Literature Time!

I don't read nearly as much as I should. I like reading. I always have. But I get busy and its so nice to just zone out in front of the TV. I have a Nook now and that's nice to carry around--the iphone app is even better.

Anyway, before we went to Missouri, I downloaded a couple of books to read in the airport. One of those books was by Beverly Lewis. She writes these books about the Amish community set in Lancaster County. Because I'm not a Pennsylvania native, I'm quite interested in the Amish and Mennonite communities. These books aren't that great but they are addictive. Beverly Lewis has several series of several books each. I just finished the third book of the Abram's Daughters series.

SPOILER! I'm going to summerize the books so far...

The books really run into each other so its hard to discern where one ended and the other one began. They always leave me with questions which is why after finishing this I'm going to download the fourth and probably the fifth to read while getting the oil changed in the car.

Anyway, these books are set in Lancaster County just after WWII. The date isn't important; these people are Amish afterall. It focuses on Abram, his wife Ida and their daughters-Sadie, Leah and twins Hannah and Mary Ruth. Aunt Lizzie (Ida's spinster sister) lives near by. As part of the Amish community, there are lots of interactions with family (the Masts in particular) and neighbors (the Peacheys in particular the son Gid).

So the first story starts with Sadie in the middle of her running around time. She meets up with the teenage son of the local doctor and falls in love with him. They are meeting in secret. Leah has always been her father's right hand man because he doesn't have a son-doing chores outside instead of being inside with her mother and sisters. Leah starts to suspect something going on with her sister. She also decides that she doesn't want to be outside nearly as much as before. Eventually, the relationship between Leah and her sister becomes strained because Sadie is hiding a terrible secret-she's pregnant. Ida, their mother, is pregnant at the same time too. Sadie confronts her former beau-he broke up with her because he was leaving for the army-and he refuses to do anything about Sadie despite her pleas.

Unfortunately, Sadie goes into labor prematurely and Leah takes her to Aunt Lizzie's. They call for the doctor and he delivers a stillborn baby-OR is it? The baby apparently takes a breath in the car after the doctor has already said he'd take care of the body. Aunt Lizzie and Leah agree to hid Sadie's sad secret. The rest of the family knows something but not what is going on with Sadie especially after Ida has her baby, Lidiann, and Sadie refuses to help with the care. Sadie is reluctant to become baptised into the Amish church (though she does eventually) and confess her sins (which she doesn't) despite her sister's pleading. Leah, meanwhile, starts to court her distant cousin, Jonas Mast. Her father isn't exactly pleased because he'd prefer if she courted Smithy Gid, the neighbor's son. Abram, in hopes that distance can drive a wedge between Leah and Jonas, arranges an apprenticeship in Ohio for Jonas. Jonas readily accepts invitation to go to Ohio for the apprenticeship in carpentry not knowing its origin.

Jonas pleas for Leah go come out to Ohio and she refuses him as she says she's needed at home. Eventually, Leah convinces her sister, Sadie to go in her place. Sadie is snuck out and off to Ohio. About this time, the truth about Sadie comes out from Leah to her parents who get the bishop involved.(One of Sadie's former friends threatened to tell the bishop so Leah felt she had no choice.) Jonas comes back to Pennsylvania to get baptized into Leah's church where they plan on living once they are married later in the fall. While in town, the truth comes out to Jonas (it already has to Leah) that Leah is not the daughter of Ida and Abram BUT the daughter of Aunt Lizzie who found herself pregnant during her running around time too! (Details on this fact hasn't come out yet.) Jonas goes back to Ohio. Sadie now knows (I can't remember how) that she is facing the shun because of not telling the bishop. Sadie is mad at her sister and tells Jonas something that she saw between Leah and Gid-interpeting it as romantic. Jonas writes to Leah regarding this. Leah writes back BUT Sadie keeps the letter. Receiving no response, the wedding is off between Jonas and Leah. There is some anger between the families-the Masts and Leah's and the Masts refuse to talk to them after this because Jonas gets shunned too. (For not coming back after his apprenticeship was over.)

The twins haven not been neglected during all of this. Mary Ruth has started working for an English family-they are Mennonites which confuse me on how they can be English but oh well. She also has desire to become a teacher. Mary Ruth and Hannah start to court a set of brothers. Hannah joins the church with her beau. Mary Ruth's unfortunately is killed in a tragic cart versus car accident with the doctor's oldest son. Mary Ruth finds comfort in the Mennonite church. She stands up to her father and goes to live with her Mennonite employer. Hannah's beau has become disillusioned with the Amish church after his brother's death and leaves her.

Leah starts to court Smithy Gid much to everyone's delight and agrees to marry him. Ida is pregnant again and dies during childbirth. She has a live son and before dying makes Leah promise to raise Lidiann and the boy, Abe. Leah promises and has to break off the engagement to Smithy Gid because Abram will not allow the couple to raise the two children as their own.

Leah has acted as mother to the two young children for years. Mary Ruth has become a teacher and Mennonite-eventually she starts to date the doctor's oldest son-the killer of her beau. Hannah marries Smithy Gid and has kids. Leah is content with her life as a mother and old maid. Nothing is heard from Jonas (though his family continues to shun Leah's) though it is assumed that he and Sadie are married. Eventually, the bishop recieves word that Sadie wants to come back and repent because she is now a widow. She is granted the chance and comes home. She was never married to Jonas and has lost contact with him. All of her children have been stillborn and now her husband too is dead. Leah was very angry after realizing what Sadie had done to her but at the end of book three, it seemed like everything was close to working out. We'll see what the '60s have in store. Does Jonas come home? Does Leah ever get married? Can she even get married? Did Sadie's son die all those years ago? (OR is he the son of someone else in the story?) Who is Leah's father? (The doctor?, a rapist?) Does anything bad happen to Smithy Gid or Hannah? What about Mary Ruth?