Scraps of Love: Marry for Love/Mother's Old Quilt/The Coat/Love of a Lifetime

by Janet Spaeth, Tracey Bateman, Lena Nelson Dooley

MARRY FOR LOVE...Janet Spaeth

The delightful Bridgit Streeter plans a tea that her future Pastor/husband, Peter Collins, requests. She tackles with much anxiety, cutting and stitching together her own wedding dress. There's just one problem. Bridgit can't cook or sew. She can, however, ride like the wind, and farm from sunup to sunset. The antics of Bridgit endear her to readers, young and old alike.

MOTHER'S OLD QUILT...Lena Nelson Dooley

John Collins accidentally kills the dog of a woman shadowed by tragedy, adding to the despair Maggie Swenson feels will never leave her. John works hard to compensate for his mistake; chopping wood, feeding the animals, cleaning the barn, falling hard for the lovely Maggie. He gifts Maggie with a new puppy wrapped in an old quilt. Maggie's broken heart heals as she cares for the pup, and slowly she returns John's love. She cleans and repairs the quilt, later learning the meaning of each piece of fabric.

THE COAT...Tracey V. Bateman

Leah Halliday lines her son, Collin's, coat, with parts of an old family quilt. Headmaster Max Reilly intervenes in a scuffle between Collin and several other boys. Max buys Collin a new coat, and meets Leah when he delivers the present to the Halliday home. Leah refuses the coat then at Max's prompting, realizes the lining of Collin's old coat instigated the fight. Max takes Collin under his wing, taking advantage of every opportunity to spend time with Leah as well. He fears what will happen to their newfound love when Leah learns of his past.

LOVE OF A LIFETIME...Rhonda Gibson

Spunky Colleen Halliday receives a huge box in the mail, delivered by the handsome Adam Walker. In the box are request from her aunts to preserve the family's memories. Colleen can't bake a lick, but inherited a bakery from her grandma. Alarms blare and smoke billows when Colleen burns another batch of sweets. Adam's sister, Jenny, offers to teach Colleen how to bake. In return the two girls work on scrapbooks together. Jenny's for a school project and Colleen's to piece together her past. Adam is clearly drawn to the woman that influences his sister, but a past relationship threatens his happiness.

Genres: Christian Fiction, Historical, Fiction

352 pages, Paperback

First published October 1, 2004

About the author

In first grade, Janet Spaeth was asked to write a summary of a story about a family making maple syrup. She wrote all during class, through morning recess, lunch, and afternoon recess, and asked to stay after school. When the teacher pointed out that a summary was supposed to be shorter than the original story, Janet explained that she didn’t feel the readers knew the characters well enough, so she was expanding on what was in the first-grade reader. Thus a writer was born. She lives in the Midwest and loves to travel, but to her, the happiest word in the English language is home.

Reviews

[Marilyn · Rating 4 out of 5]

Scraps of Love is four novellas revolving around the history of four generations and locations. The history and interwoven romance brought life to this collection. Some of the tales had more of a Christian message than others.

Marry for Love found Bridgit Collins in the Dakota Territory during the late 1800’s. The new minister fell for her but she had grown up without her mother farming with her father. The quilt started with her wedding dress she had sewn that fell apart after washing it.

Mother’s Old Quilt explored the tragic losses of Maggie Swenson. When the man responsible for killing her dog brought a new puppy to her wrapped in the tattered quilt but she realized it had to be an heirloom.

The Coat brought the bullying of Collin because of his mother Leah had used the quilt to line his torn coat by the tormenting students. She had no choice with money tight and losing her job to returning soldiers.

Love of a Lifetime found Colleen struggling with the bakery her grandmother had left her. When her great aunt sent her the chest filled with scraps of fabric, pictures, letters an old sewing basket she turned this into a scrapbook project.

Our mother encouraged me to read this collection as she had enjoyed it. So no review was required but I have expressed my own thoughts.

[Cheryl · Rating 4 out of 5]

I thought that this was a book with 4 novels in it, and it was. But it was not what I thought. The 4 stories were written by 4 different people, but it was a continuation from one story to the next one. I found that fascinating.

[Shirley Peters · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was a sweet set of novellas. But they definitely contained a lot of sorrow. And as a warning, one literally killed the dog in the first chapter. Ultimately all the characters find their HEA, but the path there is rough.

[Amanda · Rating 4 out of 5]

These 4 short stories were sweet and fun to read. I like how they were connected, in spite of being by different authors.

[Nancy · Rating 5 out of 5]

A scrap of love through many generations never dies .

[Amanda · Rating 2 out of 5]

This book has 4 "novellas" in one, all written by 4 different people and about 4 different generations in one family. The second book of the four was best. The writing in the others was mediocre, and all the stories were predictable (typical for Christian romance though, I think), and the quilt theme didn't stay through all four books which I thought was interesting.

[Cws]

YA Bat

[Stephanie]

Four generations of western love stories in this volume.

[Christine Shaffer · Rating 3 out of 5]

Its a cute easy read. Christian romance book