Stones for Bread: More than just a fiction book

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    If you are tired of reading Christian fiction books because of the repetitive themes and shallowly explored characters, you will enjoy Stones for Bread.

    If you are sick of "Christian" romance books that cross that line of appropriateness for Christ-followers to read, you will enjoy Stones for Bread.

    If you are looking for a fiction story that involves your emotions at a deeper level than normal, you will enjoy Stones for Bread.

    I read a lot of Christian fiction books.  Why "Christian" fiction only...or mostly?  Well, I just don't enjoy filling my mind and my life with obscenities, disrespect, innuendo, and the like. 

    The drawback to sticking with mostly Christian fiction books is that many of the themes are repetitive.  Same 'ol, same 'ol. 

    So when I come across a Christian fiction book that has incredible depth and meaning to it, I'm very pleasantly surprised! 

    Stones for Bread is definitely a "keeper."  ☺

    The irony?  Due to health reasons, I'm not supposed to eat bread.  So I guess I'll just drool while looking at these photos of delicious artisan bread.  Ha!

Summary of "Stones for Bread":

    A solitary artisan. A legacy of bread-baking. And one secret that could collapse her entire identity.

    Liesl McNamara’s life can be described in one word: bread.

    From her earliest memory, her mother and grandmother passed down the mystery of baking and the importance of this deceptively simple food. And now, as the owner of Wild Rise Bake House, Liesl spends every day up to her elbows in dough, nourishing and perfecting her craft.

    But the simple life she has cultivated is becoming quite complicated. Her head baker brings his troubled grandson into the bakeshop as an apprentice. Her waitress submits Liesl’s recipes to a popular cable cooking show. And the man who delivers her flour—a single father with strange culinary habits—seems determined to win Liesl’s affection.

    When Wild Rise is featured on television, her quiet existence appears a thing of the past. And then a phone call from a woman claiming to be her half-sister forces Liesl to confront long-hidden secrets in her family’s past. With her precious heritage crumbling around her, the baker must make a choice: allow herself to be buried in detachment and remorse, or take a leap of faith into a new life.

    Filled with both spiritual and literal nourishment, Stones for Bread provides a feast for the senses from award-winning author Christa Parrish.

Joy In Our Journey's review by Julie:

    This was a hard book to put down; a totally surprising “bread book”.  It even has numerous detailed recipes for making various breads from well-kept cultures used for making the beautiful and delicious flavors and aromas that come from freshly-baked bread. 

    The story is not actually about just bread, but much more of the life of the young woman whose obsession in life has become her own bakery and what she produces there; it is of her life and journey from girlhood to womanhood, her emotional and spiritual adventures along the way, her attempts to keep private and self-contained thoughts and feelings, her slow awakening of her need for human love and compassion, her relationship with the fabulous personalities who surround her in her bakery, and most of all, her realization of how a living God has enhanced her life and surrounds her and enriches her with the Bread of Life.

    The truths illumined here are life-sustaining.  The author’s use of Scripture and assurance of God’s love in Liesl’s life are true to any person’s needs for direction and comfort.  This is a fabulously rich lesson on love and forgiveness, even redemption for thoughts and actions which may not seem forgivable; many beautiful lessons to be learned through the reading of this story.

    This reader had to go to her kitchen and make a loaf of bread when finished reading—though not from a culture that has been fed and cared for by generations before—still a lovely reward and reminder of how good it is to know a loving God who cares even about the crumbs we have with which to sustain ourselves, and to be thankful for what we are given.

    I received a copy of this book for review, but was not compensated financially in any way. The opinions expressed are those of Joy In Our Journey.com and are based solely on experiences while reading this book.

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