BOOKMONGER
Faith-based books share settings, themes
Authors’ characters strengthen
faith through similar journeys
Two Northwest authors use Sonoma
County’s vineyards as the setting for their
latest novels, both of which propound the
Christian faith. And that’s not the only sim-
ilarity between these works. Both authors
also incorporate the element of a vineyard
fire that jeopardizes a family business.
Sisters-based author Melody Carl-
son is a veteran writer who has produced
more than 200 books over the course of her
career. Camper life is a theme that Carl-
son has incorporated repeatedly. In her
newest work, “Looking for Leroy,” mid-
dle aged elementary school teacher Brynna
Phillips faces a lonely summer in Portland
after a recent divorce, that is until colleague
Jan invites her on a road trip in Jan’s new
camper.
Their plans to head to Yosemite get side-
tracked on the Oregon Coast, when Phillips
realizes that a campground they’ve stopped
at had been the camp where she once had a
teenage summer romance with a boy named
Leroy.
Inexplicably, Jan and another camper, a
biker they’ve just befriended, now decide
that they should locate Leroy in the hopes
that Brynna can rekindle the romance.
Despite Brynna’s misgivings, the trio heads
for Sonoma County, where the boy’s family
once owned a vineyard.
After a couple of days of wine tasting
combined with searching for Leroy, the
campers find a vineyard where Leroy is
now, conveniently, a widower. His grown
kids are helping him after a disastrous vine-
yard fire set the family business back, and
one of his daughters hires Brynna on as
office manager without Leroy’s knowledge.
These two, although they’re working
on the same property, don’t even meet as
adults until two thirds of the way through
the story. Another character suggests that
Brynna consider the Biblical story of
Ruth and Boaz as a guide for her decision
making.
Although this is billed by the publisher
as a second chance romance, the actual
courtship sequence can only be character-
ized as whirlwind, and more of an exercise
in humility.
“The Biondi Brothers” has a little more
dramatic meat on its bones. Ilwaco, Wash-
ington, author Rosemary Andrews weaves
18 // COASTWEEKEND.COM
‘The Biondi Brothers’ is by Rosemary Andrews.
This week’s books
‘Looking for Leroy’ by Melody Carlson
Revell – 320 pp – $15.99
‘The Biondi Brothers’ by Rosemary Andrews
Palmetto – 294 – $17.99
‘Looking for Leroy’ is by Melody Carlson.
her story between three biological brothers
and one adopted brother, all of whom work
for the family vineyards, which are located
in Sonoma County and Italy.
When the eldest brother, Jay, discov-
ers that somebody has jeopardized the fam-
ily business by concealing heroin packets in
wine shipments from their Italian vineyard
to the United States, he suspects the Mafia
is involved. His fears are borne out when
he halts the shipments, and the family’s
vineyards on both continents are torched
simultaneously.
Andrews relays this story in 79 short
chapters, told from the perspectives of var-
ious characters. Each of the brothers grap-
ples with his own set of problems, and
Andrews demonstrates that none of them
can attain true peace until they accept Jesus
as their savior. Where Christian readers find
affirmation, non-Christian readers may feel
repelled, but the author does acknowledge
other spiritual points of view.
The Bookmonger is Barbara Lloyd
McMichael, who writes this weekly column
focusing on books, authors and publish-
ers of the Pacific Northwest. Contact her at
BarbaraLMcM@gmail.com.