Plain News ~ September 2019

Ivy set the rags and cleaners in their holder on the barn wall. “Actually if I never milked another cow, it would be too soon—with or without all possible modern conveniences.”

He stared at her again “But your life here is so easy…and worldly.”

Worldly? She’d stick to the topic of easy for now. “Easy? You think because we have indoor plumbing and generators to help out in our barn that our life is easy?”

~Excerpt from A Christmas Haven

Dear Readers,

I hope the end of the summer is bringing you a lovely time of soaking up the last of the season’s harvest and fun. Here in North Georgia, we’ve enjoyed lots of farmers market tomato sandwiches, near daily swimming in the pool and lake, and evenings of campfires with s’mores.

But I’m excited for fall for a number of reasons, one being that my book A Christmas Haven releases on September 24! This earlier release gives readers extra time to read it before Christmas. The timeline of the story occurs in the months leading up to the holidays, so it’ll be fun for all of us to countdown to Christmas.

One of the book’s main characters is a young man who grew up Swartzentruber Amish. Can you imagine living in a world without electricity, running water, or machinery of any sorts? A world of no refrigerators or gas powered stoves, no showers, and that often involves farming with no modern equipment. To a person living like this, even the Old Order Amish seem worldly.

Is it possible for a friendship or even love to blossom between two Amish people who are raised so differently? A Christmas Haven explores this and much more. The setting is fictional Raysburg, PA, home of Greene’s Pharmacy with reoccurring characters from last year’s release The Christmas Remedy. I hope you’ll join me in this journey.

To celebrate the book’s release I’m giving away a copy of A Christmas Haven to three winners.

To enter simply click here (it will take you to a private blog post just for my newsletter readers) and leave a comment to enter.

For fans of holiday romances and Amish life comes a new Christmas tale of surprising expectations and discovering miracles.

Old Order Amish Ivy Zook is wrestling with her need to shed her community’s ways so she can grow the business of her dreams: planning parties. As long as she’s stuck living without modernization, she can barely get her business on its feet. But if she leaves too soon, she’d cause trouble for her sister, Holly, who is planning her wedding to Joshua Smucker. All of their plans become twice as complicated when an old car crashes into the storefront of Greene’s Pharmacy, carrying a Swartzentruber (ultra-conservative sect) Amish man, Arlan, and his very ill sister.

The Zooks take in Arlan and Madga, tending to the woman’s illness and Arlan begins helping around the family farm. Ivy and Arlan are on different tracks, one wanting to leave her community and the other to return to his. But both young people are trying to discover what God has in store for their futures and what miracles might lie around the corner this Christmas season.

Releases September 24, 2019

A marriage is tested in this Old Order Amish novel of longing for renewed love and a path for forgiveness.

Old Order Amish wife and mother Jemima has put her marriage and family ahead of herself for years. She’s set herself aside. Raising four children, she’s followed all the rules and has been patient in looking forward to her time to chase a dream of her own.

But when she finds out that her life savings for pursuing that dream is gone–and her husband, Roy, has been hiding a child with another woman–her entire world is shattered. Will she be able to listen to God and love Roy’s child? With so much at stake, how can she and Roy fix their relationship before their lives come crashing down?

Releases April 21, 2020