accordance with the FTC’s 16 CFR, Part 255:  “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising”):  Many thanks to Propeller Consulting, LLC and HCCP for providing this prize for the giveaway and review.  Choice of winners and opinions are 100% my own and NOT influenced by monetary compensation.  I did receive a sample of the product in exchange for this review and post.


About the author:

 Levi Lusko is the author of the bestselling books “Through the Eyes of a Lion” and “Swipe Right.” He is also the lead pastor of Fresh Life Church – a multisite church located in Montana, Utah, Oregon, and Wyoming that he and his wife Jennie pioneered in 2007. Levi travels around the world speaking about Jesus. He takes pleasure in small things, such as black coffee, new shoes, fast Internet, and falling asleep in the sun. He and his wife have one son: Lennox, and four daughters: Alivia, Daisy, Clover, and Lenya, who is in heaven.

 

Giveway:

 Courtesy of FlyBy Promotions, I have one copy of Take Back Your Life to give away. Just comment on this post, or email me if you do not have a blogger account. I will pick a winner using Random.org 10 days from now on September 4.

The Gentleman Spy, Serendipity Secrets #2 by Erica Vetsch

Book description:


He only wanted a duchess for a day--but she's determined to make it a marriage for life

When his father and older brother suddenly pass away, the new Duke of Haverly is saddled with a title he never expected to bear. To thwart the plans of his scheming family, the duke impulsively marries a wallflower. After all, she's meek and mild; it should be easy to sequester her in the country and get on with his life--as a secret agent for the Crown.

But his bride has other ideas. She's determined to take her place not only as his duchess but as his wife. As a duchess, she can use her position to help the lowest of society--the women forced into prostitution because they have no skills or hope. Her endeavors are not met favorably in society, nor by her husband who wishes she'd remain in the background as he ordered.

Can the duke succeed in relegating her to the sidelines of his life? When his secrets are threatened with exposure, will his new wife be an asset or a liability?

Book review: 

Although these aren't the type of books I normally read, I enjoyed the first one so much that I have been looking forward to reading the second one.Since the main male character was a spy, this book leaned more towards being suspense than the first one, which made it all the more enjoyable to me.

 Both Charlotte and Marcus were interesting and likable characters, which is a big plus for a story, but especially Marcus. He was a rich aristocrat going through the motions of what he had to do in society, yet had a secret life as a spy that even his new wife didn't know about. And Charlotte was intended to be a meek wife to gain approval and help his place in society, but she bucked the system and got involved in helping women who were trapped in prostitution.

 I really enjoyed this story. The author did a great job of portraying life in England in the 1800's, and what a marriage of convenience might look like. Vetsch has a great writing style, and captured my attention on the first page, and kept it all through the book. This book IS a romance, so there was a lot of that in the book, made all the more interesting by the spy activities and by wondering what Charlotte would do next to mortify her mother-in-law and knock her new husband off balance.

 The main characters from  the previous book made a few appearances, and it was cool to have them tied into the story.

 Vetsch has come out with another riveting novel that has left this reader looking forward to the 3rd and last novel in this trilogy.


I was provided a copy of this book for review purposes. All opinions in this review are my own.

About the author:

Erica Vetsch is a New York Times best-selling and ACFW Carol Award–winning author. She is a transplanted Kansan now living in Minnesota with her husband, who she claims is both her total opposite and soul mate.  

Vetsch loves Jesus, history, romance, and sports. When she’s not writing fiction, she’s planning her next trip to a history museum and cheering on her Kansas Jayhawks and New Zealand All Blacks.

A self-described history geek, she has been planning her first research trip to England.

Learn more about Erica Vetsch and her books at www.ericavetsch.com. She can also be found on Facebook (@EricaVetschAuthor), Instagram (@EricaVetsch) and Pinterest (Erica Vetsch).

Giveaway. Enter here.

Persian Betrayal, Empires of Armageddon #2 by Terry Brennan

Book description:

How much can Brian Mullaney risk to serve God and save lives--without losing his own? DSS Regional Security Officer Brian Mullaney has been tasked with an incredibly dangerous mission. When a synagogue in Jerusalem is destroyed by an explosion, burying the second key prophecy Mullaney is hunting--and the deadly box that protects it--the answers he desperately needs are also crushed. How can he discover the meaning of the centuries-old prophecy now? Why are he and the ambassador he's assigned to protect being targeted? And is there any way this lone man can thwart a nuclear arms race between three ascendant empires of the past?

An otherworldly servant of evil known only as the Turk is maneuvering all three nations into an intricate dance designed to undermine prophecy about the end times. And he won't let Mullaney or anyone else get in his way.

Wounded in a bloody shoot-out, pressured by his wife to come home, and mourning the death of his best friend, Mullaney doesn't need a powerful enemy. Who is he to save the Ishmael Covenant, the treaty promising peace in the Middle East? Despite angelic intervention, Mullaney wants nothing to do with his final assignment. But without him, evil will win the ultimate struggle . . . and humankind will have no hope left. 

My review:

 It took me a while to get into the first book in this series, but that wasn't the case with this book. It picks up where the first book ended, and launches right into action and drama. This book was a thrilling ride through the Middle East, with constant action and political intrigue woven with Bible prophecy.

 It is obvious that Brennan has done a lot of research for this series, and has put a lot of history and detail in the story that taught me a lot about what has gone on in that area, and what is currently going on.

 Slight spoiler: Brennan's description of what might happen if a peace treaty was actually signed was interesting and has repercussions to do with passages in the Bible that I had never considered.

 Brian Mullaney is the main character, and this book had more character development and background on this very likable character. And he is not the only likable character. Then there are the ones not so likable that I found myself hoping would get found out and get what they deserve.

 Persian Betrayal is an awesome story of political intrigue, but also shows how unstable that area is, and what could happen if the wrong people got enough power and abilities to wipe others out. Once I picked this book up, I could not put it down. From start to finish, it is non stop action and intrigue, and it left me wishing the third book was out. Awesome story.


I was provided a copy of this book for review purposes. All opinions in this review are my own

About the author:

A Pulitzer Prize is just one of the awards Terry Brennan accumulated during a 22-year career in journalism.

​The Pottstown (PA) Mercury  won a Pulitzer Prize for Editorial Writing for a two-year series of editorials written while Brennan was the newspaper’s Editor. Once directly responsible for over 100 newsrooms in the United States, Brennan was an award-winning writer, editor and publisher,  including an award for editorial writing from the Freedoms Foundation.

​He was an Editor and Publisher for newspapers in Pennsylvania, Illinois, and New York and moved to the corporate staff of Ingersoll Publications (400 newspapers in the U.S., Ireland and England) as Executive Editor of all U.S. newspaper titles.

 In 1996 Brennan transferred his successful management career to the non-profit sector and served for 12 years as Vice President of Operations for The Bowery Mission and for more than a decade as Chief Administrative Officer for Care for the Homeless in New York City.

​Terry and his wife, Andrea, live in Connecticut, near their daughter, son-in-law and grandchildren; their son lives in Lake Tahoe, California. Terry's two adult sons and their families live in Pennsylvania. 

Check out his website at terrrybrennanauthor.com
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Persian Betrayal is available from Kregel Publishing.