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Chautona Havig

Chautona Havig

Using story to connect YOU to the Master Storyteller

What Is So Great about this Popular Mail-Order Bride Series?

by Chautona Havig · 1 Comment

In today's episode, I tell about Westward Home and Hearts Mail-Order Bride series featuring mail-order brides with a twist of suspense.  via @chautonahavig

I suppose you could say that mail-order brides have been a thing since the Garden of Eden–if you change the spelling just a smidge.

In today’s episode, I tell about a large, multi-author series featuring mail-order brides with a twist of suspense.  The Westward Home and Hearts Mail-Order Bride series offers stories of men and women who are broken, under threat, or hiding for reasons only the story will tell.

Westward Home

Note: links may be affiliate links that provide me with a small commission at no extra expense to you.

What Is So Great about this Popular Mail-Order Bride Series?

In a world that romanticizes the mail-order brides of the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, I always have trouble ignoring the ugly side. Just like every child who was sent from London to the English countryside as part of Operation Pied Piper during WWII didn’t get an idyllic experience with “The Professor, every bride didn’t have a happily-ever-after. Enter the Westward Home and Hearts Mail-Order Bride Series.

As of the recording of this episode, there are twenty-one books available (either to read or on preorder) by eleven different authors.  They are also available in Kindle Unlimited, so for those with that subscription, we’re talking a lot of books for no extra expense!

The brain-child of author Elaine Manders whose book Lacy’s Legacy kicks off the series, all the books are stand-alone novels or novellas but… there’s one thread that ties them together.  Mildred Crenshaw, the owner and genius behind the Westward Home and Hearts Matrimonial Agency.

What can you expect from this series?

Oh, so much. Lost loves mistaken identities bad experiences with the process, and love.  Lots of happily-ever-afters despite the suspense, danger, and more.

This is the element that convinced me to join a couple of years ago, and this is finally the year for my book.  I had planned to publish in February, but life gets ugly sometimes and refuses to cooperate. So, I didn’t do it. Another author, Margaret Tanner, stepped up and released her book early just so the series could continue to have a new book releasing every month! I haven’t read that book, Saffron’s Savior, but I intend to.  I did read her June release Harriet’s Heartache, and it has a unique premise involving a strange cult.

Penelope's PursuitMy book Penelope’s Pursuit releases June 29 and I’m so excited!

I’ve long dreamed of writing three different mail-order bride stories, and now I have the perfect opportunity.

Penelope’s Pursuit covers the difficult topic of human and sex trafficking with the mail-order bride being the means of doing it. The book tackles three particularly difficult topics, prostitution, opium dependence, and suicide, but despite these heavy topics, the book isn’t heavy itself. And of course, as historical romance, it definitely has its happily-ever-after.

I have two more planned, as I said. Verity’s Valley takes place in the same fictional world as Penelope and involves a farmer who would be considered on the Autism spectrum today.  Felicia’s Foibles examines what might have happened if young ladies of a small town back east got “westward fever” and created a dearth of marriageable women in their town.

After reading all the synopses of all the books, I do want to read them all, but I believe i’ll start with:

  • Lacy’s Legacy
  • Ruby’s Risk
  • Lydia’s Lot
  • Rose’s Rescue
  • Sarah’s Surrender

You can find out more about the books, the authors, and even fun giveaways in the Westward Home and Hearts Reader Group on Facebook.

I know this episode was a bit of a plug for a series I’m a part of, but even if I wasn’t, I’d have wanted to chat about it. I do hope you’ll give some of the books a read and let me know which were your favorites!

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If you’d like to be on the Because Fiction Podcast, please go HERE and submit your topic idea! I’d love to hear about it.

 

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Comments

  1. Catherine G says

    June 28, 2021 at 12:28 pm

    This series sounds interesting and an upgraded version of the traditional mail order brides. I’m looking forward to reading them.

    Reply

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The Because Fiction Podcast

The Because Fiction Podcast
The Because Fiction Podcast

Taking the pulse of Christian fiction

Episode 162: A Chat with Author, Nancy Naigle
byChautona Havig

Hey, we’re back after a couple of weeks of vacation, and boy did I need it. And, have I got a fabulous interview for you. Nancy Naigle and I talked about her books, her most recent release, What Remains True as well as her Christmas books and the one I’m most anxious to read, The Shell Collector. Listen in and learn about what Nancy says about this bet she has going on in What Remains True. Great stuff!

Note: links may be affiliate links that provide me with a small commission at no extra expense to you.

Need a Great Romantic Read to Wind Up Your Summer Reads?

As I said in the podcast, a while back, someone told me I’d LOVE The Shell Collector–one of those people who recommends books you HAVE to read if they say you do.  So I bought it and it’s been sitting on my shelf ever since. Well, now it’s on my GoodReads shelf, and I’m about to start it (and I optimistically thought I’d be done with it by the time this episode released. Oh, me of too much faith in myself and my time management!)

Author of over thirty books, not to mention a bestselling author who also has movies made of her novels (And The Shell Collector has been optioned! EEEP!), Nancy loves to write Christmas books and small-town stories. Seriously, as we talked, I felt like she was talking about me half the time. We’re so very alike in so many ways. It was fun.

Nancy also pointed out that her first books (if you go WAY back) are not Christian fiction and are a bit spicier than she prefers to write and definitely more than she writes today. So be warned there, but she did assure us that they are all closed-door books.

What Remains True by Nancy Naigle

One woman wants to win a bet. One man wants to become a rodeo champion. One little girl may give them both something even better—from USA Today bestselling author Nancy Naigle.

“A commitment-phobic rodeo star and a divorcée with secrets find love in this wholesome romance. . . . As uplifting as it is sweet.”—Publishers Weekly

Working at a little shop on Main Street in a small town is exactly the break that executive Merry Anna Foster needs following her divorce. She’s made a bet with her ex-husband that she can live on the amount of money she’s giving him in alimony. If she can do it, then Kevin will have to stop complaining and leave her alone. But after three months of this new life, will she even want to leave Antler Creek?

Adam Locklear, bull rider and owner of the local feedstore, is having the best year of his rodeo career. He’s also a bit distracted by the pretty new neighbor living in his old bunkhouse. But Adam has no time for matters of the heart. He’s got his future all mapped out, and that future doesn’t involve a woman just yet. It doesn’t involve parenting a little girl either. However, Carly Fowler still suddenly leaves five-year-old Zan—the daughter Adam didn’t know he had—in his care.

Is it possible that the future holds a life even better than what Merry Anna and Adam had each dreamed of? One that includes both tenderness and even love—not just for each other but for Zan too?

You can learn more about Nancy’s books and movies on her WEBSITE.

Oh, and PSST… I’m loving the audiobook of this one!

Like to listen on the go? You can find Because Fiction Podcast at:

  • Apple 
  • Castbox 
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  • and more!
Episode 162: A Chat with Author, Nancy Naigle
Episode 162: A Chat with Author, Nancy Naigle
August 9, 2022
Chautona Havig
Episode 161: A Chat with Christian Women's Fiction Robin W. Pearson
July 26, 2022
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Episode 160: A Chat with Liz Johnson about The Last Way Home
July 22, 2022
Chautona Havig
Episode 159: A Chat with Biblical Fiction Author, Mesu Andrews
July 19, 2022
Chautona Havig
A Chat with Historical Christian Fiction Author, Stephanie Landsem
July 12, 2022
Chautona Havig
Episode 157: A Chat with Historical Christian Fiction Author, Lynn Austin
July 8, 2022
Chautona Havig
Episode 156: The Fragrance of Violets by Susan K. Beatty
July 5, 2022
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Episode 155: Chatting with Heather Day Gilbert & Jen Cudmore
July 1, 2022
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Episode 154: A Chat with Romantic Suspense Author, Sami A. Abrams
June 28, 2022
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Episode 153: A Chat with Historical Author, Tracie Peterson
June 21, 2022
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