Empowered: How God Shaped 11 Women’s Lives (And Can Shape Yours Too)
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By Catherine Parks

                Empowered shares the lives of eleven remarkable women whose lives were shaped by God in different circumstances. The women featured are: Corrie and Betsie ten Boom, Sophie Scholl, Pandita Ramabai, Charlotte Forten Grimke, Esther Ahn Kim, Elisabeth Elliot, Phillis Wheatley, Joni Eareckson Tada, Fanny Crosby, and Annie Armstrong.
                In each chapter we learn about the women’s beginnings, the hardships they faced with trials such as war and suffering, and how they turned to God and were inspired to do great things with His strength. There are questions at the end of each chapter for introspection as well.

                Some of the women I was familiar with like Joni Eareckson Tada and Corrie and Betsie ten Boom, but others were new to me and I learned a lot from such as Sophie Scholl, Pandita Ramabai, and Esther Ahn Kim.

                The book is geared towards girls 13-18 and this would make a perfect eighth grade graduation gift. It’s inspiring and the questions that went along with each chapter really brought the lessons and messages into our daily lives. I would highly recommend this book for summer reading.

​I received this book from BH Publishing and Lifeway in return for my honest review. All thoughts and opinions are my own.

The Clean Indie Reads I Love Audiobooks young adult giveaway is here and it will run from May 24th-31st. You can enter to win codes for 10 different YA audiobooks! Good luck!  

I am so excited to share with you that Best Friends…Forever? and Landry in Like are now available in paperback! I got so many questions about when they would be in print and they are finally here. It’s so great that these came out just as Landry in Like was given the Literary Classics Top Honors Youth Book Award for upper middle grade books. You can pick up your copies here and complete your Landry’s True Colors Series collection.

Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/gp/bookseries/B00YNT0FCM
Barnes & Noble: https://bit.ly/2jxUuUZ
Book Depository: bit.ly/30ajWEC
Indie Bound: https://www.indiebound.org/search/book?keys=Krysten+Lindsay%27
Books A Million: https://bit.ly/30h4UwZ
 
Watch the book trailers here:
Best Friends...Forever?: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RFp2fPFbvTQ
Landry in Like: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2CsGREKFQco&t=6s

Happy to have author N.J. Simmonds back on the blog to talk about her book, The Path Keeper. 

Tell us about your book

The Path Keeper is the first book of the Indigo Chronicles – an urban fantasy romance trilogy set in London. It centers around the forbidden love between Zac and Ella, a love that has played out over two-thousand years and many lifetimes. The story goes back and forth in time, showing how past decisions and mistakes can shape our destiny - culminating into one shocking discovery that will have them both fighting for their lives. Basically, can love ever be stronger than fate?

Beware that the book carries a trigger warning and, although spiritual and romantic, it can get very dark, sweary and adult in places. The book appeals to those who enjoyed reading The Time Traveller’s Wife, Outlander and even Game of Thrones…so plenty of adventure and love, but with a bit of grit.
 
What inspired you to write this book?

A mix of things. I’m originally from London, so it felt natural for me to set the book there (in fact, all the books I’ve written so far have been set in Lodnon). I also spent a year solo-traveling around Australia in my early twenties, and learning reiki and other holistic practices, so that definitely coloured a lot of the spiritual aspects of the book.

I wanted to write a love story, but I also wanted to explore that inexplicable (and sometimes unhealthy) intensity you can feel when you are drawn to someone you only just met. Having experienced a number of past life regressions myself, I decided to make Zac and Ella a couple who had loved one another many many times before, yet she never remembers. It grew from there, and before I knew it I was also writing about WW2 London and set scenes in Spain (where I was living at the time), including revelations about Ella’s family’s secrets too.
 
Who are some of your favorite authors?

I tend to have favourite books, not authors, as I don’t always like everything one person writes.

Saying that though, I read a lot of older YA fantasy and books set in London, and I adore the writing of Laini Taylor, Leigh Bardugo, Patrice Lawrence and V.E.Schwabs. Patrice writes ‘London teens’ impeccably and we need more books like hers in the world. As for the other three, their fantasy worlds and characters are absolutely flawless. Laini writes like poetry – I want to do magic like her, when I grow up.
 
Which book by another author do you with you had written?

Other than Harry Potter and its Unique World Domination? I’m not sure. None, to be honest. Every book ever written has the spirit of that author running through it, so I couldn’t possibly have been able to write anything other than the books I’ve written myself.

But I would love to see my fictional worlds live beyond the page and be embraced by fandoms that fully immerse themselves in that universe. Perhaps not to the extent of theme parks and Primark t-shirts, no one could ever predict just how far J K Rowling’s idea would go, but to see your book made into a film and then have people dress up as your Cosplay characters, write fan fiction and create artwork of your characters…that’s immense. As a writer, especially of fantasy, you have to be obsessed with the worlds you create – so there’s no bigger compliment than others being just as fanatical about it.
So what book do I wish I had written? Any of the books that inspire all of that. That’s the whole point of writing - not to be revered for your words, but to create a world others want to be part of.
 
Are there any particular songs that inspired your writing as you worked on this book?

I have had songs inspire entire book ideas, but not with The Path Keeper.
There are two songs from the 90s (my era) that remind me of the book though. Killing Me Softly by the Fugees reminds me of the scene when Zac plays the guitar for Felicity and she realizes who he is, causing all sorts of issues between her and her daughter, Ella.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oKOtzIo-uYw

And No Ordinary Love by Sade sums up the entire theme of the series – although Ella isn’t a mermaid, like Sade is in the video!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_WcWHZc8s2I


Who is your favorite character in your book and why? 
This is a tough question as they are all my babies. It’s like being asked who my favourite child is!

Of course Ella and Zac are special to me, but I feel like shaking them half the time and they ended up changing in ways I never anticipated. I also loved creating Dolly and Evie, I cried so much when I wrote their scenes, they were like real people to me.
But my very favourite character is Luci, although you won’t meet her until May 2020 when the second book, Son of Secrets, comes out. She’s a fascinating mix of misunderstood evil, maternal obsession, violent revenge, fiery wantoness and a huge, vulnerable heart.

So if The Path Keeper is a heady mix of passion, esoteric question and dark truths – then Son of Secrets is an even bigger, witchy, feminist punch to the guts.

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I started writing Dating the It Guy as a romance between a high school girl and the popular senior son of a senator, but I also wanted to include a storyline of having the main character deal with her grandpa’s recent dementia diagnosis. My grandfather moved in with us when I was Emme’s age because he could no longer live on his own. I decided to write about it years later just to get it out. In fact the first time I read a section of it to my mother, she left the room because it was too much to deal with. It’s tough to look back at memories like that sometimes.

So I finished the book, but set it aside for a while. Then two years ago, there was a pitch contest online and I decided to see if there would be any interest in this story. My publisher said she’d be interested in seeing it. At that time I had only published middle grade novels with her and wasn’t sure she’d want a young adult novel from me—after all there are a lot of publishers who aren’t fond of genre hopping. I remember when I sent it to my publisher I mentioned I hoped that this book would help someone else. My publisher wrote, “have I told you I love your writing?”

During the final editing process, I had my mom read the manuscript and told her, “I’m not sure you’ll like this one because it’s very personal, so be warned.” I’ll never forget her calling me and saying it was her favorite book I had written and she felt I handled those scenes with the grandpa with such sensitivity and love. She loved the sense of love and family in it and how I handled it with dignity and that meant so much.

I basically have a peace about what I wrote, but it was very hard putting this book out there. You’re taking a very personal experience and opening it up to criticism from strangers who haven’t walked in your shoes. What made it worthwhile was that the feedback on it has been wonderful as people love the humor and the family bonds. I think having the humor in it helps as that gets you through difficult times and it shows that you can continue to laugh even while going through a storm.

My main goal was wanting to show that dealing with dementia can deepen a relationship and you can love someone deeper when taking care of them. It was hard being one of my grandpa’s caregivers starting as a sophomore in high school until I was well into college, but I loved spending time with him.

Along the way,  I realized that if I went through that as a teen, then there were other teens who had taken on a caregiver role (along with their parents) to a family member. I wanted to give those teens a book that understood what they were going through. Sometimes knowing you’re not alone in a tough situation can help so much and I hope I did that for my readers.

Purchase Dating the It Guy

About the Author
Who knew all those embarrassing, cringe-y moments in middle school and high school could turn into a career? And who would have thought that daydreaming in math class would pay off down the road?
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​Krysten Lindsay Hager writes about friendship, self-esteem, fitting in, frenemies, crushes, fame, first loves, and values. She is the author of True Colors, Best Friends…Forever?, Next Door to a Star,  Landry in Like, Competing with the Star (The Star Series: Book 2), Dating the It Guy, and Can Dreams Come True?
Her debut novel, True Colors, won the Readers Favorite award for best preteen book and the Dayton Book Expo Bestseller Award for childen/teens. Competing with the Star is a Readers’ Favorite Book Award Finalist.  Krysten’s work has been featured in USA Today, The Flint Journal, the Grand Haven Tribune, the Beavercreek Current, the Bellbrook Times, Springfield News-Sun, Grand Blanc View, Dayton Daily News and on Living Dayton. ​

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