Mindy Starns Clark's and Leslie Gould's The Amish Bride ~ Reviewed

THE AMISH BRIDE 

Mindy Starns Clark and Leslie Gould
Paperback: 352 pages
Publisher: Harvest House Publishers (August 1, 2012)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0736938621

               

Description:

Bestselling authors Mindy Starns Clark and Leslie Gould offer readers The Amish Bride, Book 3 in the Women of Lancaster County series, which tells the stories of young Plain women as they explore their roots, connect with family, and discover true love.

Ella Bayer and Ezra Gundy are in love and hope to marry someday, but she is a young Mennonite woman while he is an Amish man. Though both Plain, one of them will have to forsake what they believe to embrace another way of life.

Hoping some distance will cool the relationship, Ezra's family sends him to work at an Amish dairy farm in Indiana. But Ella disregards what her family wants and follows Ezra. In short order she finds a place to live, a job in a bakery, and an unexpected but budding friendship with a handsome Amish farmhand, Luke. When a family tragedy forces Ella back to Pennsylvania, she must face all she's been running away from. And once she has made peace with those around her, she has an important decision to make: Whose Amish bride will she become--Ezra's or Luke's?

The Amish Bride is book three in The Women of Lancaster County.  In this book we focus on Ella Bayer, a young Mennonite woman who is in love with Ezra Gundy, a young Amish Man.  They love each other, but both no the difference in their religious backgrounds could keep them apart.  They decide to go to Indiana, where Ezra is to learn the ins and outs of working on a dairy farm, and Ella plans to escape a troubled home life and pursue her dreams of becoming a bakery owner.  Her time away is also to learn some family secrets for her grandmother as well as to escape seeing her estranged father who has returned into her life.  In the meantime, she meets another Amish man, Luke.  It seems as if she’s being pulled in so many directions, and she is unsure about trusting God to lead her instead of doing what she wants to do.

                 

This was a good story.  I read book one in the series, but haven’t read book two yet, so it took a while to catch myself up to the characters.  Ella’s character was interesting.  She was so headstrong in her decisions, that I almost got annoyed with her at times, and found myself wanting to talk some sense into her.  In the end, though, she listened to the Lord and found that life was way better with his leading then it would have been had she followed through with her own plans.

 

Reviewed by: Sarah Meyers