Lynette Cunningham was a flight attendant without a job. She was returning home after a long period of time away to see her father. She had been a suspect in a bank robbery in her small town, Freedom, NC when she was a teenager. Nothing was ever proven and no arrest was ever made, but suspicion seemed to hang in the air whenever she was in town. Now, she had come back because her father had been murdered by an arsonist and she wanted some answers and needed to clean out his stuff and get out of town. She had no intention of staying in a place where she had such unpleasant memories. In truth, they weren't all unpleasant but she hated the gossip of some of the people in town.

Price Fletcher was the young minister in town. He was attracted to Lynette and he wanted to help her find her way back to Christ. She had lost her faith when the bank robbery incident happened and she didn't believe that God really cared about her. Price was determined to show her that she had a God who loved her very much and was very interested in her life. He was also very interested in getting to know Lynette better and hoped to have her in his life for a long time to come.

There were quite a few accidents and mishaps that seemed like too many to just be coincidence or clumsiness. You'll have to read the book to find out if Lynette is able to overcome these challenges in her life.

I enjoyed this book and I liked the fact that it was a clean romance with no descriptive sex scenes or inappropriate language. There was suspense, romance and quite a bit of preaching. I had a hard time connecting emotionally to the characters. I like a book that is a faith-based book but at times it seemed like too much.

I was given an arc copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

When we meet Lynette Cunningham we learn that she is a flight attendant who has recently become unemployed as her airline has gone out of business, which has Lynette thinking about a career change. She talks to her father Max in her old hometown of Freedom, North Carolina where he suggests that he has found proof of her innocence because ten years ago Lynette was falsely accused of robbing a bank and she somewhat reluctantly agrees to consider coming to visit him even though she has reasonable doubts about setting foot in town again. Her father says a prayer for her to find resolution and a return to her faith in God. But tragedy awaits our heroine. Early in the morning Lynette receives a phone call informing her that her father has died the previous night in a house fire and she needs to come back to handle things as soon as possible. There is no changing her mind now, she must go to Freedom.

Once there, one of the first people to offer Lynette help in any way is Price Fletcher, the towns young, eligible, handsome preacher with eyes the colour of glossy pecans and dark blonde hair. It doesn’t take more than a moment for Lynette to register her attraction to this man, although she is perturbed by his being a man of the cloth. But she has issues with God and isn’t about to work through them easily no matter how enticed she feels. Pastor Price is a determined and prayerful man. He sees more in Lynette than first meets the eye. He is undeniably attracted to her physically, with her red tresses, hazel eyes and tall lithe body and he is determined to win her back to God’s kingdom and ultimately into his arms. Lynette moves into the small apartment over the garage that wasn’t consumed by the fire and settles into small town life as she deals with the mess life has dropped at her feet.

Over a short period of time a friendship grows between the two and Price prays for more than friendship, but always adding that only if it is God’s will. Lynette finds herself helplessly drawn to Price, despite what he represents and the confusion that causes her personally. Price offers the churches help in a physical manner to clear off the land of the charred remains of the destructive fire. He then steps in whenever she needs muscle to achieve her needs. The couple go out on numerous dinner dates and slowly but surely Lynette starts to tackle the question of her faith and the deep question of why do bad things happen to good people. She also dares to question God about her unfair accusation and why He abandoned her when she needed Him the most.

One of the nice things about returning to your hometown is becoming reacquainted with friends from the past. Van owns the best little diner in the town and welcomes Lynette back with open arms. The women form a deep attachment to each other quickly, sharing snippets of their daily lives and the thoughts they have been pondering. Van has a subplot that is a doozy and sure to cause book groups to discuss it for many a long meeting. It helps that Van has also been positively affected by Price’s ministry and that she has nice things to say about him to Lynette about her own journey of faith.

Price turns out to be Lynette’s knight in shining armour, saving her from dreadful accidents and threats that keep mysteriously happening to her. And it’s undeniable that there is a relationship growing between Price and Lynette but the course of true love never runs smoothly, at least not in books. At one point Lynette comes to the decision that she could never be the woman that Price would want or need to be in his life long term and she decides to break off the friendship. But Price doesn’t take it lying down. He just prays even harder about the journey that Lynette is travelling and trusts God to move all obstacles if it be His will. And his faith in God’s ability to push through the walls that Lynette has raised proves well placed. Slowly Lynette begins to read her father’s old bible that was saved from the fire and she begins to see answers to her questions and she offers little prayers that struggle with faith but want to believe. All the while Price is there, offering friendship and support and voicing his concern at the dangerous situations that Lynette keeps finding herself in.

It is clear to just about everyone around the town that there is something going on between Lynette and Price, but Lynette is unwilling to acknowledge it. Price is faithful in his friendship and wears Lynette down; she is just unable to resist his charms, his smile able to melt her resolve. They share kisses that hint at passion stirring in both of them, but always respectfully pull away from wanting too much. Lynette is encouraged into singing in the church fund raising concert and reveals herself to be an accomplished singer, which further sets Price’s heart aflutter. Eventually he proclaims his love for Lynette and a touch reluctantly she admits that she is falling in love with him. The mysterious happenings are solved and Lynette is finally exonerated of the crime she was accused of. It ends sweetly with Price sealing their love forever and Lynette happily seeing her future as being the future wife of Price.

This book is written conservatively and with a definite Christian readership in mind. There is absolutely no hanky-panky, indeed, Lynette tells herself off for letting her lust get out of control at one point. It is a romance that plays by very strict rules. The main character Lynette starts off the novel as being far away from God, a back slider who has issues and blames God for the things wrong in her life and as the story ends she is back in the fold of the church and has a thriving relationship with God. The story arc is clearly defined and there are no surprises in the novel.

Bell has an ability to express things using food as an analogy. Memories flow like syrup on pancakes and Price’s eyes are the colour of pecans. She also has the knack to write in what might be called rather poetic style. Doves wake Lynette with a peaceful melody and she finds conversations with Price as calming as the seaside. But there are some clunky pieces of writing that feel stilted or border on mundane and predictable. It plays into common tropes that are much overused in literature. “As time passed, her frown turned to a smile.” and “As if she were a feather, he picked her up in his arms and carried her up the steps.” She also makes Lynette close her eyes in pleasure over steamed vegetables or tells the reader that the conversation between the friends took forty minutes, which feels a little like word count padding rather than moving the story forward.

This book represents all that I dislike about certain styles of Christian fiction. It is all too often so preachy, quoting bible chapter and verse left and right, as if a non-Christian was ever going to read this and feel convicted about the state of their own relationship with God. I confess I lost count of the times a verse would be trotted out along with a mini sermon about what it means to us today. I also couldn’t help but feel a little snarky about the moralistic beliefs that Bell slipped in between the covers of this book, such as encouraging women to wear tailored, knee length skirts or dresses and finding that a woman’s greatest joy and desire should be to be a housewife serving her husband at home.

The story lines were tiresome and predictable although this book veered towards being down right smutty compared to other books of its ilk with talk of passion between the two characters and lust coming up several times but neatly handled with a terse comment to oneself. The book feels as if it were written at a standard for pre-teens who are just learning about relationships rather than reflecting the real lives of mature adults. It feels as if Bell had seen a story arc in a writing book and followed it faithfully. Couple meet, couple start to fall for each other and then couple break up momentarily, couple reignite feelings for each other, couple end up happily ever after. It was also very clear who the ‘baddy’ was causing the mysterious situations around Lynette very early in the piece.

There is no hokey, down home charm about this book. It is badly written, full stop. This book made me want to apologise to bookish people everywhere and explain that this isn’t really how Christians behave in normal settings and it certainly is not decent literature. I cringe every time I read a book like this, questioning who exactly the target audience is according to the publishers. As a woman of strong Christian beliefs I don’t want badly written books with predictable storylines and cardboard cut-out characters given to me to read. Surely there are more interesting plot lines out there than a preacher falling in love with a back slidden woman. And dare I stir the pot just a little more and question why it couldn’t have been a woman preacher and a man she was drawn to? Do publishers of Christian novels think so little of women in the church that they think writing of this style is acceptable or sought after? Are women in the church only worthy of second rate writing? No. I want to read books like “Home”, by Ginny L. Yttrup or “Stars in the Grass” by Ann Marie Stewart. Good stories that revel in real emotions and honest questions of faith and confidence, that don’t rely on giving a sermonette mid story, but get their Christian message across with minimal preaching and maximum impact via the actual story line.


As a strong Christian with feminist ideals I find the underlying opinions suggested in this novel disturbing and thoroughly out of touch with the modern world. I don’t dislike this book for its Christian message, quite the opposite; I want to see my faith represented in literature in honourable ways. But is this honestly what publishers think we want? Is this how we as women are viewed? Is this the cookie cutter style of woman that the patriarchy believes we should conform to? To read this kind of literature would suggest yes. Evangelising through the book will never work because it won’t appeal to anyone outside of the strict evangelical faith circles. Of course, there must be a market for such a book for readers who like their fiction sappy and treacly sweet and utterly devoid of reality. But this is the equivalent of a Danielle Steel novel in the Christian world. It is cheesy and formulaic and leaves the reader deeply unsatisfied.

Give me a book worthy of my hard earned money. Give me a book that reflects faith in the real world. Don’t give me simplistic work and think I will be satisfied. I want literature that challenges my thinking, which expands my mind and is beautifully written in the bargain. With every book written to this standard what we are really saying is that quality Christian women’s fiction just isn’t a priority to Christian publishing houses, which is sad because the market for Christian women’s literature has barely been tapped. Christian women want literature that reflects their lives; they are sick and tired of literature that attacks the church and anyone of faith. Christian women want a choice to read books that stand out from the crowd for positive reasons, but this book isn’t giving it to them.

Sparks of Love is a terrific book. Suspense and romance are the two main ingredients I enjoy most in a book . I was pulled immediately into the well written plot. I could not put the book down.