"And because the man spoke with all authority of heaven and earth, the wind listened to him and stopped what he was doing and became calm."
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Look to the Hills:
Book One of the West Hope Trilogy by Mary Jean Bonar Trafford Publishing
book review by Susan J. Illis
Janine Stephens is content with her hectic life—serving as director of music for her church, keeping an immaculate home, volunteering, and playing an active role in the lives of her grown children. Even her husband's loss of his job is just a tiny blip, so confident are they that the Lord will take care of them. Yet she is inexplicably drawn to a house for sale in West Hope, near their daughter’s home, but miles away from the city where they live. While her husband is out of town visiting their son, Janine views the home, reinforcing her conviction that they are meant to live there.
At the same time, several aging women (and a few men) in West Hope are coping with health difficulties, deaths of loved ones, and the need to downsize. Presented in a blur of names and hardships (there is a list of characters in the back of the book), these secondary characters are presumably important to later books in the trilogy, but mainly serve to interrupt the flow of Janine's story.
An inspirational novel set in the beautiful hills of southwestern Pennsylvania and neighboring West Virginia, Look to the Hills features characters who rely heavily on their faith to not only guide them through difficult times, but everyday situations. Janine is a perfectionist, who seems almost too good to be true, a problem which affects many characters in the book. Even among Christians there is sometimes conflict. Look to the Hills is a pleasant, comforting read, a respite from the occasional cruelty of real life.