The English Daughter by

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About The English Daughter 

What happens when your spouse has become a stranger? 

Old Order Amish wife and mother Jemima Graber has put her marriage and young children ahead of herself for years. For the last decade she’s set herself aside while her husband, Roy, invested in the family’s successful horse farm. While raising four little ones, she’s followed all the rules and patiently waited to finally chase a dream of her own.

But now, at the time when her dreams are about to be realized, Roy has grown distant from Jem, and she doesn’t know what to make of his unusual moods and absences. Is his erratic behavior somehow connected to the tenant in the family’s rental property, an Englisch woman Roy dated during his rumschpringe days? And if so, how far does God’s forgiveness extend in impossible situations?

MY THOUGHTS ON THIS BOOK 

Saying I love Cindy Woodsmall’s books is an understatement. She writes by far the best Amish books! Each one dealing with very difficult issues that people face daily. And The English daughter is written with the same expertise as her other books. And I need to mention that Erin Woodsmall is definitely a great addition to her mother in law’s writing.  In this story, Roy is becoming distant with his wife Jemima, and she has no idea why, or what she can do about it.

 

ABOUT THE AUTHORS

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CINDY WOODSMALL is a New York Times and CBA best-selling author of twenty-five works of fiction and one nonfiction book. Cindy’s writing has been featured on ABC’s Nightline and the front page of the Wall Street Journal. She lives outside Atlanta with her husband.

ERIN WOODSMALL is a writer, musician, wife, and mom of four. She has edited, brainstormed, and researched books with Cindy for almost a decade. More recently she and Cindy have coauthored five books.

Sneak Peek

Read the first three chapters of Isaiah’s LegacyThe drama of the Old Testament comes to life as Judah’s most notorious king ascends to the throne in this gripping novel from the award-winning author of Isaiah’s Daughter At eight years old, Shulle has known only life in a small village with her loving but peculiar father. When Uncle Shebna offers shelter in Jerusalem in exchange for Shulle’s help tutoring King Manasseh, Judah’s five-year-old co-regent who displays the same peculiarities as her father, she’s eager to experience the royal court. But Shulle soon realizes the limits of her father’s strict adherence to Yahweh’s Law when Uncle Shebna teaches her of the starry hosts and their power. Convinced Judah must be freed from Yahweh’s chains, she begins the subtle swaying of young Manasseh, using her charm and skills on the boy no one else understands. When King Hezekiah dies, twelve-year-old Manasseh is thrust onto Judah’s throne, bitter at Yahweh and eager to marry the girl he adores. Assyria’s crown prince favors Manasseh and twists his brilliant mind toward cruelty, beginning Shulle’s long and harrowing journey to discover the Yahweh she’d never known, guided with loving wisdom by Manasseh’s mother: Isaiah’s daughter, the heartbroken Hephzibah. Amid Judah’s dark days, a desperate remnant emerges, claiming the Lord’s promise, “Though we’re helpless now, we’re never hopeless–because we serve El Shaddai.” Shulle is among them, a girl who becomes a queen through Isaiah’s legacy.

Ours for a Season by Kim Vogel Sawyer

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ABOUT THIS BOOK

An Old Order Mennonite couple’s vows and beliefs are challenged in this stirring contemporary novel for fans of Cindy Woodsmall or Shelley Shepherd Gray.

Anthony and Marty Hirschler are part of an Old Order Mennonite community in Pine Hill, Indiana. The couple has grown apart since a doctor confirmed they would never have children. Marty longs to escape the tight-knit area where large families are valued, and the opportunity to do so arises when her childhood friend, Brooke Spalding, resurfaces with the wild idea of rebuilding a ghost town into a resort community. Brooke hires Anthony to help with the construction, drawing the Hirschlers away from Indiana and into her plan, and then finds herself diagnosed with cancer. Moral complications with Brooke’s vision for a casino as part of the resort and the discovery of a runaway teenager hiding on the property open up a world neither the Hirschlers nor Brooke had considered before. Will they be able to overcome their challenges and differences to help the ones among them hurting the most?

 

MY THOUGHTS ON THIS BOOK 

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Our’s for a Season is such an awesome read. I love that author Kim Vogel Sawyer puts a different twist on Amish and Mennonite stories! Anthony and Marty Hirschler are unable to have children, which is not a good thinking for a couple in the Mennonite  community where having a big family is a way of life. As Marty is longing to leave their community, she rec’ves a letter from her best childhood friend, Brook Spaulding, wanting to contract rebuilding a ghost town out to Anthony. Which would mean leaving their Old Order Mennonite community in Pine Hill for a long while. Will their time away from home rebuild the life and marriage they once had?

This is such a sweet, but yet heartbreaking story. My heart was aching for Marty and Anthony. Two people who clearly loves each other, but the disappointments And pressures of life have slowly pulled the two apart. And their Mennonite friends could really be harsh and uncaring about the remarks they would make because the couple was childless. I was so glad Brook hired Anthony, so the couple could be forever gone from these.

But their new home and surroundings didn’t cure their problems immediately. There were many issues, many twists and turns to this story that made life, as well as decisions so very difficult at times. But as usual, Ms. Sawyer creates awesome, realistic characters, and weaves together every twist and turn the story takes, writing an amazing story for us to read. I love everything about this story. I love that Ms. Sawyer clearly tells the Gospel in this story within the lives of the characters. I highly recommend this story to anyone wanting a good clean fun read. And especially to those who love and enjoy Amish and Mennonite stories!

I received this book from Waterbrook/Multnomah Launch Tours to read and review. I was not required to write a positive review. The opinions I have expressed are my own. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal  Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 55.

 

ABOUT THE AUTHOR 

F9B8C0FD-7A07-474B-987B-23A98C6690A8Award-winning, bestselling author Kim Vogel Sawyer is a wife, mother, gramma, chocolate-lover, cat-petter, and–most importantly–a daughter of the King! With more than 1.5 million books in print in seven different languages, Kim enjoys a full-time writing and speaking ministry. Her “gentle stories of hope” are loved by readers and reviewers alike. Kim and her retired military husband, Don, reside on the plains of Kansas, the setting for many of her novels.