Anna Schmidt's A Stranger's Gift ~ Reviewed

A Stranger's Gift (Women of Pinecraft) 

anna Schmidt

• Paperback: 320 pages
• Publisher: Barbour Books (November 1, 2011)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1616262346

Description

Hester Detlef, a field director for the Mennonite Disaster Service, is determined to restore a hurricane victim’s faith, as well as his property. Shunned, then done, Amish man John Hafner has no time for a Mennonite do-gooder. Will love and faith take root once the debris is cleared?

Review:

A Stranger’s Gift is about a young Mennonite woman named Hester Detlef who heads up an organization for disaster relief in Pinecraft, Florida.  She went against the Mennonite traditions and went to school to be a nurse.  After her mother died, she dedicated her life to helping others, forgetting about herself in the process.  She puts her whole self into the clean up effort after Hurricane Hester hits her community.  In the meantime, she meets John Steiner, a man shunned from his Amish faith.  In the beginning, they get on each others nerves, but throughout the course of the story, they find out they have more in common with each other than they thought.

This was a nice book.  It shows that you can’t shut God out and run away from your problems, and you can’t avoid dealing with life’s issues by submerging yourself in work.  I enjoyed watching as the love story unfolded, particularly for Hester, who figured she would be an old maid.

Reviewed by: Sarah Porter