This author participates in the Readers' Favorite Free Book Program, which is open to all readers and is completely free. The author will provide you with a free copy of their book in exchange for an honest review. You and the author will discuss what sites you will post your review to and what kind of copy of the book you would like to receive (eBook, PDF, Word, paperback, etc.). To begin, click the purple email icon to send this author a private email.
This author participates in the Readers' Favorite Book Review Exchange Program, which is open to all authors and is completely free. Simply put, you agree to provide an honest review an author's book in exchange for the author doing the same for you. What sites your reviews are posted on (B&N, Amazon, etc.) and whether you send digital (eBook, PDF, Word, etc.) or hard copies of your books to each other for review is up to you. To begin, click the purple email icon to send this author a private email, and be sure to describe your book or include a link to your Readers' Favorite review page or Amazon page.
This author participates in the Readers' Favorite Book Donation Program, which was created to help nonprofit and charitable organizations (schools, libraries, convalescent homes, soldier donation programs, etc.) by providing them with free books and to help authors garner more exposure for their work. This author is willing to donate free copies of their book in exchange for reviews (if circumstances allow) and the knowledge that their book is being read and enjoyed. To begin, click the purple email icon to send this author a private email. Be sure to tell the author who you are, what organization you are with, how many books you need, how they will be used, and the number of reviews, if any, you would be able to provide.
Linda Hanna Lloyd’s debut novel, The Syrian Peddler, was inspired her grandfather, Sam Hanna’s immigration to America. Born in Altoona, Pennsylvania to parents of Syrian and Irish descent, Linda spent three years researching her grandfather’s story, driving through Pennsylvania to visit, Uniontown, Masontown, Brownsville, and the Coal and Coke Heritage Center. Then by train to New York City to Ellis Island, where she found the registry of Sam’s steamship and imagined his thoughts as he entered the New York Harbor
A graduate of The Pennsylvania State University with a Master’s Degree in Education, Linda was the producer and host of a monthly Maryland Cable Television Health Promotion Series, nine of which won national awards. She is the recipient of two Creative Writing Awards from The Institute of Creative Research. Linda was a health professor at Howard Community College in Columbia Maryland where she received an International Community College Teaching Excellence Award, from The National Institute for Staff and Organizational Development, The University of Texas at Austin. She retired from the United States Department of Health and Human Services where her work focused on improving the quality of health care and health literacy.
Linda resides in Austin, Texas with her husband Douglas Seward Lloyd. She is the mother of Karlyn Johnston Heide and Derek Johnston. In her spare time, Linda continues writing, volunteers for the People’s Community Clinic, is a member of the Writer’s League of Texas, and participates in Chamber Music Workshops.
Reviewed by Grant Leishman for Readers' Favorite
The Syrian Peddler by Linda Hanna Lloyd is a fictionalised retelling of the author’s forebears as they immigrated and settled in America in the early years of the twentieth century. Like so many Europeans, many people from the Middle East sought a better life at the turn of the century in the new world that was the rapidly developing United States. Many Syrians left their homeland, which was wracked with uncertainty and the Turkish invasion, to seek a new life and to discover the American dream. We follow the adventures of Saddo, later to become Samuel and finally Sam, from Aleppo, as he travels on this exciting new adventure from Syria to the coal towns of Western Pennsylvania. Despite the many trials and tribulations that these new adventurers were to encounter, Sam, like so many of his compatriots, worked hard and thrived in the tough but rewarding environment.
What I particularly liked about this book was the knowledge that, despite the day to day happenings to Sam and his friends and family being fiction, to a large extent the realities were true. Linda Hanna Lloyd’s forebears did settle in Masontown and did create Hanna’s Department store. The author has clearly researched her family well and woven an interesting tale of life in the early 1900s in rural America. I found the character of Sam to be compelling and the read was straightforward and simple. I certainly believe the author has done her family justice with this retelling. I did like the opportunity she took, at the end of the book, to detail the lineage of the characters down from Sam and his family. This gave the book that spark of authenticity. For an interesting glimpse of a different type of American immigrant from the usual Italian or Irish variety, I can definitely recommend The Syrian Peddler as a very good read.
