You might enjoy reading Nancy Lavo’s compelling novels. I found these three especially refreshing. Five Stars each!
The Place Where You Belong
Hallie just might be able to revitalize the town and a heart.
Public Relations specialist Hallie Nichols returns home to Village Green, determined to stay just long enough to make living arrangements for her aging mother while avoiding the rejection and painful memories of her past—specifically her ex-boyfriend, banker Trey Gunther.
Irked to find Hallie unrepentant for the hurt she caused him ten years ago, Trey dishes a little payback by mandating she meet with him weekly about her mother’s finances. His plan backfires when his old attraction to Hallie flares. He’s the one suffering, and worse, he discovers Hallie may hold the solution to his beloved town’s woes.
If he swallows his pride and asks for her help, can he convince her to put aside her animosity toward him and the town? Will their efforts be enough to save Village Green?
My Thoughts: You gotta love a small-town banker who drives a pickup. Banker Trey stays in his Texas village while old flame Hallie flees to the city for an education and a PR firm of her own. Hallie returns home to find a suitable place for her cantankerous mother who has had a stroke. She faces homecoming blues, painful memories, and that she’ll never be the favored daughter as her older sister is. Trey and Hallie reluctantly work together to save their hometown, discovering wisdom and forgiveness along the way. A heart-warming story for a woman who comes from an Iowa town of less than 1000 souls.
Single mother and baker Eden Lambert arrives in quaint Village Green looking for a home for herself and her 18-month-old son, Jake. Her warm welcome by her elderly hostess, Mary Jo Piermont, is offset by the cold disdain of Mary Jo’s self-appointed protector, Joe Wolfe.
At first, the long-legged blonde and her kid look like trouble to Joe. Mary Jo saved the builder’s life years ago, and he will do no less for the woman he considers a surrogate mother. But as he keeps an eye on the unwanted guests, Joe’s suspicions soon become replaced by admiration and respect for Eden’s resolve and dedication to her son. With his background of abuse and abandonment, Joe is aware of the dangers facing the vulnerable and wants better for Eden and Jake. He offers her a business arrangement—he’ll build her a bakery, and she can run it.
As they join forces to start the bakery, can they overcome the scars of the past to find a recipe for love?
My thoughts: Eden is a single mom, a college dropout, admits to making a lot of stupid decisions. She and her son Jake flee her mother’s chaotic home in Florida and head out of town, hoping to find a place where they can belong. The small town of Village Green, Texas, beckons them, where they meet the upscale Aunt Bee named Mary Jo, a widow. Having a gift of bringing people into family, she insists that Eden at least tour her lovely old home, then talks her into staying overnight.
Two younger men keep an eye on Mary Jo–her greedy nephew and Joe Wolfe, whom she and her husband mentored as a boy but who has the “manners of a warthog” when it comes to this single mother with a questionable background welcomed into her home.
Nancy Lavo writes delightful faith-based love stories. This one is especially refreshing.
The ebook for this A Slice of Paradise is on sale through this weekend!
A Calling Worth the Risk
Noah Speer’s fast track to the pulpit of the largest church in the South stalls when he’s sent to Village Green to aid the aged local pastor. Frustrated with the interruption to his career and desperate for a sympathetic ear, he turns to newcomer Dr. Emily Cutler.
A woman who’s been praised for her good heart and sharp mind but never her looks, Dr. Cutler is delighted when the handsome celebrity pastor seeks out her company, even though she knows it’s only because she’s one of the few single women in town under the age of seventy. She determines to enjoy the brief time with him, a pleasant diversion while she’s building her medical practice.
As their unlikely friendship grows, Noah is challenged to take a hard look at himself and the course he’s plotted out for his life. Is the path he’s pursuing the one God has for him? And where does the doctor fit in?
My Thoughts: Noah Speers is a gifted preacher from a tony neighborhood in a big city, handsome and groomed to become the head pastor of the largest church in the south with a TV ministry. He’s asked by his grandfather, who started the church, to help out an old seminary friend with back trouble. What a shock! The town is so small and quaint and he wasn’t there to preach but to do home visits to mostly elderly widows.
Noah doesn’t do quaint. He stays with the older man but can’t even help with cooking. He meets the plain Dr. Emily Cutler, who recently opened a medical practice to pay off medical school bills. But their attraction to each other would never work out. Unless both prayed to follow God’s will for their lives.
Nancy Lavo’s stories of small-town Texas are sweet and compelling and would be delightful as gifts.
A love of happy endings and a fiction writing course at the community college started award-winning author Nancy Lavo on the road to publication. She’s published her lighthearted romances in both the traditional and inspirational market. She and her husband live in the great state of Texas.
You may follow Nancy on her Instagram page.
Here is her Amazon Author Page.