Hide & seek

A very good older contemporary story based on a young woman getting out of prison and trying to find her way in society again. Her father-in-law is determined to track her down and keep her from doing so, and it's easy to feel empathy for her as she does everything she can to get free of her past.

While I did really enjoy it, I found it to be quite a bit weaker than the first story in terms of details, especially in the area of Luke's restoration of the Chalmers House. In the last book he was awarded the contract to restore the house, but now it's been over a year and he's just now getting started. Not a smart thing for an old house in critical condition, but also not likely for an owner who needs an office space for his business and has to wait for Luke to finish. The roof has just been put on and the termites have just now been sprayed. Where it really lost me was the whole scene where the floor caves in so someone can fall right through, and Darcy says, “Oh, I think I found where the termites were getting in.” What? Termites are pretty easy to see by the time they weaken a floor enough to cave, and with people stomping in and out of that room, someone would definitely notice the spongy floor, and that repair has to be done before the walls get painted. In short, this guy knows nothing about his own business, and it would have totally made the story better if the author had really researched home remodel/restoration before writing some of these scenes.

I also felt that the ending was too abrupt and I wish the author could have made it into a long-running series, since there's plenty of material in this small town.

I really loved the strong emphasis on faith and the small-town life. It was also fun to see them talking about not having A/C systems except for window units, fluffing a hairdo by blow-drying upside down, and not using cell phones or computers for anything. It's barely in this century with a 2000 publication date, and the step back to that sort of thing was neat.