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The Snow Queen: Magic of the Ice Mirror Review and Giveaway

The Snow Queen: Magic of the Ice Mirror Review and Giveaway

Get ready for a digital adventure with The Snow Queen: Magic of the Ice Mirror.

The Snow Queen: Magic of the Ice Mirror Review and Giveaway

About The Snow Queen: Magic of the Ice Mirrors

After celebrating their victory over the Snow Queen, Gerda and Orm have given their fellow trolls a taste of freedom. But when Orm gets a cold-hard reality check, they slip into another perilous journey and must protect the world from eternal winter.

Our Thoughts

This was our first time being introduced to the characters of the Snow Queen, Gerda and Orm. This movie is actually the sequel to another film, which is pretty great for fans of the duo Gerda and Orm. If you haven’t yet seen it, no worries as the beginning of the film shows you a recap of the first movie.

The digital copy (available on iTunes November 3rd, 2015) is perfect entertainment for your children on long car rides, after school and those cold days spent inside (because lets face it, winter is coming!). The graphics are clear and bright, drawing you right into the movie and the characters. The animations are better suited for a slightly older child (maybe kindergarten and up) as they are more realistic (versus cute and cuddly) and at times the Snow Queen can be a little scary. Our main characters Gerda is a human girl and Orm is a troll (with an incredibly funny nose!). The humour is fantastic and the plot line is great throughout the movie.

The movie also tells a great story about telling lies. In the opening Orm promises to never tell a lie again. He quickly goes back on this promise and our story unfolds!

Check out the Trailer!

The Snow Queen: Magic of the Ice Mirror – Trailer from Momentum Pictures on Vimeo.

Momentum and kaboom entertainment want to give you the chance to win your own digital copy of The Snow Queen: Magic of the Ice Mirror on iTunes. My Canadian and American readers can enter via the Rafflecopter form below.

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Disclosure: I received a digital copy of this film in order to facilitate this review. All opinions expressed are my own.

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Merry Mary by Ashley Farley

Merry Mary

A longing for a child coupled with loneliness is at the heart of this Christmas miracle story, Merry Mary by Ashley Farley.

Merry MaryAbout Merry Mary

A young woman stumbles longing for a child stumbles upon a Christmas miracle.

Investigative journalist, Scottie Darden, is photographing the homeless for her Lost Souls series when she makes a discovery that could change her life forever. Under a makeshift tent in subzero termperatures, she finds a dead woman’s body and her infant child still alive. Without her cellphone to call for help, Scottie makes a split second decision to take the baby home. Her initial instincts are to provide the baby with food, shelter and warmth until her family can be located.

But as her fondness for the baby grows, she finds herself facing a life on the run or worse, time in prison.

My Thoughts

This novel was touching in so many ways. I felt connected to Scottie in so many ways, having struggled myself with infertility as well as loss from miscarriages. It has changed how I relate to others, pregnancy and even myself. It leaves you feeling lonely and angry. You lash at people you don’t want or mean to. You hope so badly for good news, to only be repeatedly let down. I can only begin to imagine the thoughts that went through Scottie’s mind as she took that child home. The protectiveness, the love and even the heartbreaking anguish.

She is mentally stable but some might think of her actions as opposite to this. She is just a woman who has suffered more than she should have and wanted to protect and love the child that by some miracle, she was able to rescue just in time. If she had not been there, this child would have had no chance of survival. It is as if the child is a gift of life and hope in Scottie’s time of despair.

This gift, Mary, teaches Scottie so much. She learns to trust, she believes in her own strength and courage and she learns to let go. So much happens to Scottie in this novel, some good and some bad, but all so heartbreaking real. Mary is more then just a child, she is a symbol of hope, strength and life. Merry Mary will leave you smiling and crying, and each page is worth every moment.

You can purchase a copy of the book on Amazon, Barnes and Noble, iBooks and Kobo.

Rating: 5/5

About the Author

Ashley Farley is a wife and mother of two college-aged children. She grew up in the salty marshes of South Carolina, but now lives in Richmond, Virginia, a city she loves for its history and traditions.

After her brother died in 1999 of an accidental overdose, she turned to writing as a way of releasing her pent-up emotions. She wrote SAVING BEN in honor of Neal, the boy she worshipped, the man she could not save. SAVING BEN is not a memoir, but a story about the special bond between siblings.

HER SISTER’S SHOES—June 24, 2015—is a women’s novel that proves the healing power of family.

Look for MERRY MARY this holiday season, a heartwarming story of the powerful connection between a caring soul and an innocent child in need.

You can connect with her online, Facebook and Facebook.

The Giveaway!

Ashley is giving away a $50 giftcard choice of Amazon, Barnes & Noble or Paypal (international). My readers can enter via the Rafflecopter form below.

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Disclosure: I recieved a digital copy of this book in order to facilitate this review. All opinions expressed are my own.

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Jesusita by Ronald Ruiz

iRead Book Tours

Jesusita is the story of immigrants—legal and illegal—trying to survive in California in the years after World War II.

Jesusita Book ReviewAbout Jesusita

Jesusita, alone and impoverished, struggles to keep her four young children together. Though she finds support from Padre Montes at St. Teresa’s Catholic Church, her faith won’t solve her problems, especially those with her daughter, Paulina. Far from home, Filipino laborers are denied by law any contact with white women. Angie, the young daughter of an illiterate and unmarried mother, knows only one way to make money. And Felix, abandoned by his mother and separated from his only brother, is placed in a foster home on an isolated ranch. The interrelated lives of these people provide a complex, sometimes violent, and often tragic image of American poverty within the nation’s postwar boom.

My Thoughts

Jesusita, tells the story of one woman who has struggled to earn a living in a country that is not accepting of her culture and a society that would do anything to keep their existence hidden.

Jesusita is the main character in this novel and the other characters seem to move around her and as we get to the later half of the book we understand the importance of finding out about the lives of Angie and Felix. It is from her the story flows and that we learn about the others tied in to her story and her struggles. She suffers to keep a roof over her children’s heads and food in their stomachs. This is a pain that I can not even begin to imagine experiencing as a Mother. The emotional and physical strain takes a toll on her and we can witness this through the relationships between herself and her children.

It is God that helps her through her darkest moments but also that helps her hide her frustrations and angers instead of dealing with them. She hides behind the perfect image she portrays to her religious family, while her home life falls apart.

Jesusita was a fascinating novel, that at times was hard to follow but near the end of the novel the story comes together full circle. It is complex, intricate but fascinating at the same time. A very good read!

You can purchase a copy of the book on Amazon and Barnes & Noble.

Rating: 4/5

About the Author

After reading Dostoyevsky’s Crime and Punishment at the age of 17, I knew I wanted to be a writer. But I knew nothing about the craft. My first novel, Happy Birthday Jesús, was published 36 years later. Surprisingly, it received good reviews

For many years, I was a criminal defense attorney and at the end of my career a prosecutor, but I always managed to find time to write. What I saw and experienced during those years often serves as a basis for my writing. For me, learning how to write has been a long, continuous and, at times, torturous process.

Now retired, I try to write every day and I feel fortunate that I have found something in writing that sustains me. I’m glad I persevered during all those years of rejection. More than anything, writing about what I see and experience in life has given me a sense of worth.

The Giveaway!

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Disclosure: I received a digital copy of this book in order to facilitate this review. All opinions expressed are my own.

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SuperKind: Help Spread RAOK Around the World

How many of you have been personally touched by a RAOK? Maybe someone paid for your coffee on a day you were running late, held a door open for you instead of rushing off and slamming it in your face or maybe a neighbour cleaned up your leaves as a surprise. Every little act of kindness goes a long way to help make our world a better place! SuperKind wants to help you, help your child learn these valuable lessons.

SuperKind: Teaching RAOK

So what exactly is SuperKind?

SuperKind is a personalized product aimed at spreading RAOK around the world while building a team of RAOK superheroes! Each SuperKind kit contains sixteen custom kindness cards, sixteen custom stickers and a certificate to stick the stickers to.

SuperKind: Spreading RAOK

The cards are double-sided and about the size of a business card (2″x3.5″). On one side of the card is a picture of your child performing a RAOK. The idea is for your child to perform the act of kindness and then pass the card on encouraging the next person to perform an act of kindness in the next seventy-two hours.

SuperKind: Spreading RAOK

SuperKind wants all children to be able to participate in this campaign, so right now you can receive a free digital version of this campaign just by sharing the Kickstarter page. A win-win for all children (and their parents too!).

SuperKind: Spreading RAOK

You can also enter to win a $500 Cash giveaway on the SuperKind website right now! Make sure to head over there now to enter and find out more about this awesome project from SuperKind.

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Murder on Safari by Peter Riva

iRead Book Tours

In Murder on Safari, it is up to a reality TV producer and an expert safari guide to stop a terrorist attack.

Murder on Safari By Peter Riva

About Murder on Safari

Every adventure starts at the fringes of civilization. For expert safari guide Mbuno and wildlife television producer Pero Baltazar, filming in the wild of East Africa should have been a return to the adventure they always loved. This time they’d be filming soaring vultures in northern Kenya and giant sea crocodiles in Tanzania with Mary, the daughter of the world’s top television evangelist, the very reverend Jimmy Threte.

But when a terrorist cell places them in the crosshairs, there is suddenly no escape and they must put their filming aside and combine all their talents to thwart an all-out al-Shabaab terrorist attack on Jimmy Threte’s Christian gathering of hundreds of thousands in Nairobi, Kenya.

My Thoughts

Murder on Safari is an intense, action full novel that demands your full attention. Peter incorporates the language of the African countries they travel through (with some explanation to the terms so you just have to pay a little bit more attention to the first time the words are used but it doesn’t take away from the story). I loved how action packed the entire novel was from start to finish as they traveled East Africa and explored the wilds while trying to escape terrorists. There was never a really dull moment.

Despite the action packed adventure in the story, there was just as interesting story line playing out behind the scenes in our main characters of Pero and Mary. Pero has lost someone close to him and it is this loss which helps him on this mission. Mary is the glue that holds the story together, a very important part of the novel and how the story unwinds.

Murder on Safari was a fantastic read from start to finish, that readers will not want to put down.

You can purchase a copy of the book on Amazon, Barnes & Noble and Chapters.

Rating: 5/5

About the Author

Peter Riva spent many months over thirty years in Africa, many of them with the legendary guides for East African white hunters and adventurers. He created a TV series (seventy-eight 1-hour episodes) in 1995 called WildThings for Paramount TV. Passing on the fables, true tales and insider knowledge of these last reserves of true wildlife is a passion.

The Giveaway!

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Disclosure: I received a digital copy of this book in order to facilitate this review. All opinions expressed are my own.

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