Abigail — Jo Grafford

Abigail Price, a recently widowed church secretary, receives a letter from an old friend, urgently requesting her presence for the opening of the Mountain Springs Church in rural Idaho. Though things are difficult at the moment, financially and otherwise, she splurges on a train ticket, not quite knowing how she'll scrape up the funds for the return trip.Chad Patterson's boxing career is cut short when his ailing father insists he return home to Mountain Springs to run the family sawmill. Bitter over his premature exit from the boxing circuit, Chad is even less thrilled to discover his father's work crew is a hodgepodge of misfits, ex-cons, and all-around troublemakers.To make matters worse, some do-gooder pastor has arrived into town and won't quit hounding everyone about attending his church opening festivities. Plus, some hoity-toity church lady seems to think Chad and his men should simply fall in line with her every demand when it comes to cleaning up the church grounds. It doesn't help that she's too pretty for her own good and his rascal logging crew is all too happy to oblige. Or the way he finds himself leaping to her aid in the hopes of coaxing one of those rare but intoxicating smiles from her…ONCE UPON A CHURCH HOUSE is a sweet and inspirational historical western romance series with a dash of magic and time travel.Pastor Zach Shepherd feels called to plant a church in rural Mountain Springs, Idaho, a place his friends warn him is unredeemable. However, he's a firm believer in miracles and scoffs at their dire predictions of his pending failure. He quickly sizes up the renegade collection of mostly male town folk and determines what they need (in addition to salvation) is a woman's touch to straighten them out. Throwing on his matchmaker hat, he prays God will send a few saved and sanctified women his way to get the first marriages rolling. He specifically prays for the kind of women legends are made of -- from the Bible days -- never dreaming how swiftly nor how thoroughly his prayers would be answered!