Title: Hallowed Ground Author: Rebecca Yarros
Series: Flight & Glory #4
Publisher: Embrace
Release Date: January 25, 2016
Genre: Contemporary Romance, Military
More Info: Goodreads
Purchase: Amazon US
Purchase: Barnes & Noble
Purchase: Amazon UK
Purchase: iTunes
Purchase: Kobo
There are some debts you can’t repay.
Josh Walker is loyal, reckless, and every girl’s dream. But he only has eyes for December Howard, the girl he's craved since his high school hockey days. Together they have survived grief, the military, distance, and time as they’ve fought for stolen weekends between his post at Ft. Rucker and her college at Vanderbilt. Now that Josh is a medevac pilot and Ember is headed toward graduation, they’re moving on—and in—together.
Ember never wanted the Army life, but loving Josh means accepting whatever the army dictates—even when that means saying goodbye as Josh heads to Afghanistan, a country that nearly killed him once before and that took her father. But filling their last days together with love, passion, and plans for their future doesn’t temper Ember’s fear, and if there’s one thing she’s learned from her father’s death, it’s that there are some obstacles even love can’t conquer.
Flight school is over.
This is war.
New Military Romance! Hallowed Ground by Rebecca Yarros is Now Available!
Trailer
Excerpt
I pushed my chair out and reached for her, lifting her tiny, curved frame into my lap. Her head tucked beneath my chin, and she curled into me, fitting right where she was always meant to be. My arms closed around her. “We have a month.”
“It’s not long enough.” Her fingers gripped my shirt like she could keep me here if she just held on tight enough. God, what I wouldn’t have given to stay with her.
“Forever isn’t long enough for us, December, but that’s what we’re going to have. You and I have never chosen the easy path. This is just another hurdle.” I rubbed my chin over her soft hair and tried to soak in every detail of holding her—the sweet way she smelled, the smooth texture of her skin beneath my hands.
She leaned back in my arms and cupped my face. “I can’t lose you.” Her voice broke, and tears pooled in her eyes.
I’d never hated myself more than I did in that moment. She’d made it through a nightmare no one should have to face, and I was about to ask her to chance that fire again. My breath hitched, barely passing the lump in my throat. “You won’t. It would take something a hell of a lot stronger than a war to keep me from you.”
I sealed that promise with a kiss, tasting her fear and desperation as she responded. She opened underneath me, and I fused my mouth to hers, surrendering to the heat between us to pull us through this moment. There was nothing hotter or sweeter in this world than kissing December, feeling her go soft and pliant.
We’d fought so fucking hard to get here, to be together. This wasn’t fair, and we both knew it. But we also both knew it didn’t matter. Fair wasn’t exactly in the U.S. Army vocabulary.
I retreated just enough to whisper against her lips, “I’ll come home. I swear it.”
Read the Prologue & Chapter One!
Guest Review
As a big fan of the Flight and Glory series I was really looking forward to the release of Book 4: Hallowed Ground. Then I found out it was to be a continuation of Josh and Ember’s story. I have to say that I am not a fan of when an author does this. I am always so afraid that I won’t like it and it will ruin their story for me. I debated whether I would even read it since I loved the previous books in the series so much. I decided to trust the author and with a prayer spoken I dove in.
It is here I will warn you that the Josh you get in Hallowed Ground will not be the Josh you know from Book 1. Prepare yourself. Life and struggles change people. Some it bends, others it breaks. In this book you will see both from Josh.
Hallowed Ground isn’t a story of Josh and Ember falling more in love or even what comes after that. It’s the story of how their life together has to be put on hold while Josh does his duty and the aftermath. It’s the story of how even your best laid plans can come crashing down and leave you not knowing where to go or knowing who you even are. It’s a story of sacrifice, loss, grief, and how they crawl their way out the wreckage.
This book will make you pause and reflect. It will make you so angry and sad. I cried so hard while reading it multiple times. Not just for Josh and Ember, but for all the Josh and Embers for whom this story is a reality every day. I wanted to shake Josh so many times while reading this for the choices he was making. At one point I had to just stop reading and rant with my book friends before I could even finish it.
I have zero first-hand experience with a loved one being in the military. For that reason, I had a very difficult time reading this book and I don’t mean that in a bad way. Many times when reading books, I think, is this real? No, but could it be real? The author is a soldier’s wife. She knows exactly what deployment looks and feels like. She could have very well lived through the knock on the door for all I know. These are the things I am thinking as I read this book. It was difficult to get through.
“When it comes to you, to how much I love you… I have no morals.
No honor.
I would lie, cheat, murder, steal, dishonor everything I hold dear if it meant spending my life with you.
No measure of duty, or God, or country could ever make up for losing you…”
Flight and Glory is easily one of my favorite series ever and deserving of a million stars. I am so sad that it is coming to an end. Hallowed Ground wasn’t my favorite (Beyond What Is Given is) of the series but I am glad I read it (except for that one part where Josh is mean and makes the dumbest decision any character I have ever read makes). I give it 4.5 emotionally crippling stars.
Giveaway
a Rafflecopter giveaway
Full Measures
(Flight & Glory, #1)
Amazon US
Three knocks can change everything…
“She knew. That’s why Mom hadn’t opened the door. She knew he was dead.”
Twenty years as an army brat and Ember Howard knew, too. The soldiers at the door meant her dad was never coming home. What she didn’t know was how she would find the strength to singlehandedly care for her crumbling family when her mom falls apart.
Then Josh Walker enters her life. Hockey star, her new next-door neighbor, and not to mention the most delicious hands that insist on saving her over and over again. He has a way of erasing the pain with a single look, a single touch. As much as she wants to turn off her feelings and endure the heartache on her own, she can’t deny their intense attraction.
Until Josh’s secret shatters their world. And Ember must decide if he’s worth the risk that comes with loving a man who could strip her bare.
Eyes Turned Skyward
(Flight & Glory, #2)
Amazon US
Since her sister’s death, twenty-year-old Paisley Donovan, who shares her sister’s heart condition, is treated like delicate glass by her parents. But nothing will stop her from completing her Bucket List—even if it kills her. And it almost does, until Jagger Bateman pulls her from the ocean and breathes more than air into her lungs—he sets her soul on fire.
Jagger is enrolled in the country’s toughest flight school. He’s wickedly hot, reckless, and perfect for a girl looking to live life to the fullest. Except that Paisley is the commanding general’s daughter, and her boyfriend is Jagger’s biggest rival. Now Paisley must decide just how much to risk for a guy who makes her heart pound a little too hard.
They’re flying through dangerous territory—and one wrong move could make them crash and burn…
Beyond What is Given
(Flight & Glory #3)
Amazon US
Be careful what you wish for…
Lt. Grayson Masters is focused on graduating the Apache helicopter course, and the last thing he needs is his gorgeous new roommate Samantha Fitzgerald distracting him. While her smart mouth and free spirit are irresistibly irritating, he can’t deny their off-the-charts chemistry, no matter how hard he tries.
Having just been expelled from college, Sam has no business digging for Grayson’s secrets while she’s hiding her own, but that doesn’t stop her from trying to tear down his walls. Each barrier she busts through drops one of her own, though, and she’s not prepared for the truth: another woman laid claim to Grayson’s heart long ago.
Falling in love is something neither Grayson nor Sam can afford, and when that line is crossed and secrets are exposed, they’ll learn that sometimes it’s the answered prayers that will put you through hell.
About Rebecca Yarros
I’m a hopeless romantic and adore all things chocolate, coffee and paleo. No, seriously, I need to have a caffeine IV put in. I’ve adored reading all my life, and writing naturally evolved from my love of late nights and promises of one more page.
I’m also a military wife of sixteen years. During my husband’s deployments to Iraq and Afghanistan, I was devouring a book a day, and during his third deployment, I finally wrote my own. With a somewhat ironic timing, I received my book deal for Full Measures during his fourth deployment, and published a month after he returned home. We’re currently preparing for his fifth deployment, so check out the blog for the latest!
On the homefront, we have six kids. Yes, you read that right—six. If I’m not writing or playing guitar, I’m usually tying hockey skates for our four boys, or sneaking in John Hughes marathons with my two daughters. We fostered and adopted our youngest daughter from the foster system and we’re passionate about helping others do the same through our non-profit, One October! We’re always busy navigating the winding road of our daughter’s recent autism diagnosis, getting our boys to hockey, prepping for a deployment, and generally trying to stay sane. We’re die-hard Mets fans, but our hearts call Colorado home.
Leave a Reply