The PLAN A Woman in a PLAN B World by Debbie Taylor Williams

My Review:
If I was looking for a book to help me in living my life according to God's Plan then this would be one I would consider reading. Very well written and easy to read and follow. I totally enjoyed this book much better then another Plan B book I read here in the last few weeks. I say two thumbs up on this one. Scripture is what the author turns to at every turn in the plan. The author lets the reader know that even our PLAN B or C or D can be used and made into God's PLAN A if we allow Him to work His PLAN.

The book is divided into three parts~

• Live out Loud
• Love out Loud
• Laugh our Loud

There are discussion starter questions to help stimulate:
spiritual matters
provide forum to grow spiritually
help to encourage self and others

The author gives land mines that you may faces and ways to disarm the land mines as they come along.

PLAN B may not be your ideal, but God can still use it for His PLAN A if you will let Him.

(Kerrville, TX) – From the beginning of time women have dreamt about their “Plan A” - the perfect husband, cute children, immaculate home, size six wardrobe, prestigious job, fabulous friends. But it doesn’t take much of real life to set in before compromises, changes and disappointments manage to cloud those dreams. The Plan A Woman in a Plan B World: What to Do When Life Doesn’t Go According to Plan encourages women to re-evaluate the Plan B route and discover the blessings of God’s Plan A.

Using nine landmines that often claim the God-given plan for women, author/speaker Debbie Taylor Williams helps women reclaim hope and teaches them how to manage those sabotaging thoughts that claim many minds. Sprinkled with humor, an obvious love for God’s Word, and discussion starters for small group study, The Plan A Woman promises to help woman believe that God does have special plans for her, even in this Plan B world.

Debbie Taylor Williams is the founder of Hill Country Ministries, an organization dedicated to spreading God’s Word and ministering to women. Best known as a passionate biblical expositor, Debbie uses humor and practical illustrations to communicate spiritual truths to women throughout the nation. She is the author of Pray with Purpose, Live with Passion, Prayers of My Heart, and other books. She and her husband make their home in Kerrville, Texas. Learn more by visiting her popular Web site: www.debbietaylorwilliams.com

Interview Questions:

1. Your book focuses on living the Plan A life God designed specifically for you. What encouragement can you give for the woman who feels she's lived far too long on Plan B? Is there hope?

With God nothing is impossible! The Spirit who moved over the surface of the deep and created light and life is the same Spirit who abides in every believer. We can live the Plan A life God has for us because Christ lives in us and He is our hope of glory. Col 1:2

2. In your book you talk about hazardous landmines. What are a few common landmines women fall into?

Bitterness, discouragement, being fixated on the past, fear, feeling shaken by our circumstances, having expectations of how others should act are but a few of the land mines we can experience in a Plan B world. Left unattended, these land mines can cause devastating harm to us and others. God's Plan A is not for us to ignore these land mines, nor is it His plan for us to tip toe around them. Rather, He directs us to address and de-mine them. When we do, we can walk in bold assurance, confident of the ground upon which we walk. We're able to carry out the good works and plans God has for us; those that bring purpose and joy.

3. Talk about your P.R.A.Y. conferences and how women can learn more about your prayer ministry.

April 2, 2008 God woke me up at 4 a.m. and told me that I wasn't doing all that He wanted me to do. He then directed me to one of His Plans for my life: to take the principles from my book, Pray with Purpose — Live with Passion, to a church in every state in the United States. He told me to waive my speaking fee and travel expenses; that He had freely given me the keys to prayer that can change women's lives; and that I was to freely take them to my sisters. P.R.A.Y. with Passion Conference was birthed as a ministry of my non-profit ministry. It has been a joy to see God powerfully open doors through women who hear about the conference and pass the word to their women's ministry leader or event planner. Women are coming to salvation. Spiritual breakthroughs and repentance is taking place among believers. A "pink hearts" club is spreading across America, one composed of women and men who come forward and receive a heart on which they write how God has spoken to their hearts. And God is speaking. If I haven't been to your church/state, contact lauren@debbietaylorwilliams.com ministries, call toll free 888.815.9412, or visit my web site for more information www.debbietaylorwilliams.com

4. In your spare time, what do you enjoy doing?

I love being with my husband. Whether we go for a walk, watch the sunset, take a hike in the country, travel, play golf (sort of...I'm a beginner :), or go for a drive and breakfast on Saturday mornings, he's my honi and love of 35 years. Our two adult children and their spouses are so much fun to be with; as is our 17 month old grandson. Family, friends, sharing the Lord - for what more could we ask?

Something Extra:

The Plan A Woman in a Plan B World, by Debbie Taylor Williams

“You’re Not the Only One Who Missed Plan A” Chapter 1 excerpt, pages 23-27.

God Has an A+ Plan for Your Life

“I know the plans that I have you for you,” declares the Lord, “plans for welfare and not for calamity to give you a future and a hope.”Jeremiah 29:11

If ever a convention were held for women who feel they’ve missed Plan A, the room

would be filled. You’d undoubtedly hear comments like these:

• “My husband left me when our children were three and five,” one woman might say.
• “I’ve always dreamed of being married and having children. But I’m single with no hope of marriage.”
• “My Prince Charming turned into an abuser.”
• “I was fired from the company I built from the ground up.”
• “My child died of leukemia.”

Biblical Plan A Women in a Plan B World

Not only do we hear the voices of friends today, but we also can imagine the voices of those whose lives are recorded in the Bible. Perhaps if we caught each one at the moment she was hit with her Plan B, we might have heard something like the following:

• “Adam and I were supposed to live happily ever after in Eden. My oldest son was not supposed to kill his brother.”—Eve
• “I thought Abraham and I would have children when we were young.”—Sarah
• “I thought I’d live a quiet life. I never dreamed I’d become a queen—or that the lives of so many people would depend on me risking mine.”—Esther
• “My plan was to marry Joseph, then have children. Never did I imagine that I’d conceive a child by the Holy Spirit while a virgin. ”—Mary

As you can see, a long list of women in the Bible lived something other than what they must have considered their Plan A lives. No doubt, they appeared to be everyday women living ordinary lives: preparing meals; washing dishes and clothes; competing with other women; and experiencing problems with in-laws, children, infertility, sibling rivalry, and so on.

What they probably couldn’t see at the time, but what we have the opportunity to see now, is how God used them. Their lives counted for him and for eternity. Though at times some may have felt like appendages to their husbands and their husbands’ calling, while some may have felt lonely and isolated, God used each woman. Their names are recorded for eternity. God listened to these women’s prayers, intervened on their behalf, and met them where they were—in the desert, by a river, in a field, inside their homes. He met them in the midst of their daily responsibilities—drawing water, gleaning wheat, searching for infertility cures.

Did they know they weren’t rocking mere infants but future kings? Did they realize they weren’t just dressing babies but grooming leaders? Not simply singing psalms to toddlers but planting scriptures in the minds of prophets?

God had an A+ plan for these women even though they didn’t know it at the time. God has an A+ plan for your life too.

-Used by permission Leafwood Publishers

Visit Debbie's site here and come back and tell me something you learned, or something you liked about the site. I'll draw one comment to receive a copy of Debbie's book compliments of KCWC. Please US or Canada residents only. Drawing will be held on June 30th. Be sure to leave a way of contact.

Goes to

Get more information about this book here.

A copy of this book was provided for this review by KCWC.

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Mailbox Monday ~ June 21, 2010

Join Mailbox Monday meme
@ The Printed Page

Father's Day Wishes

Spotlight on: ME?

I've been featured at Winning Blogs head over there and check out the interview.
Thanks Megan.
click here

Faithful Reader study guides

Need a study guide for a book club or your own purpose. Check out Faithful Reader's study guide page. They have study guides for all kinds of books from A-Z. Check out other features they have while you're there.

Click here to go to Faithful Reader Study guide page.

Love Find You In Golden, NM by Lena Nelson Dooley

Head over to Scraps of Life
for this book tour.

Raising a Modern-Day Princess by Pam Farrel & Doreen Hanna

My Review:

This book is center is around making your daughters entrance into womanhood memorable with a rite-of-passage. It tells the hows and whys to have a rite-of-passage. Gives invaluable ideas and advice on how and when to hold RoP. Godly guidence and Biblical truths are used throughout the book. You can make your daughter walk into the future with courage and confidence. You'll find this book has all kinds of resources (journal, leader's guide and more) at Becoming a Modern day Princess. There is an appendix in the back of the book with worksheets and some ideas also. This program may be used individually or as a group. Make this program something your young lady will not forget. I must say this book isn't what I was expecting. It is geared toward a information book not a how-to book. It deals with how-to and why have a Rite-of-Passage not How to Raise a MDP. Very good if you're looking for hosting your daughter in a RoP night.


Every young girl dreams of that fairy-tale moment when she gets to be a princess. Whether she’s playing dress up, imagining herself as a Disney princess, or dreaming of her wedding day, deep in the heart of each girl is a desire to be loved and cherished—to feel like royalty.

Pam Farrel and Doreen Hanna have a passion to see young women learn what it means to be daughters of the King. Unfortunately, many girls around the world have lost their way. Statistics of teen pregnancies, bullying, and depression among girls are heartbreaking.

Pam and Doreen say, “Every girl deserves a mentor, a mom, and a memorable blessing—a rite of passage to womanhood—and a chance to be a woman who reflects God’s character and lives it out to leave a positive imprint in a world that desperately needs it.” Pam and Doreen’s new book, Raising a Modern-Day Princess (Focus on the Family/Tyndale House Publishers, January 2010), provides parents, mentors, and youth leaders with the tools they need to help the young women in their lives cross over into womanhood with a healthy self-image and a true understanding of who they are in Christ.

Central to this process is the rite of passage ceremony—a defining moment in which girls can be
blessed by significant adults in their lives when their family and community celebrate and support them as they enter womanhood. The book includes a step-by-step guide to creating this unique rite of passage ceremony and a special chapter for dads or father figures on writing a blessing for that special young lady. “Mentor Moments” at the end of each chapter reinforces the importance of supporting and encouraging adolescent girls during the most formative years of their lives.

Written in the same tradition as Robert Lewis’s Raising a Modern-Day Knight, which sold over
246,000 copies, Raising a Modern-Day Princess encourages parents and those who work with teen girls to raise up a generation of women who recognize their worth as daughters of the King of kings.

Pam Farrel is a relationship specialist, an international speaker, and the author of over 25 books, including the best-selling Men Are Like Waffles—Women Are Like Spaghetti. Pam has been a pastor’s wife and director of women’s ministries, and she currently serves as president of Seasoned Sisters (seasonedsisters.com). Her other books include Red-Hot Monogamy, The 10 Best Decisions a Woman Can Make, and The 10 Best Decisions Every Parent Can Make. Pam and her husband, Bill, write a newspaper and magazine column on relationships and are frequent guests on shows like Focus on the Family. The Farrels live in El Cajon, California.

Doreen Hanna is founder and president of Treasured Celebrations Ministries (treasuredcelebrations.org). She is the creator of the Becoming a Modern-Day Princess curriculum, a biblically based rite-of-passage program for teenage girls. Doreen is a faculty member and motivational speaker for CLASS (Christian Leaders, Authors & Speakers Seminars) and has been a women’s Bible study teacher and trained biblical counselor for more than 25 years. She was a contributing author to Refined by Fire, compiled by Anthony and Crystal Obey, and Families Can Bounce Back, compiled by Diana L. James. Doreen was also an author/mentor for the 2008 Moments of Grace devotional book. Doreen and her husband live in Santa Fe, New Mexico.

A copy of Raising a Modern-Day Princess was provided for review by
Tyndle House Publishing

Watcha Reading ~ A Cousin's Challenge

This is how "Whatcha Reading Wednesdays" works this week...

Go to page 1 type in the first sentence. If it is a spoiler at all be sure to put **Spoiler Alert** at the top of your comment (like if the selection announces the death of an integral character or something).

Link up over at Busy Moms Who Love to Read

Taken from Wanda E. Brunstetter's A Cousin's Challenge:

Quiet darkness met Jolene Yoder as she stepped into Aunt Dorcas’s kitchen.

A Tailor-Made Bride by Karen Witemeyer

Blog tour for A Tailor-Made Bride by Karen Witemeyer is posted at
Scraps of Life

Teaser Tuesday ~ They Almost Always Come Home

Teaser Tuesdays is a weekly bookish meme, hosted by MizB of Should Be Reading. Anyone can play along, so I thought I would play for fun! Just do the following:

• Grab your current read
• Open to a random page
• Share two (2) “teaser” sentences from somewhere on that page
• BE CAREFUL NOT TO INCLUDE SPOILERS! (make sure that what you share doesn’t give too much away! You don’t want to ruin the book for others!)
• Share the title & author, too, so that other TT participants can add the book to their TBR Lists if they like your teasers!

Frank insists we take fishing equipment-not for pleasure, but for survival. the word survival scares me. It's hard not knowing exactly how long we'll be gone. We've told our loved ones no more than a week... Give or take a day, we three have one week to conduct our search. I can't dwell too long on the idea that finding anything more than a corpse would be a miracle after this much time anyway.

p. 58, They Almost Always Come Home by Cynthia Ruchti

See this book's tour, my review and a giveaway here.

May/June mystery challenge update

Book my daughter has read

Book Description

Cherry Ames is back, just as you remember her! The books are just as you remember them, retaining the same look, feel, and sense of adventure and patriotism as when they were first published. With fully illustrated color covers and a soft-finished hardcover format just like the originals, these books will transport you back to the days when you were reading about this spunky young nurse. Series editor and registered nurse Harriet Foreman was inspired by and remains a devoted fan of Cherry Ames: " ...I was going to follow in her footsteps and become a nurse-nothing else would do."

The war is over, and Cherry is sent home. Her new assignment is working in a veteran's hospital, where she finds her biggest challenge in raising the spirits of men who have lost arms, legs, or other body parts. Will they be welcomed back to their families and able to work again? Jim Travers, the woodworker who has lost a leg and was the sole support of his elderly mother, isn't convinced. But he finds he is of critical assistance to Cherry as she tracks the mysterious thief who has robbed the Veteran's Centeer of a medicine that can help a small boy recover from a deadly disease.

April's post here
March's post here
January's post here

Seeds of Summer by Deborah Vogts

Head over to my Scraps of Life site for this book's blog tour. Click here.

Mailbox Monday ~ June 14, 2010

Join Mailbox Monday meme
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Lauraine Snelling goes on stage...

For those that live close or are going to be in the area of Drayton, ND this one's for you.
The theatrical is back again this year at the
OxCart Days.
Check out the schedule here.

Finding Jeena by Miralee Ferrell

This week, the Christian Fiction Blog Alliance is introducing Finding Jeena Kregel Publications (March 8, 2010) by Miralee Ferrell

ABOUT THE AUTHOR:

In October 2007 Kregel Publications published The Other Daughter with excellent reviews. The Romantic Times Review magazine gave it Four out of Four and a half stars, with a very strong review. Two different major motion picture studios are currently considering the book as a possible family movie, and my second book in the series (Past Shadows) is on my publishers desk being reviewed for a possible contract offer now.

In February of 2009, Love Finds You in Last Chance, California was published by Summerside Press and Finding Jeena released in March 2010 from Kregel Publications.

Miralee Ferrell lives in Washington with Allen, her husband of more than 37 years, ans has two grown children. She serves on staff at her local church ans is actively involved in ministry to women.

ABOUT THE BOOK

Jeena Gregory thought she’d made it. She has everything a woman could ask for and a budding career promises more. But when rumors around town cast her boss in a shady light, Jeena starts to question her employer’s integrity. Was she wrong to trust this man and this job?

When the boss disappears, salaries go unpaid, and Jeena overhears several hush-hush phone calls, she realizes her carefully crafted world is crumbling. Shaken to the core at the threat of losing everything, Jeena is suddenly confronted with her prejudices─and with a God she had long forgotten.

If you would like to read an excerpt of Finding Jeena, go HERE.

They Almost Always come Home by Cynthia Ruchti

Read to the end of this post there is a giveaway.

(Wausau, WI) – At the foundation of each relationship resides the need to know love can survive even when feelings fade. In Cynthia Ruchti’s debut novel, They Almost Always Come Home, readers feel the desperation of this foundational yearning in a marriage clearly pulling loose from its moorings. Compounded by other issues—an unrewarding career and mismatched dreams—it’s enough to drive a man into the arms of the Canadian wilderness. When Greg Holden doesn’t return home from a wilderness canoe trip, his wife Libby wrestles with survivor guilt, a new layer of grief, and the belief that she was supposed to know how to fix her marriage. She planned to leave him—but how can she leave a man who’s no longer there? He was supposed to go fishing, not missing.

Libby has to find him before she can discover how their marriage ends. She plunges into the wilderness on an adventurous and risky manhunt, unsure what she will do if she finds him…or if she doesn’t. She expects to meet hardship, discomfort, and danger in the wilderness. She doesn’t expect to face the stark reality of her spiritual longing and a faint, but steady pulse that promises hope for reviving her marriage. If Greg’s still alive.

They Almost Always Come Home provides a glimpse into common, however uncomfortable, marital conflicts. Cynthia weaves a page-turning story, suspense building scene by scene. Her characters mirror ordinary people, living real-to-life situations, allowing readers to relate and sort through a myriad of emotions and life decisions. If fiction can contain adventure, riveting self-awareness, and romance all between the same covers, this is the book!

My Review:
I loved this book. I say two thumbs up for Ruchti's first novel. It kept me wanting to know more; definitely a page turner, attention keeper. Loved the way Ruchti tooks the reader from Libby's view of things to Greg's. The transitions were smooth and not choppy. However, most of the book is written from Libby's perspective. I'd say the theme of the book was perseverance. I can't wait to read more of Rachti's books.

1. How would you describe your book?

The tagline for the book is “She’d leave her husband…if she could find him.”

When Libby’s husband Greg doesn’t return from a two-week canoe trip to the Canadian wilderness, the authorities write off his disappearance as an unhappy husband’s escape from an oatmeal marriage and mind-numbing career. Their marriage might have survived if their daughter Lacey hadn’t died and if Greg hadn’t been responsible. Libby enlists the aid of her wilderness-savvy father-in-law and her faith-walking best friend to help her search for clues to her husband’s disappearance. What the trio discovers in the wilderness search upends Libby’s assumptions about her husband and rearranges her faith.

It’s my prayer that this fictional adventure story and emotional journey will reveal its own hope-laden clues for those struggling to survive or longing to exit what they believe are uninspiring marriages. How can a woman survive a season or a lifetime when she finds it difficult to like the man she loves?

2. How were you different as a writer and as a person when you finished writing They Almost Always Come Home?

This book changed me in a profound way. It forced me to take a more honest look at myself and my reactions to crises so I could write Libby’s character with authenticity. Libby is a composite of many women. I haven’t experienced what she did, but I identify with some of her struggles and longings, as I hope my readers will. I see my friends in her eyes and know that her tears aren’t hers alone. Her shining moments feed my courage. Libby speaks for me and for many others when she discovers that she is stronger than she realized and weaker than she wanted to admit.

Writing her story was a journey for the author as much as for the character.

3. What did you feel the tug on your heart to become a writer?

My journey toward a lifetime of writing began by reading books that stirred me, changed me, convinced me that imagination is a gift from an imaginative Creator. As a child, I read when I should have been sleeping…and still do. I couldn’t wait for the BookMobile (library on wheels) to pull up in front of the post office in our small town and open its arms to me. Somewhere between the pages of a book, my heart warmed to the idea that one day I too might tell stories that made readers stay up past their bedtimes.

4. What books line your bookshelves?

My bookshelves—don’t ask how many!—hold a wide variety of genres. The collection expands faster than a good yeast dough. I’m a mood reader, grabbing a light comedy one day and a literarily rich work the next. Although I appreciate well-written nonfiction, I gravitate toward an emotionally engaging contemporary women’s fiction story.

Cynthia Ruchti writes stories of “hope that glows in the dark.” She writes and produces The Heartbeat of the Home, a syndicated drama/devotional radio broadcast, and is editor for the ministry’s Backyard Friends magazine. She also serves as current president of American Christian Fiction Writers. Cynthia married her childhood sweetheart, who tells his own tales of wilderness adventures.

Something Extra From the Author's Heart

Ten years ago, my husband almost didn’t come home. His canoe adventure with our son Matt soured on Day Two when Bill grew violently ill from what we presume was either pancreatitis or a gall bladder attack. He’s an insulin-dependent diabetic, so any grave illness is a threat. One in the middle of the Canadian wilderness is morgue material.

With no satellite phone with which to call for help, Matt took turns caring for his father and watching the shore for other canoeists happening past their hastily constructed campsite. The few other canoes were headed deeper into the remote areas of the park, not on their way out. None had a satellite phone. And none of them were doctors.

As my husband grew sicker, his diabetes went nuclear. He couldn’t eat, yet needed insulin because his liver thought it should help out by dumping vast quantities of sugar into his system. Even in a hospital setting, the situation would have been difficult to control, and the nearest hospital was light years away across vast stretches of water and woodland, through peopleless, roadless wilderness.

Our son stretched a yellow tarp across the rocks on shore and wrote S.O.S. with charcoal from a dead fire. He scratched out countless notes on pieces of notebook paper torn from their trip journal:

Send rescue! My dad is deathly ill.

Read the rest of the story at the KCWC BLOG

Blog Tour Giveaway Includes:

North Pak 20 inch cinch sack (lime)
Day Runner journal
Canoe Brand wild rice
Canada's brand blueberry jam
Coleman 60-piece mini first aid kit
Wood canoe/paddle shelf ornament
Six original photography notecards from video trailer
"Hope" hanging ornament
Mini Coleman "lantern" prayer reminder

One commenter's name will go into the drawing for the above prize. Please leave me a comment telling me if you like to go camping? what is your favorite part of camping? Where do you like to go? Favorite anything about camping I don't care, a tip something. Drawing will be held on June 18th. Be sure to leave a way of contact. Please US residents only.


A copy of this book was provided for this review by KCWC.

This blog tour is through: