Showing posts with label Author: Cindy Woodsmall. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Author: Cindy Woodsmall. Show all posts

Sunday, May 22, 2011

Review: When the Soul Mends

When the Soul Mends (Sisters of the Quilt, Book 3)

About the Book:
Returning to the home she fled in disgrace, will Hannah find healing for the wounds of the past?

After receiving a desperate and confusing call from her sister, Hannah Lapp reluctantly returns to the Old Order Amish community of her Pennsylvania childhood.

Having fled in disgrace more than two years earlier, she finally has settled into a satisfying role in the Englischer world. She also has found love and a new family with the wealthy Martin Palmer and the children she is helping him raise. But almost immediately after her arrival in Owl’s Perch, the disapproval of those who ostracized her, including her headstrong father, reopens old wounds.

As Hannah is thrown together with former fiancĂ© Paul Waddell to work for her sister Sarah’s mental health, hidden truths surface about events during Hannah’s absence, and she faces an agonizing decision. Will she choose the Englischer world and the man who restored her hope, or will she heed the call to return to the Plain Life–and perhaps to her first love?

When the Soul Mends is the third and final book in the Sisters of the Quilt series.

My Comments:
This is the third book in a series, and I haven't read the other two; therefore there was a lot of backstory alluded to which I didn't completely understand, but it was explained well enough for this story to make sense.    Still, there were a lot of names that took me a while to keep straight, but Woodsmall did provide a list of characters at the beginning of the book to aid with this.  

I enjoyed the story and assuming the truthfulness of the details of Amish life, it was interesting to note the ways they are different (and the same) from normal Americans.  Not being real familiar with Amish life, I'm not sure how realistic it is.  At its essence it is a matter of choosing a life partner and lifestyle.  I can't say I loved the book, but there was nothing wrong with it either.  It was an amusing diversion, nothing more or less.  Grade:  B

Sunday, December 13, 2009

When the Heart Cries: My Review

I've said before that I think Cindy Woodsmall is one of the better authors out there writing Amish Fiction. When the Heart Cries is the first in a three book series about Hannah Lapp. Hannah has been raised in an Old Order Amish family, but as a teen fell in love with a neighbor, a Mennonite. On the way home, after agreeing to marry him, she is raped and almost run down by a car. Her parents don't call the police, but want her to tell the bishop what happened. She doesn't want to talk about it, and eventually finds out that the experience left her pregnant. What happens to her relationship to her family? Her church? Her fiancee? No spoilers here, but I enjoyed the story.



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