Book Review of A Log Cabin Christmas Collection

Review: Christmas Traps and Trimmings

Title: Christmas Traps and Trimmings

Author: Kelly Eileen Hake

Category: Historical Romance

Publication Date:  09/01/2011
Publisher: Barbour Publishing, Inc. 
Pages of this story: 46
ISBN#  1616264780

Authors Note:

The quake depicted in this story was the first of the sequence of New Madrid Earthquakes, a series of three major quakes that took place December 16, 1811, January 23, 1812, and February 7, 1812. By far the largest-known quakes east of the Rocky Mountains, historians and geologists conservatively rank them as probable 7.7 on the Richter scale--seismographs not having been invented yet in 1811. 

     The incident depicted in this novella, the quake on December 16, 1811, occurred at roughly 2:15 a.m. and was followed by a large aftershock at approximately 7:00 a.m. The more specific details, such as shifting chimneys, the eerie stillness and the strange luminescence, the rushing rumbling roar preceding the shaking, clear streams giving off the odor of eggs and poisoning wildlife, are pulled from firsthand Kentucky eyewitness accounts in journals of the period.  

     While no single account mentions all such details, they are each accurate and compiled to give a more complete picture of the experience and devastation of the quakes.  

Page: 152  At the end of the story.

9 Historical Romances during American Pioneer Christmases

I will be doing these nine stories individually.   

 About the Author

Kelly Eileen Hake is a reader favorite of Barbour's Heartsong Presents series, where she has released several books. A credentialed Secondary English teacher in California, she is pursing her MA in Writing Popular Fiction. Known for her own style of witty, heartwarming historical romance, Kelly is currently writing the Prairie Promises trilogy, her first full-length novels. She has been writing since she could hold a pen and was first published at the tender age of eighteen. 

My Thoughts

As I said in my previous reviews of this book, I loved this collection of stories. Each one of them are amazing by themselves, but by putting them all together in this way kept me reading from one to the next with ease. 

So for the third story: Christmas Traps and Trimmings

Kelly's  characters in this story are amazing. She has a way of getting you really involved in her story. You feel for each character, and can actually put yourself in their position. 

And then to find out that the quake actually happened.. Wow... 

Wilhemina Montrose, an heiress to the Montrose fortune, but she finds herself not wanting to do what she is being told she must after her fathers death. She and her companion Belinda find themselves boarding a ship from London, England heading to America. 

Will she find what she is looking for in America? Will Belinda and Wilhemina even get to America? Find out by reading this amazing story of trials and tribulation of a young lady and the man she finds to hopefully give her and Belinda safe haven... (A Home)

If I could give the rating for this story that I would like to give it, it would be Six Clocks... But my rating only goes to Five Clocks...  A must read!!!

My Rating

Five Clocks!!!!