Friday, February 26, 2021

"When Twilight Breaks" by Sarah Sundin

About this book:

  “Munich, 1938.
  Evelyn Brand is an American foreign correspondent determined to prove her worth in a male-dominated profession and to expose the growing tyranny in Nazi Germany. To do so, she must walk a thin line. If she offends the government, she could be expelled from the country--or worse. If she does not report truthfully, she'll betray the oppressed and fail to wake up the folks back home.
Peter Lang is an American graduate student working on his PhD in German. Disillusioned with the chaos in the world due to the Great Depression, he is impressed with the prosperity and order of German society. But when the brutality of the regime hits close, he discovers a far better way to use his contacts within the Nazi party--to feed information to the shrewd reporter he can't get off his mind.
   As the world marches relentlessly toward war, Evelyn and Peter are on a collision course with destiny.”
 
 
Series: No, a standalone.


Spiritual Content- Scriptures are mentioned & quoted; Prayers, Thanking God, & Blessings over food; Talks about God; ‘H’s are not capitalized when referring to God; For the first part of the book, Evelyn says she loves God but doesn’t need Him for strength, only when she’s in a pinch; Church going & hymns; A Christmas service; Mentions of God & forgiveness; Mentions of prayers, praying, & blessings over food; Mentions of Bibles, Bible reading, & books of the Bible; Mentions of Christians, Jews, converting, & persecution; Mentions of churches, church going, hymns, sermons, & pastors/priests; Mentions of synagogues & rabbis; Mentions of a cross necklace; A couple mentions of sins;
             *Note: Mentions of the official German church rejecting the Old Testament and Apostle Paul while preaching about an Aryan Jesus; Mentions of a synagogue being demolished; A mention of a hairstyle like a Grecian goddess would wear.
 

Negative 
Content- Minor cussing including:  a ‘damning’, three ‘idiot’s, six ‘shut up’s, and eight ‘stupid’s; Mentions of curses (said, not written); Sarcasm & eye rolling; All about Nazis, communists, persecution, treason, pogroms, violence, fighting, weapons, deaths/murders, & concentration camps; Being held at gunpoint & threatened (up to semi-detailed); An attack, pain, fighting, killing someone (in self-defense), injuries, & blood/bleeding (semi-detailed); Recalling pain & seeing someone die (barely-above-not-detailed); Seeing people being beat up & blood/bleeding (semi-detailed); Threats & Riots (semi-detailed); Lying & Deceiving for the sake of safety; Mentions of dead bodies & how they were killed (barely-above-not-detailed); Mentions of orders to kill Jews (including women); Mentions of executions & guillotines; Mentions of wars, fighting, & deaths; Mentions of arrests, injuries, & blood/bleeding (barely-above-not-detailed); Mentions of beatings, injuries, pain, & watching someone be murdered (up to semi-detailed); Mentions of weapons (guns & knives); Mentions of violence, mobs, gangsters, & thugs; Mentions of prisons/jails; Mentions of Evelyn’s old boyfriends slapping her & locking her in a car trunk; Mentions of hatred; Mentions of lies, lying, liars, & deception; Mentions of rumors; Mentions of alcohol & drunks; Mentions of cigarettes/cigars, smoking, & tobacco; A few mentions of bombs & air raids; A couple mentions of torture; A mention of divorce.
 
 
Sexual Content- a hand kiss, two nose kisses, a chin kiss, two cheek kisses, five forehead kisses, an almost kiss, a barely-above-not-detailed kiss, two semi-detailed kisses, and two border-line semi-detailed // detailed kisses; Wanting to kiss & Staring at someone’s lips (up to semi-detailed); Touches, Embraces, Nearness, Dancing, and Remembering all of this (semi-detailed); Sleeping next to each other (cuddling) for warmth; The Main characters have to sleep in the same room a few times; Sitting in a man’s lap (barely-above-not-detailed); Noticing & Smelling (including a shirtless man’s muscles & legs, semi-detailed); A man offers Evelyn to sit in his lap (which she refuses), tries to touch her bottom with his knee, comments on her time of the month, & also fondles her bottom; Mentions of a honeymoon & the couple staying in each other’s presence; Mentions of kisses & kissing; Mentions of flirting & flirts; Mentions of boyfriends/girlfriends & dates; A few mentions of seducing a man; A few mentions of affairs & mistresses; A few mentions of crushes; *Spoiler* The main couple (after they have to get married) share a couple mentions of suggestive comments about a married couple unbuttoning or removing each other’s clothing along with a mention of a Peter taking Evelyn to bed. *End of Spoiler*; A mention of loose morals; Love, falling in love, & the emotions;
             *Note: Mentions of women’s curves, hips, & bust lines; A few mentions of negligees; A few mentions of painting of people wearing no clothes at all or very little; A couple mentions of shirtless men; A mention of a knee to the groin; A man comments that others don’t think Evelyn is making “little Nazis” with a higher power man.
 
-Evelyn Brand, age 26
-Peter Lang, age 27
                                P.O.V. switches between them
                                                Set in 1938
                                                        348 pages

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Pre Teens-
New Teens-
Early High School Teens-
Older High School Teens- 
My personal Rating-
I haven’t read many books by this author and to be frankly honest, I don’t know how many more I’ll end up reading. I found the first third not able to grab my attention, the next third interesting, and then the final third a little too kissy and suggestive. It wasn’t over the top compared to some other books I’ve read recently, but it still made me uncomfortable and I found those scenes to be unnecessary.

The main characters were fine, I suppose, but I thought Evelyn did a major switch after falling in love with Peter. Faith content was pretty decent, a bit more would have been nice, but what was there wasn’t a bad amount. It was interesting (? I don’t like using that word when it comes to brutal parts of history, but I’m at a loss for what else to call it) to see Germany just before World War II as I haven’t read much about that time. The foreign language aspects were neat and I liked seeing that, but overall this book was only okay to me.  

 
 
See y’all on Friday with a new review!


*BFCG may (Read the review to see) recommend this book by this author. It does not mean I recommend all the books by this author.
*I received this book for free from the Publisher (Revell) for this honest review.

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