Christy Awards

Sisterchicks Take the Boot! (and we don't mean shoe thievery) Jenna and Sue have been sisters-in-law for nearly thirty years but inseparable friends for only the last five. When Jenna is invited to a week's stay at a fifteenth century restored palace on a quiet canal in Venice , Sue is her travel companion of choice. The catch? They must cook for a group that is staying at the palace for a retreat. It's the first time Sue has been this far from home, and both women are coming out of a valley season of life where they operated each day in long shadow s of fear. Entering into the lilting gondola-paced Italian lifestyle and discovering corners of Venice most tourists never see, they welcome a new time of refreshing. And over boiling pots of pasta, they dare each other to dream again.

"I need you," the tall, good-looking missionary had said...but he'd been speaking to Josey's entire church at the time. Had she taken it too literally? Because she was no longer in Gull Lake, Minnesota. She was a missionary. In Russia. For a year.True, Josey had wanted to skip town when her sister married her ex, and her secret crush/best friend got engaged. But Russia? Yet after a few weeks the idea grew on her. She could speak enough words to buy fruit at the Moscow market, and the missionary role was feeling...right (although her bagel-thieving roommate tested her daily). Even the frosty Russian weather was no big deal for this Minnesota girl--it was getting her love life to thaw that was the real challenge!