About the Book
Book Title: Gone to Texas
Author: Caryl McAdoo
Genre: Historical Romance
Release date: September 6, 2018
Can beauty truly come from ashes?
Deception drives seventeen souls to hard choices. Either stay on the land they thought they’d bought or heed the lure of free land in the faraway wilderness of a new Republic. Rife with peril and hardship, three families knit together by blood and friendship head out with a widowed man, daughter, and his slave, gambling everything they own on the prospect of land ownership and working it together. Does friendship pave a way to marriage? Can puppy-love survive through a harrowing journey to blossom into a forever lover? With duress at every turn, can the clan stay together all the way to Texas and accomplish their goals?
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MY REVIEW:
“The truth would be the right answer of course. But the truth… it was so hard.” This could have been the statement of any of the half-dozen or so of the travelers whose lives we see in Caryl McAdoo’s Gone to Texas novel.
Having been sold land in Tennessee by a shyster, a close-knit group of three families decides to reject the idea of sharecropping and head for the wide-open, cheap land of Texas. What starts out as a party atmosphere of friends and relatives becomes a journey of growth and change for many of the group.
While the immediate focus is the young love between Alicia and Flynn, we are treated to see other, more mature loves, as well as familial loves and friendship, loves. Trust has to be both earned and given, and characters are shown both in their best light and at their worst. Forgiveness and mercy are huge themes replayed many times. How sweet it is to see them displayed, especially with certain people we might say don’t deserve those kindnesses. The gospel is clearly laid out.
I liked the support and pride especially one character showed in her loved one’s dreams and plans. I think that kind of support glorifies God and enables the spouse to do great things.
I found the novel hard to enter into at first because the colloquialism was so thick and used without a break for a while. As I kept reading, this improved, and I was able to better enjoy the book. At one other point, there were numerous typos to the point I had to reread sentences and put in my own pronouns to make sense of what was really happening.
Bottom line: I enjoyed this book and will recommend it to others. I received a complimentary copy of this book from the author and Celebrate Lit. This in no way affects my opinions and I was not required to leave a positive review.
About the Author
Top priority is God’s glory, and that’s exactly what Caryl McAdoo prays her stories will bring. To entertain and draw readers into a closer walk with Him is next. A quick check of stars and reviews attest to the success of this award-winning, best-selling author—all by the Father’s faithfulness. Besides writing, she loves singing praises, including the new songs He gives her! Visit her YouTube channel. Ron, her high school sweetheart husband won her heart fifty-two years ago, and they share four children and seventeen grandsugars. Ron and Caryl live o
n thirty-four acres ‘The Peaceable’ in the woods south of Clarksville, seat of Red River County in far Northeast Texas and wait expectantly for God to open the next door.
Guest Post from Caryl
As much as I hated leaving the Buckmeyers, Baylors, and Nightingales and the Red River Valley, I loved starting this fresh Family Saga series with all new characters! GONE TO TEXAS is Book One of the Cross Timber Romances and features three families—the O’Neals, Van Zandts, and Worleys—joined by blood and friendship through Liberty O’Neal. Laud Worley is her little brother and Mallory Van Zandt, her best friend since school days.
Together, they’d traveled south to settle in Tennessee and were about to harvest their first cotton crop that fall in 1840 when they discovered the deed to their land—the land they’d spent all their pooled savings on—was forged and no-good.
The legal owner graciously allows them to stay through harvest, taking his portion of their labor and cottonseed. At the gin, Seve Van Zandt hears rumors of Texas, a new Rebublic out west, offering free land to pioneers willing to tame its wildlands. This first story—book one—is all about their journey to the new country filled with hope and dreams.
A hired widower who with his daughter and slave helped harvest the clan’s cotton asked to join them on their journey, and so, on that fateful September morn, seventeen souls set out after they hung a hand painted sign on one of the cabins they left behind. “Gone to Texas”!
Another very special thing about this novel, one hundred twelve thousand words—about three hundred fifty pages, is that it is also book one in a brand new collection! The Thanksgiving Books and Blessings Collection that includes stories from eight other authors besides me: Lena Nelson Dooly, Heather Blanton, Kristin Holt, Kit Morgan, Suzette Williams, Pauline Creeden, George McVey, and Lynette Sowell!
All nine books will have Thanksgiving Dinner with family around the table, giving thanks to God for all his blessings. I’ve noticed many series launched in December, but Thanksgiving is my favorite. I love giving thanks to the Lord!
And as always, I pray my story gives God glory, and that its readers will be drawn closer to Him through it. He blesses and highly favors me daily. I cannot thank or praise Him enough!
Thank you, too, for reading my stories, reviewing my stories, and participating in the most AWESOME CELEBRATE LIT‘s Blog Tour!!
Blog Stops
A Baker’s Perspective, September 11
Captive Dreams Window, September 12
proud to be an autism mom, September 12
Inklings and notions, September 13
Luv’N Lambert Life, September 13
cherylbbookblog, September 14
D’S QUILTS & BOOKS, September 14
Locks, Hooks and Books, September 15
Debbie’s Dusty Deliberations, September 15
Janices book reviews, September 16
Abba’s prayer warrior princess, September 17
Carpe Diem, September 17
Creating Romance, September 18
Madeline Clark, September 18
Margaret Kazmierczak, September 19
The Mimosa Blossom, September 20
Babbling Becky L’s Book Impressions, September 20
Back Porch Reads, September 21
Bibliophile Reviews, September 22
Texas Book-aholic, September 23
Godly Book Reviews, September 24
Bigreadersite, September 24
Giveaway
To celebrate her tour, Caryl is giving away
GRAND PRIZE : $50 Amazon Gift Card
1st Prize: THREE Choice-of-Caryl’s Titles (print–US only or eBook)
2nd-4th: ebook of JOHN DAVID’S CALLING
5th-7th: print copy VOW UNBROKEN
8th-10th: $5 Amazon gift cards!!
Be sure to comment on the blog stops to earn nine extra entries into the giveaway! Click the link below to enter. https://promosimple.com/ps/d1a6/gone-to-texas-celebration-tour-giveaway
Babbling Becky L’s Book Impressions 