Stephanie Landsem's Blog, page 7
September 30, 2020
Review and Giveaway: Clouds, A Memoir
I met Laura in a church basement. We’d both spotted a notice for a mom’s bible study (with free child care!) and decided to give it a try. She had Alli and Sam and was pregnant with Zach. My oldest daughter, Rachel, was just one year old. I was looking for spiritual growth and friendship. I found those things and so much more in my friendship with Laura.
The next seventeen years saw the usual joys and difficulties of marriage, children, and family life for both of us. We shared our faith, lo...
September 22, 2020
Book Reviews: Joining the Tyndale author ranks!
In celebration of my upcoming new novel, I’m happy to showcase some books I’ve recently read by a few of the fantastic authors at Tyndale Publishing. I’ve absolutely loved working with the team there and am honored to be a part of such a great book family. Please check out these authors and many more here at the Tyndale website . Soon I’ll get to see my latest novel, In A Far Off Land, joining the ranks! Let me know in the comments if you’ve read any of these authors’ works and what you have...
September 10, 2020
Book Reviews: stories of WWII and a giveaway
Check out the giveaway for The London Restoration below!
This time, I’ll be choosing a winner from my Facebook Page friends. Make sure to ‘Like’ my page HERE to be entered in the giveaway. I’ll choose a winner on Monday, September 14th. (US only, please. International postage is ridiculous.)
September’s book reviews are some recent WWII reads. Books on WWII are insanely popular right now, so I’ve been looking for some that are a little out of the ordinary such as new settings (Munich and U...
August 27, 2020
Leo (or Slats, or Jackie, or Telly . . .) the MGM Lion
The roar of the lion before some of our favorite films has been going on for almost one hundred years and has actually been more like a pride of lions parading through the years.
The picture of a majestic lion first appeared on the Goldwyn Pictures Corporation logo in 1916 but it wasn’t until 1924, after Goldwyn Pictures became Metro-Goldwyn-Meyer (MGM), that a video clip of a lion was used in the bumper that preceded the studio’s films. Since then, there’s been seven lions to introduce the M...
August 6, 2020
Book Reviews: Stories about Friendship and a Giveaway
Check out the giveaway for The Last Year of the War below!
What’s a girl to do when there are so many good books and never enough time to read?
If you’re like me, you want to make the most of your reading time and your budget. And that’s where I hope to help.
I’ll be publishing short reviews of some recently read books and my old favorites. It will be an eclectic list because, while I love historical fiction, I read across almost every genre. Be it a mystery, women’s lit, contemporary r...
July 28, 2020
Book News: In A Far Off Land
One reason for me is that I’ll have a new book coming out and I can’t wait to share it with you.
Last Friday, I sent off the final manuscript to my editors at Tyndale House Publishers. It was both terrifying (the last chance I’ll have to make any changes), exciting (one step closer!) and a huge relief (finally done!). I celebrated with a glass of prosecco while my son, Joey, did a congratulatory dab in the ba...
May 24, 2020
Historic Epidemics: the Dancing Plague of 1518
A depiction of dancing mania, on the pilgrimage of epileptics to the church at MolenbeekPieter Brueghel the Younger, 1564
As my last post on the Historic Epidemic series, this one is a little less serious. And yes, the Dancing Plague of 1518 was a real thing—no matter how ridiculous it sounds.
This mysterious plague wasn’t a one-time occurrence in 1518 but something that historians find reference to over the course of hundreds of years, and in places all over medieval Europe.
The bes...
May 12, 2020
Historic Epidemics: The "New Normal" after the Black Death
How could any good come from a pandemic that devastated the known world?
Hard to believe, but in the aftermath of the Great Pestilence of the fourteenth century, people were–in general– better off than they were before, at least economically
Before the onset of the Bubonic plague in 1350, Europe was a predominantly agrarian society, with a social structure that consisted of three orders:
Nobility (5%): those who owned the land and had means to protect it with soldiers, weapons, and hors...
Historic Epidemics: The “New Normal” after the Black Death
How could any good come from a pandemic that devastated the known world?
Hard to believe, but in the aftermath of the Great Pestilence of the fourteenth century, people werein general better off than they were before, at least economically
Before the onset of the Bubonic plague in 1350, Europe was a predominantly agrarian society, with a social structure that consisted of three orders:
Nobility (5%): those who owned the land and had means to protect it with soldiers, weapons, and horses. ...May 1, 2020
Historic Epidemics: Sweden and the Black Death
Flowers over the canal in Uppsala, Sweden, on a beautiful spring day in 2017 In case you missed the news, Sweden hasnt been following the same pandemic measures that most of the rest of the world is undertaking. Elementary and middle schools are still in session, bars and restaurants are open and filled with people, and retailers are open for business. Not surprisingly, their death rates are the highest in Scandinavia, especially among the elderly. Over 50% of Swedens Covid-19 deaths are of...
