Showing results by author "Tessa Afshar"

Purple. The foundation of an influential trade in a Roman world dominated by men. One woman rises up to take the reins of success in an incredible journey of courage, grit, and friendship. And along the way, she changes the world. But before she was Lydia, the seller of purple, she was simply a merchant's daughter who loved three things: her father, her ancestral home, and making dye. Then unbearable betrayal robs her of nearly everything.

Elianna is a young girl crushed by guilt. After her only brother is killed while in her care, Elianna tries to earn forgiveness by working for her father's textile trade and caring for her family. When another tragedy places Elianna in sole charge of the business, her talent for design brings enormous success but never the absolution she longs for. As her world unravels, she breaks off her betrothal to the only man she will ever love. Then illness strikes, isolating Elianna from everyone, stripping everything she has left.

A hidden message, treachery, opposition, and a God-given success, will lead to an unlikely bounty. The scribe Sarah married Darius, and at times she feels as if she has married the Persian aristocracy too. But there is another thing she did not expect in her marriage - Sarah has grown to love her husband. She has wealth, property, honor, and power, yet securing her husband's love seems unattainable.

Without wealth or family, the widow Ruth left her people and followed Naomi, her beloved Hebrew mother-in-law, to rebuild Naomi’s home in Israel. Provisions gone and starvation at the door, Ruth used all that she had left - a strong back and a willing heart - to gather grain in a field, abandoned after the harvest. Tormented by others, Ruth is shocked to find the owner of the field watching her.

The prophet Nehemiah’s cousin has been catapulted into the center of the Persian court - working long hours, rubbing elbows with royalty, and becoming the queen's favorite scribe. Not bad, for a woman living in a man's world. But a devastating past has left Sarah believing that God doesn't love her and that her achievements are the measure of her worth - a measure she can never quite live up to. Darius Pasargadae is accustomed to having his way.

Striking beauty comes at a price. Rahab paid it when at the age of 15 she was sold into prostitution by the one man she loved and trusted—her father. With her keen mind and careful planning she turned heartache into success, achieving independence while still young. And she vowed never again to trust a man. Any man. God had other plans. Into the emotional turmoil of her world walked Salmone, a prominent leader of Judah, held in high esteem by all Israel.