my cozy book nook

Echoes Among the Stones

by Jaime Jo Wright

Genre: Mystery | History | Thriller

Star Rating: ⭐️ ⭐️ ⭐️ ⭐️ ⭐️

With insight, gentleness, and honor for those who’ve felt the depths of grief and longing for a return to normal, Wright composes yet another truly inspiring tale of mystery, family, and love.

Through Imogene Grayson (our historical heroine) and Aggie Dunkirk (our modern gal), we see the intricate journey of grief—the way it sucks you in and erodes the edges of your soul, keeping you from remembering the good because it’s all just so mixed up.

Amid the drama of murder and flooded graves and family feuds, war and trauma and love and loss, Wright guides the reader to press into God instead of pushing Him away. We see it in Oliver “Ollie” Schneider’s gentle, steady presence and concern for Imogene, and we see it in Collin O’Shaughnessy’s kindness to an eccentric old woman, Mumsie, as well as his compassion and loyalty to Aggie.

We walk alongside the characters as they wrestle with God, with their honest questions, their sadness, their anger, and even their confusion about how to move forward when what they loved would be forever unmoved—encased in earth and memories.

My own grief has often resembled theirs, and I found myself tearing up as they wept, reminding myself that God brings hope even as I cry my tears. Years past now, memories bring smiles and just the burning sensation that says I might cry. I believe Wright finesses her words into an accurate and beautiful picture of life and helps us breathe a little easier, knowing we’re not the only ones to walk this way, to have these questions, to hold to these hopes.

Throughout the book, sweet romances build between our heroines and their beaus, but as always, they aren’t the focus of the story. The romance isn’t overwhelming. Sometimes I wish I knew what the heroes were thinking, but I love the way Wright uses facial expressions, habits, and skillfully placed words to give us the barest hint of their hearts.

And now that I’ve written six paragraphs on what I love, I guess I’ll be moving on too.

QUOTABLE 

People dying’, no, you’re right. It’s never over.

Ollie, p. 93

His words drilled a hole in Imogene’s heart, and with them followed the haunting reality that death branded its mark into a person’s soul, and time healed no pain. It never would.

Imogene, p. 94

Horrible as that was, no one remembers the smaller battles. The ones we fought for years, long after the bombs stopped falling.

Mumsie, p. 139

Death didn’t give a person a choice. It just came and stole. Whether you’d finished what you wanted to do with your life or not. Death was a thief, and there was no justice that could imprison it from stealing again. And if God provided hope in the midst of Death’s evil . . . Aggie was willing to beg to see it.

Aggie, p. 223

Maybe one day a sunset would come, sweep the valley in its red delights, and promise a new beginning.

Imogene, p. 356

A person shouldn’t miss the promise. . . . The promise of whatever is in store. Grief is like the moment you close a chapter in a really good book. It leaves you suspended, unfinished, even remarkably unsatisfied. But it doesn’t mean the story is over. You just have to—

Keep reading?

Collin and Aggie, p. 372

ONE HUNDRED WORDS OR LESS LESSON

Time doesn’t heal every wound completely. But it can give us space to fall in love again, to lean into God for comfort, and to find our way home no matter how lost we feel.

I’d love to hear from you! What Jaime Jo Wright book is your favorite? What were your thoughts on this one? Have you read another historical/contemporary mystery book you enjoyed? Or what are you reading right now that you really love? Drop a comment below!