MARISHA'S SHOP - ALBUMS OF SONGS

A New Day Has Come marks Celine Dion's return to recording after a lengthy maternity leave, and charts the pop diva's growth as an artist and as a woman. Although Dion's songs have always been about the power of love (she wasn't mincing words when she titled her 1997 blockbuster Let's Talk About Love), maternal rather than romantic sentiment fuels her fire this time out. As she gushes on the uplifting title song (penned by '80s one-hit-wonder Aldo Nova), "Where there was weakness I've found my strength/All in the eyes of a boy." And Dion's lovefest with motherhood doesn't end there. On the heartfelt, country-tinged "Goodbye's (The Saddest Word)," the chanteuse muses, "There is no other love like a mother's love for her child," and on the anthemic, gospel choir-accented ballad "Prayer" -- which recalls Faith Hill's equally poignant "There Will Come a Day" -- she describes children as "the light" and "truth of spirit in flight." Along with newfound maternal instincts, the new songs reveal a more spiritual and edgier Dion. The songbird with glass-shattering chops sounds a bit like Sheryl Crow on the bluesy, honky-tonk rocker "Ten Days," but the lyrics still reach skyward: "Ten days I've seen the rain/Comin' down on a sunny day/But all I've got to do is pray and pray." Dion, however, hasn't stopped singing about romance altogether, and the soaring ballad "Have You Ever Been in Love," as well as her solid renditions of Nat King Cole's "Nature Boy" and Etta James's "At Last" should satisfy her lovelorn fans. It's obvious that for Celine Dion, A New Day Has Come.