Book picks similar to
The Desert Princess by Jill Eileen Smith


biblical-fiction
historical-fiction
christian-fiction
fiction

David and Bathsheba


Roberta Kells Dorr - 1980
    The book starts out with Bathsheba as a young girl and David as a strong willed rebellious military leader.  It details the way they meet and follows them all the way through their difficulties.

Healer of Carthage


Lynne Gentry - 2014
    A third-century plague. A love out of time.First-year resident Dr. Lisbeth Hastings is too busy to take her father’s bizarre summons seriously. But when a tragic mistake puts her career in jeopardy, answering her father’s call seems her only hope of redeeming the devastating failure that her life has become. While exploring the haunting cave at her father’s archaeological dig, Lisbeth falls through a hidden hole, awakening to find herself the object of a slave auction and the ruins of Roman Carthage inexplicably restored to a thriving metropolis. Is it possible that she’s traveled back in time, and, if so, how can she find her way back home? Cyprian Thascius believes God called him to rescue the mysterious woman from the slave trader’s cell. What he doesn’t understand is why saving the church of his newfound faith requires him to love a woman whose peculiar ways could get him killed. But who is he to question God? As their different worlds collide, it sparks an intense attraction that unites Lisbeth and Cyprian in a battle against a deadly epidemic. Even as they confront persecution, uncover buried secrets, and ignite the beginnings of a medical revolution, Roman wrath threatens to separate them forever. Can they find their way to each other through all these obstacles? Or are the eighteen hundred years between them too far of a leap?

The Honorable Imposter: 1620


Gilbert Morris - 1987
    Taking the post offers fortune and escape from a life he despises, but Winslow discovers it also means becoming a spy. His mission is to infiltrate a group of religious separatists and to ferret out the whereabouts of their leader, who is accused of dissension against the King. In spite of his initial uneasiness, infiltration proves to be an easy matter. But will the ultimate betrayal be so simple? With the influences of good and evil, faith and doubt, compassion and selfishness pulling him apart, to whom could he turn?

Canteen Dreams


Cara C. Putman - 2017
    When her community starts a canteen at the train station, Audrey spends nearly every spare moment there, offering food and kindness to the soldiers passing through. She never expected to fall for a local boy…or face the challenges of budding love in the face of war. Rancher Willard Johnson admires Audrey’s passionate nature, but when his brother is killed in action, he feels he must avenge by enlisting himself. His father insists he stay, but Willard knows he must go. Reality intrudes, and he never expected the jealousy he experiences when he sees those in uniform. Can Willard’s budding relationship with Audrey weather the storms of war? Or will one of the other soldiers at the canteen steal her heart? Other books in this series: Sandhill Dreams Captive Dreams A Promise Kept A Promise Born A Promise Forged

The Governess of Highland Hall


Carrie Turansky - 2013
    Will Julia be able to find her place when a governess is neither upstairs family nor downstairs help? Missionary Julia Foster loves working alongside her parents, ministering and caring for young girls in India. But when the family must return to England due to illness, she readily accepts the burden for her parents’ financial support. Taking on a job at Highland Hall as governess, she quickly finds that teaching her four privileged, ill-mannered charges at a grand estate is more challenging than expected, and she isn’t sure what to make of the estate’s preoccupied master, Sir William Ramsey.Widowed and left to care for his two young children and his deceased cousin’s two teenage girls, William is consumed with saving the estate from financial ruin. The last thing he needs is the distraction coming of a kindhearted-yet-determined governess who seems to be quietly transforming his household with her persuasive personality, vibrant prayer life, and strong faith.While both are tending past wounds and guarding fragile secrets, Julia and William are determined to do what it takes to save their families--common ground that proves fertile for unexpected feelings. But will William choose Julia’s steadfast heart and faith over the wealth and power he needs to secure Highland Hall’s future?

Thorn in My Heart


Liz Curtis Higgs - 2003
    Two sisters long to claim one man’s heart.In the autumn of 1788, amid the moors and glens of the Scottish Lowlands, two brothers and two sisters each embark on a painful journey of discovery.Jamie and Evan McKie both want their father Alec’s flocks and lands, yet only one brother will inherit Glentrool. Leana and Rose McBride both yearn to catch the eye of the same handsome lad, yet only one sister will be his bride. A thorny love triangle emerges, plagued by lies and deception, jealousy and desire, hidden secrets and broken promises. Brimming with passion and drama, Thorn in My Heart brings the past to vibrant life, revealing spiritual truths that transcend time and penetrate the deepest places of the heart.

Finders Keepers


Sarah Monzon - 2016
    Three hundred years. One ship that ties them together. Spain, 1689 The same evil that stole her mother’s life stalks Isabella Castellano. Afraid for her safety, Isabella disguises herself as a cabin boy and hires on to one of His Majesty’s treasure fleet vessels. But has her flight from a known threat only led her to be ensnared in a sea of dangers? Florida, Present Day Summer Arnet will go anywhere to capture the perfect shot that will get her marine photography noticed by the prestigious nature magazine, Our World—even diving in waters haunted by great white sharks. When a treasure hunter with a ladies’-man reputation approaches her about a sunken ship at one of her dive locations, it may be the chance she’s been looking for to launch her career…if his charming smile doesn’t derail her first. A past tragedy has left a hole in Trent Carrington’s life—a hole he’s tried to fill with women, money, and adventure. Could the feisty marine photographer be the missing piece, or will Trent finally accept that the treasure he seeks can’t be found where rust and moths destroy?

The Pelican Bride


Beth White - 2014
    Both have promised to marry one of the rough men toiling in this strange new world in order to escape suffering in the old. Geneviève knows life won’t be easy, but at least here she can establish a home and family without fear of persecution for her outlawed religious beliefs. When she falls in love with Tristan Lanier, an expatriate cartographer-turned-farmer whose checkered past is shrouded in mystery, Geneviève realizes that even in this land of liberty one is not guaranteed peace. Trouble is brewing outside the fort between the French colonists and the native people surrounding them. And an even more sinister enemy may lurk within. Could the secret Geneviève harbors mean the undoing of the colony itself?

A Reluctant Queen: The Love Story of Esther


Joan Wolf - 2011
    Esther, a beautiful young Jewish woman, becomes the wife of the Persian king, Ahasuerus, but when the king is tricked into persecuting the Jews by his minister she feels she must reveal the truth about her identity and save her people.

Faithful Daughter of Israel


Wanda Ann Thomas - 2019
    Her deepest desire is to find acceptance among her people. For that to happen she must live one more day, and one more day after that. Desperation drives her to turn to the only means of survival for women without friends or family—harlotry. At Jerusalem’s Dung Gate in the dead of night, a scarlet-caped Roman soldier nears, and Anna quakes at having to approach the imposing, broad-shouldered man. Confronted by the foreigner, who identifies himself as the fortress commander, Anna fears she has made a terrible mistake. JULIAN OF ALEXANDRIA is counting the days until he could escape this cursed assignment. He suspects his mother, his Jewish mother, is to blame for the bad luck of being stationed in Judea. Raised thoroughly Roman, Julian wants nothing to do with the Jews. Until Anna. Anna, the spirited Jewess who means to be a harlot. Except this frightened half-dead beauty seems an unlikely seductress. Though he should flee this attraction and fulfill his promise to his father to find a Roman wife, Julian makes himself Anna’s protector. Impossible choices face this desperate Jewess and her hardened Roman commander. Will their rigid beliefs and traditions separate them, or will they follow their hearts?

Blowing on Dandelions


Miralee Ferrell - 2013
    In 1880, three years after her husband’s death, she struggles to run an Oregon boardinghouse and raise two girls alone. Things don't get easier when her critical, domineering mother moves in. Katherine must make the situation work, but standing up for herself and her family while honoring her mother isn't easy. And with a daughter entering the teenage years, the pressure on Katherine becomes close to overwhelming. Then she crosses paths with Micah Jacobs, a widower who could reignite her heart, but she fears a relationship with him might send things over the edge. She must find the strength, wisdom, hope, and faith to remake her life, for everything is about to change.

Out of the Embers


Amanda Cabot - 2020
    The orphanage that was her refuge and later her workplace has burned to the ground, and only she and a young orphan girl have escaped. Convinced this must be related to her parents' murders, Evelyn flees with the girl to Mesquite Springs in the Texas Hill Country and finds refuge in the home of Wyatt Clark, a talented horse rancher whose plans don't include a family of his own.At first, Evelyn is a distraction. But when it becomes clear that trouble has followed her to Mesquite Springs, she becomes a full-blown disruption. Can Wyatt keep her safe from the man who wants her dead? And will his own plans become collateral damage?Suspenseful and sweetly romantic, Out of the Embers is the first in a new series that invites you to the Texas Hill Country in the 1850s, when the West was wild, the men were noble, and the women were strong.

A Place in His Heart


Rebecca DeMarino - 2014
    Puritan Barnabas Horton is still in love with his deceased wife and needs only a mother for his two young sons. And yet these two very different people with very different expectations will take a leap of faith, wed, and then embark on a life-changing journey across the ocean to the Colonies. Along the way, each must learn to live in harmony, to wait on God, and to recognize true love where they least expect to find it.This heartfelt tale of love and devotion is based on debut author Rebecca DeMarino’s own ancestors, who came to Long Island in the mid-1600s to establish a life–and a legacy–in the New World.

Rekindled


Tamera Alexander - 2006
    could two people fall in love once again?Ten years ago Kathryn Jennings made a vow. For better or worse. And that promise still holds true, even though her marriage has not turned out as she expected. When her husband fails to return home one stormy winter night, she struggles to keep their ranch, but her efforts are blocked at every turn. After a shocking glimpse into her husband's past, Kathryn uncovers a hidden truth. What she wouldn't give to turn back time and be able to love her husband for the man that he was, not for the man she always wanted him to be.Larson Jennings has spent his entire life running from a broken past, unable to trust, reluctant to try again. One fateful night, his life takes an unexpected twist, and soon he is forced to make a choice. Whatever he chooses, his decision may cost him his life.

Born of Persuasion


Jessica Dotta - 2013
    Orphaned and unmarried in a time when women are legal property of their fathers, husbands, and guardians, she finds herself at the mercy of an anonymous guardian who plans to establish her as a servant in far-off Scotland.With two months to devise a better plan, Julia’s first choice to marry her childhood sweetheart is denied. But when a titled dowager offers to introduce Julia into society, a realm of possibilities opens. However, treachery and deception are as much a part of Victorian society as titles and decorum, and Julia quickly discovers her present is deeply entangled with her mother’s mysterious past. Before she knows what’s happening, Julia finds herself a pawn in a deadly game between two of the country’s most powerful men. With no laws to protect her, she must unravel the secrets on her own. But sometimes truth is elusive and knowledge is deadly.