I was provided a complimentary copy of this book by Bethany House. I was not compensated for this review and all thoughts and opinions expressed are my own. I was not required to write a positive review.
The Road Home by Beverly Lewis Published by Baker Publishing Group on April 3, 2018
Genres: Amish & Mennonite, Christian, Fiction, General, Religious
Pages: 320
Source: Bethany House
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Sent from Michigan to Pennsylvania following the tragic death of her Amish parents, Lena Rose Schwartz grieves her loss and the separation from her nine siblings. Beside the fact that Lena has never been so far from home, she hasn't met the family she will now be living with. But worse than that is having to live apart from her close-knit brothers and sisters. How will they manage without her to care for them--especially six-year-old Chris? And will her new beau, Hans Bontrager, continue to court her despite the many miles between them?
Yet even as Lena Rose holds on to hope for a reunion with those she loves most, she discovers that Lancaster holds charms of its own. Is she willing to open her heart to new possibilities?
Imagine being the oldest of nine children and losing your parents in a tragic accident. You are grown, but single, with no outside means of support. Imagine that the best, the ONLY, solution for the family is to spread out the younger children among local families and you go states away to stay and work with family you don’t know. Separating your close knit family, leaving behind the siblings you feel responsible for, you helped raise. Leaving the only home you’ve ever known in a state you have never left. Separating your family, separating your past, separating your boyfriend, possibly even separating your future. It’s not forever everyone says. It’s going to help your relatives out east every one says. But can it really help your heart? Can it really benefit your family? There seems no other options but it doesn’t feel beneficial at all. That is were we find Lena at the beginning of ‘The Road Home’. Leaving everything she knows, and loves, and just looking for the path that will, hopefully, bring her right back home.
I have yet to meet a Beverly Lewis book I didn’t enjoy. For the sake of full disclosure I haven’t read them all, yet, but she is just an amazing story teller. She gives me characters that live and breath and sets a scene I want to visit. Again, for full disclosure, Lena got on my nerves just a tidbit. I mean, yes, I should be patient with her as she did just lost literally everything in her life. Her parents are gone, her siblings separated, her home sold, and she’s living states away with family she’d never met but that her dat had spoken so highly of. She lost so much and she struggled to grieve through that. I mean, she kept a mostly upbeat outlook of hope blanketed in faith. I think her struggle was with missing home while still finding herself comfortable in her new environment. She went from not wanting to mingle with the locals her age as she was going home to her family and Hans, the man she was courting with, to finding herself falling into something more than a friendship with a local man without truly revealing her status. She wasn’t purposely obtuse or even deceptive but she was such a contrast between her thoughts and her actual interactions.
The thing is, if none of the first things had happened then none of the good could have come either. Going from Michigan to Lancaster County not only helped to heal her heart, it helped to heal the heart of Arden and Mimi. Her going to Lancaster helped to heal not only Leah’s family but also Mimi and Harley’s family. It was easy to forget that this book was set at a different time, the 1970s when Amish schools were only starting to become a thing and Amish children went to public school. When communication was so very much different than it is today, the mention of long distance charges for a phone call are almost ancient history now. However, the similarities between then and now are what lead this book forward. The idea that you can’t go ‘home’ again. you can return to where you came but it has changed and you have changed. What you left has grown as you have grown. And more often than not the Road Home doesn’t look anything like you thought it would when you left.
About Beverly Lewis
Beverly Lewis, raised in Pennsylvania Amish country and both a schoolteacher and an accomplished musician, has been an award-winning author for over a dozen years. Her acclaimed novel, The Preacher’s Daughter, was a 2006 Quill Book Award finalist in the romance category. Her books have appeared on numerous bestseller lists, including USA Today and The New York Times. She and her husband, David, live in Colorado.”
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