Count the Night by Stars

Author: Michelle Shocklee

Publisher: Tyndale House

Release Date: March 8, 2022

Terrific historical time-slip centered around the historic Maxwell House Hotel in Nashville!

Tennessee in 1897 was the place to be.  The state was celebrating its centennial anniversary and everyone came to Nashville to celebrate at the exposition.  Priscilla Nichol’s father was instrumental in bringing the railroad to Tennessee and took full charge of the exhibit, which brought their family to Nashville for the exposition.  While there, Priscilla befriends their young carriage driver Luca Moretti and his younger sister Gia.  But Nashville, like many large cities, has a dark side that people don’t want to talk about.  Priscilla learns that people that run in her family’s circles aren’t always the ones you should keep company with.

Almost seventy years later, Audrey Whitfield is helping her father run the Maxwell House Hotel in Nashville.  It’s not the crown gem that it once was, but it still has several residents as well as guests.  When Ms. Nichols, one of the longtime residents, has a stroke and is admitted to the hospital, Audrey begins going through her personal items and finds a scrapbook from the Centennial Exposition in 1897.  The more she goes through the scrapbook, the more she uncovers a mystery of the woman that she never really got to know.  Who was she?

There is nothing quite like a good time slip and when both periods deal with historical fiction, you have a very happy reader.  Shocklee did a great job tying in major historical events to both timelines with the exposition in 1897 and the hotel fire in 1961.  Both storylines were very intriguing and I keep devouring each chapter to discover what was going to happen next.  It’s not often that I get that involved in both timelines, but they were interwoven so well that I just had to know what was going to happen!  I loved the character growth of both Audrey and Priscilla and really wanted to know more.  Great read for springtime!

I received a complimentary copy of this title from the publisher.  The views and opinions expressed within are my own.