February Book Club Meeting
A Land to Call Home
(Red River of the North Series: Book 3)
by  Lauraine Snelling

Taming the land came at great price. Will their love survive the loss?

It has required long, difficult years to tame the virgin prairie of Dakota Territory, but in spite of heartache and back-breaking labor, the hardy immigrants recognize that God has been with them every step. What was merely a dream is now beginning to take shape. And so they face the challenge of proving up their homesteads and building an official town for their growing community.

Hjelmer travels west to work on the railroad, but after sending only one letter to Penny, who has agreed to wait for him, he is not heard from again. As the months pass, Penny is pursued by other eligible suitors, and her love for Hjelmer is sorely tried. Will he return to keep his promise?

First the land, then a natural disaster nearly devastates them. What will it take to make their dreams a reality?
 

- From the Publisher -

March Book Club Meeting
The Reaper's Song
(Red River of the North Series: Book 4)
by  Lauraine Snelling

Ever so slowly Dakota Territory is being transformed from a vast prairie into rich farmland. With the coming of the railroad, the small town of Blessing begins to prosper, and the Bjorklund family is reaping the promised harvest that had lured them from their beloved home in Norway.

But for Ingeborg and Haakan, realizing their dreams will not come without a struggle. After their own fields are harvested, Haakan and the neighboring men take the steam engine and the separator on the road, threshing for other homesteaders in return for a portion of their grain. With Haakan away and the fields standing idle, Ingeborg frets over work yet to be done. Fearing an early change of seasons, she takes matters into her own hands.

Has the land become more important to Ingeborg than her own family?

- From the Publisher -

April Book Club Meeting
Tender Mercies
(Red River of the North Series: Book 5)
by  Lauraine Snelling

Tracing the difficulties and joys of carving out a life from the Dakota sod in the second half of the 1800s, Tender Mercies continues Lauraine's Red River saga and will pull your heartstrings and make you feel the joys and frustrations of life on the open lands of the 19th century mid-west.

The rich farmlands of the Dakota Territory in 1887 are finally beginning to yield the abundant harvest the pioneers had dreamed about so long. The establishment of the railroad has brought significant changes to the small town of Blessing as well as prosperity to the Bjorklund family and their neighbors.

Among the townsfolk, Reverend John Solberg--despite being wary of matchmaking efforts in the past--is developing a friendship with a delightful young woman through their common love of books. Mary Martha has a gentle southern charm that wins everyone in her circle but too soon she is called on to return home to care for her mother. She leaves behind many heavy hearts and countless questions of whether it will be the last time to see her. Is she really leaving forever? 

- From the Publisher -

May Book Club Meeting
Blessing in Disguise
(Red River of the North Series: Book 6)
by  Lauraine Snelling

She told him she was headed for Blessing. Why would he not take her there?

The Bjorklund family has received word that Augusta Bjorklund is on her way from Norway to join them in North Dakota. When the train arrives in the town of Blessing with no Augusta aboard, the worried family hopes she will be on the train in the morning. But only her trunk arrives, so Bridget Bjorklund insists that Hjelmer, Augusta's brother, go find her.

Augusta, after discovering her intended bridegroom has married someone else, decides to leave her broken heart in Norway and start a new life in America, helping her mother run her boardinghouse. But knowing no English, Augusta misunderstands a ticket agent's directions in St. Paul, Minnesota, and in the harried confusion, she boards the wrong train. When she arrives at the end of the line, she is met by a handsome young rancher, Kane Moyer, who is waiting for his Norwegian mail-order bride!

- From the Publisher -