The Maid of Fairbourne Hall - Julie Klassen

READ: MARCH 27 - 29, 2012

RATING: 9 OUT OF 10

REASON: GROUP READ AT CHRISTIAN FICTION DEVOURERS

To escape a scheme to marry her off to a dishonorable man, Margaret Macy flees London disguised as a housemaid. If she can remain unwed until her next birthday, she will receive an inheritance, and with it, sweet independence. But she never planned on actually working as a servant. And certainly not in the home of Nathaniel and Lewis Upchurch--both former suitors.

As she fumbles through the first real work of her life, Margaret struggles to keep her identity secret when suspicions arise and prying eyes visit Fairbourne Hall. Can she avoid a trap meant to force her from hiding?

How on earth have I not discovered Julie Klassen before now? I'm typically drawn more towards American, prairie historical romances but Julie is an excellent writer, regardless of what time period her novels are set in. Such attention to detail! This might put some readers off, but being a budding historian myself this appealed to me massively. I'm now seriously considering writing about Victorian servants for my dissertation, as Julie made the subject far more interesting than I initially expected. 

I will admit that I was initially a bit wary of Margaret as she seemed quite stuck-up and snobbish at the beginning of the novel. But it was wonderful to see much she grew over the course of the novel. Sometimes it's worth starting out with a dislikable character in order to make the character's growth more interesting. As well as the strength of historical detail, I also adored the originality of the secondary characters - none of them seemed like cardboard cut-outs, which is something that often occurs when a novel is swimming in secondary characters, as this one was. Helen, Hudson, Lewis, Betty, Fiona - they were all believable and endearing in their own ways. 

I suppose you could say the romance was pretty standard for a historical novel, or complain that the hero and heroine didn't spend much time together, seeing as she was pretending to be a servant and he was the master of the house. Somehow, this didn't detract from the story for me. The mystery of Margaret's disappearance and Nathaniel's fears about his ship and his brother twisted around the romance and drew it out without making the reader get impatient. I thoroughly enjoyed all the twists and turns Margaret and Nathaniel had to wade through before they were able to reveal their true colours to each other. The ending was sweet, simple and very satisfying. 

I think the best way to describe this book is to say that it's comforting. It's spring break and I'm attempting to catch up on all the reading I've got behind on this semester at university, and I picked up this novel in the hope that it would bring a nice 30 minute break from all of the eighteenth century literature I'm wading through. Three days later, I've just managed to put the book down! It was the perfect time to read this book as well - amazingly, it's been 20 degrees celsius for three days straight in Scotland in March. I've spent most days lying on a blanket on the grass outside my house or taking advantage - for once - of the fact that we live a minute's walk from the beach. This was an excellent beach book. I will definitely be getting hold of more of Julie's books this coming summer! So to those who regularly read regency romances - and I do believe that this is my first - this story might not be so special or original, but it was just what I needed at this point in my life. It was immensely comforting and satisfying.

The Fiddler - Beverly Lewis

GENRE: AMISH/ROMANCE 
PUBLISHER: BETHANY HOUSE 
PUBLICATION DATE: APRIL 10, 2012 
RATING: 5 OUT OF 10 – AVERAGE 

PROS: Will appeal to those who daydream about visiting Amish country to experience peace and contentment; interesting details about Amelia as a violinist 

CONS: Predictable plot; too much head-hopping between points of view means that the reader never connects with any of the characters; not as deep or complex as her previous novels 

Amelia DeVries is living a double life – she’s a world-famous concert violinist who occasionally sneaks away from her overbearing father to play at more relaxed fiddling events. After being caught by her agent after one of her secret performances and pressured to sign on for a classical European tour, Amelia takes off on a more scenic route home through Pennsylvania. Finding herself stranded with a flat tire and no cell phone reception, she comes across Michael Hostetler, an Amish man who has left his family and is temporarily living in a cabin in the woods. They connect when they realise that they’re both running away from their real lives. While Amelia waits for her car to be fitted with a new tire, she visits Michael’s Amish community, Hickory Hollow, and finds an unexpected sense of peace and contentment. When she finally decides to return to her home in Ohio, she can’t help but take a little bit of the Amish lifestyle with her, and use her newfound faith in God to help her make some difficult decisions about her musical career. Will these choices eventually bring her back to Hickory Hollow and Michael? 

Like most fans of Amish fiction, I got started with Beverly Lewis. Over ten years since she entered the market with The Shunning, Beverly still remains a good “starter” author for those just getting into the Amish genre. She has a good grasp of the quirks of the Amish lifestyle and consistently creates engaging characters and storylines that bring readers back to her with each series she writes. As such, I had high hopes for The Fiddler, the first novel in the Home to Hickory Hollow series, especially as it returns to the community that featured in The Shunning. Sadly, I have to say that I was a bit disappointed with this most recent novel. I may not have read all of her books, but those that I have read I’ve thoroughly enjoyed, and The Fiddler did not live up to Beverly’s usual standards. If I have to be entirely honest, this didn’t even feel like a Beverly Lewis novel. The overall plot was pretty predictable and lacked the drama and engaging characters and complex family struggles of her previous books. 

I will concede that while The Fiddler is relatively predictable, it does not completely follow the formulaic Amish plot of the English woman who falls in love with an Amish man and his lifestyle and then converts to the faith. Amelia doesn’t convert to the Amish faith – how could she, being a musician? – but she does experience a stupendous amount of peace and contentment as a result of spending a couple of days among the Amish, and makes a connection with God during her trip. That’s not to say that all Amish romance are uninteresting because they contain many similar elements, but I didn’t feel that The Fiddler really did anything particularly unusual with its characters, setting or storyline to make it stand out from the plethora of Amish novels already on the market. Considering the novels I’ve previously read by Beverly Lewis, many of which delve into the theological implications of the faith while continuing to develop relationships between characters and their families, The Fiddler fell a little short. Rather than continuing on from the successes of the drama-riddled Heritage of Lancaster County series or the Abram’s Daughters series, I felt that The Fiddler was instead buying into every reader’s secret dream of visiting an Amish community and finding the signature sense of peace and simplicity that the Amish are so famous for. I’ll admit it, I’d love to do this someday – but I don’t imagine my experience would be exciting enough to write a book about. 

I wouldn’t have minded the simplicity of Amelia and Michael’s romance so much if it weren’t for the way that their story was told. While written in third-person point of view, The Fiddler head-hopped between Amelia, Michael and Michael’s mother. Even if Michael’s mother had been taken out of the equation – a good move, I believe, as her perspective added very little to the novel – the frequency at which Beverly jumped from one character to another made it very hard to make any connections with them. I’d just be starting to get inside Amelia’s head when suddenly the perspective would switch to Michael, or his mother, and I’d lose what little I had grasped of her personality and emotions. Sometimes it seemed like each character was only given ten or so paragraphs before the book switched to the next character, not even enough to truly establish the scene. Despite the predictability of the plot, I honestly think it could have been strengthened if the storytelling had been stronger and hadn’t jumped around so much. A standard romance can make itself into something more exciting simply with the addition of colourful, realistic characters. Amelia and Michael had the potential to be more than cardboard cut-outs, but as I never truly got the chance to experience their emotions and inner turmoil, I can’t say that they were as engaging as the protagonists in other Amish novels I’ve read. 

The Fiddler certainly has some potential, particularly coming from an established novelist like Beverly Lewis. The premise of a young woman finding peace in Amish country and re-evaluating her life as a result of her experiences will certainly grab the attention of many Amish readers, and the depth of research that Beverly has undertaken in order to make Amelia’s musical talents appear authentic certainly brought that aspect of the novel to life. Unfortunately, this is where the novel’s strengths end, and The Fiddler doesn’t measure up to Beverly’s previous books. I genuinely missed the depth of character development that I’d experienced in earlier novels, and I struggled in my attempts to connect with Amelia and Michael due to the incessant head-hopping. The Fiddler is a gentle, sweet romance but ultimately rather predictable, and while newcomers to Beverly’s work may enjoy this novel, I’m afraid that many fans may be disappointed by the lack of depth and complexity. 

Review title provided by Bethany House.

Love on the Range - Jessica Nelson

GENRE: HISTORICAL ROMANCE 
PUBLISHER: LOVE INSPIRED/HARLEQUIN 
PUBLICATION DATE: APRIL 03, 2012 
RATING: 8 OUT OF 10 – VERY GOOD 

PROS: Unique heroine; unusual subject matter for a historical novel 

CONS: Jumped point of view confusingly in the middle of scenes; action scenes were rushed 

As much as Gracelyn Riley hates to be separated from her best friend, Connie, she couldn’t be more excited about being shipped off to Oregon to stay with her Uncle Lou until the Spanish influenza epidemic calms down in Boston. Rumour has it that the infamous Agent Striker has been spotted not far from her uncle’s ranch, and if she can get an interview with him, this could be her big break into journalism. Gracie is tired of living under her parents’ control and a career as a journalist would allow her to avoid being married off to an unappealing society gentleman. 

Unfortunately her initial experiences at the ranch are unexciting, and Gracie spends more time scrubbing floors and helping to prepare meals than hunting for clues about Striker. The townsfolk in nearby Burns won’t say a word about Striker, and the only interesting aspect of life with Uncle Lou is his neighbour, Trevor. Gracie isn’t entirely sure what Trevor’s relationship to her uncle is, but the scar on his face certainly makes him intriguing. She’s convinced that if anyone knows anything about Striker, it must be Trevor. But as their horse-riding lessons progress into something far deeper, Gracie has to figure out where her heart truly lies. Up until she met Trevor, she was convinced that she’d leave Oregon as soon as the flu epidemic was over and she had an interview with Striker, but now she’s unsure. But her attraction to Trevor doesn’t stop her poking her head into places where it doesn’t belong, and sooner or later, she finds herself involved in a situation that’s far more dangerous than she ever expected to find on a ranch in Oregon... 

I’m particularly fond of strong heroines, but they’re not as easy to come by in historical romances as you might expect. Often the archetypal romance heroine is the kind that continually needs rescuing or is prone to fainting at the drop of a hat. I’d like to say that Gracelyn was sort of a mixture between a strong heroine and the typical romantic heroine, but she’s not quite that straight forward. She seemed very strong at times and was incredibly sure of herself and what she wanted to do in life, but at the same time she was only twenty, and still quite vulnerable and naive. While she wanted nothing more than to travel around Oregon on a horse, hunting for Striker, she didn’t realise what a dangerous position she was putting herself in. Headstrong, but not always wise in the ways of the world, Gracie was a very appealing heroine, the kind that I cared about but was also quite proud of in places. It’s not often that I find this mixture in historical novels, especially category romances such as the Love Inspired line that Love on the Range is part of. 

The characterisation in this novel isn’t the only thing that made it stand out for me. Love on the Range happens to be the second novel set in 1918 that I’ve read in 2012, and while the subject matter and plot of Jessica’s novel are very different from Murray Pura’s The Wings of Morning, both of them made me realise what a precarious time period it was to live in. Not only was the First World War on the verge of ending, but the country was being destroyed by a horrible Spanish flu which many of the returning soldiers caught when they returned home. Technological changes were taking place, some of which hadn’t yet reached Uncle Lou’s ranch in Oregon, such as a telephone, which separated Gracie from her friends and family in Boston. It was also a difficult period for women, who were starting to wear trousers and work in factories due to the necessities of contributing to the war effort, but other women were determined to put an end to this liberalisation once the war was over. Gracie struck me as a woman stuck between two worlds, protected by her conservative upbringing yet determined to embrace all of these new possibilities that were opening up for women, particularly by wearing trousers and writing articles for a newspaper. 

While I loved the plot and characterisation of Love on the Range, I did struggle when it came to some of the structural issues when it came to the story telling. As with many romance novels, Love on the Range was written in third-person point of view but did show the hero and heroine’s perspective on matters. I definitely prefer novels that show the hero’s point of view to those that don’t, but I felt that Jessica “head-hopped” between Gracie and Trevor a bit too much for my liking, it could become quite distracting when it occurred in the middle of a scene without me realising it. One minute Gracie would be talking and I’d get a snippet of her internal thoughts, but then three lines later I’d realise that the thoughts I were reading were actually Trevor’s, and that the perspective had changed without me noticing. Incidents like this jerked me out of my reading experience and I often had to reread the whole page before I got caught up in the story again. My other minor issue regarded the action scenes, which definitely broke the monotony of the typical historical romance, but sometimes sped by so fast and were resolved a bit too easily and conveniently for my liking. One of them went by in such a flash that I had to go back and check that I hadn’t missed anything vital. For the most part, my issues with the structuring of certain scenes didn’t affect my enjoyment of the novel too much, but they did occasionally interrupt the flow of reading. 

It’s incredibly encouraging to come across such an unusual storyline and protagonist in a debut novel, particularly one in the Love Inspired category romance line, where authors have a smaller number of pages in which to tell their story. Love on the Range will appeal to long-term fans of historical romance, particularly those who are looking for something a bit different that pushes the usual boundaries. While the scene progression of the novel didn’t always flow as well as it could have, I’m confident that this is something that Jessica will be able to improve on in her next novel, which I’ll be keeping my eye out for. 

Review title provided by author. 

Beyond Hope's Valley - Tricia Goyer

GENRE: AMISH/ROMANCE 
PUBLISHER: B&H PUBLISHING
PUBLICATION DATE: APRIL 01, 2012 
RATING: 9 OUT OF 10 STARS – EXCELLENT 

PROS: Satisfyingly wraps up the series; compelling sub-plots about secondary characters; continues the challenging spiritual thread from previous books 

CONS: Novel has much a slower start than previous books in the series; most of the book takes place away from the series’ original setting of Montana 

After living in Montana with her family for some time, Marianna Sommers has finally decided to return to her Amish community in Indiana and marry her childhood sweetheart, Aaron Zook. Ben Stone, the English man that she fell for in Montana, is pursuing his music career, a sure sign that they aren’t meant to be together. But even though Marianna always thought that returning to Indiana and marrying Aaron was the right thing to do, she can’t help but miss Montana and the friends and family that she left behind. Her every move is watched by her Amish neighbours in Indiana, who are convinced that she’s becoming too liberal and worldly in her time away. Worse, none of them understand the new connection she’s made with God. As Marianna helps her brother and his girlfriend prepare for their wedding and the birth of their first child, she wonders whether what is right for Levi might not be what is right for her. Is it really God’s plan for her to join the Amish community and marry Aaron, even if they aren’t as a close as Levi and Naomi? Haunted by her mother’s old romance with an Englisher, Marianna doesn’t want to bring similar hurt to her family by leaving the faith, even if it means having to hide her true beliefs. But is this truly what God wants for her life, or just what she feels obligated to do? Will the reappearance of Ben change her mind? 

I only discovered Amish fiction a couple of years ago, but I quickly became a fan of this rapidly-expanding genre. Plenty of established Christian authors are starting to dip their toes into the waters of Amish fiction, including B. J. Hoff, Lori Copeland, Kathryn Cushman, Mindy Starns Clark and, as you can see, Tricia Goyer. I have to admit, I hadn’t read anything by Tricia Goyer before I picked up Beside Still Waters in 2011, but I was immediately sucked in by her compelling plots and challenging spiritual messages. Beyond Hope’s Valley was on my “must read” list for 2012. I’m pleased with how Tricia decided to end the series, although I’m holding on to the hope that she revisits Marianna in future books. This final instalment was almost impossible to put down in places, and I became quite emotionally invested in the lives of the characters. I got angry at the nosy women in Indiana for their judgemental attitudes, felt spiritually challenged alongside Marianna, cheered Ruth on when she stood up to a man from her past, and felt incredibly proud of Levi for stepping up into the role of husband and father that had been placed before him. 

That said, I didn’t feel quite as wrapped up in the story and characters as I had in the previous two books. Beside Still Waters and Along Wooded Paths had totally blown me away and definitely made my list of top ten reads for 2011, so maybe I was setting myself up for a little disappointment. My qualms with this book are small, but I will voice them: I felt that the plot was a bit slow to get started, and a good twenty-percent of the book seemed to be spent setting up events that were to come. Having now finished the book, I kind of wish that that some of that space could have been shifted to the end of the book, so that we had more time to spend with Marianna and her chosen beau! The ending came quite quickly (and no, I’m not telling you who she chooses!) and as cheesy as I often find epilogues, I really wanted one this time! I also missed the Montana setting, since nearly the entire novel takes place in Indiana, or following Ben around on his tour. Tricia describes Montana so beautifully in the other books in the series and I hope that she chooses to set another series there as it made a great backdrop for these novels. 

But what Beyond Hope’s Valley was lacking in terms of setting, it made up for in the development of secondary characters. I really felt that Tricia delved further into the emotions of Ruth, Marianna’s mother, and her brother, Levi. Whole passages of this novel are told from Ruth’s perspective, and while I was initially sceptical about what her point of view was going to add to the novel, the inclusion of Ruth’s experiences heightened my sense of the family dynamics and cleared up some underlying issues that I’d been mulling over throughout the series. Ever wondered what difficulties Marianna’s parents had before they moved to Montana? Or why Ruth wasn’t keen on Marianna’s friendship with Ben? Now you’ll find out. While Tricia doesn’t dwell on Levi’s perspective so much as she does with Ruth, it was encouraging to see how much he’d grown since the first book in the series, and the scenes between him, Naomi and their child were really touching. We’d been given a teaser that included Levi at the end of Along Wooded Paths and I can tell you that this scene was just as good this time around, and made Levi even more endearing to the reader. Maybe it’s been too long since I read the previous books in the series, but I honestly felt that Tricia had developed her secondary characters a lot more in this book. I’m looking forward to her next Amish series, and even if she doesn’t revisit these characters (although I kind of wish that Levi and Naomi would get their own book), the strength of her character development makes me hopeful for what’s to come. 

Beyond Hope’s Valley is a satisfying conclusion to the Big Sky saga, and has the kind of ending that makes you sigh with relief and let out the breath you’ve been holding for the last couple of pages. Unlike some romantic series, I honestly didn’t know who Marianna was going to choose until I was almost at the end of the last book. I think that’s what makes this series so appealing; the characters change and develop so much over the course of the books that you can’t predict how the series will end. I’ve thoroughly enjoyed following Marianna on her journey to come closer to God and ultimately discover the man that she’s destined to be with. I’d like to think that I’ve grown along with her. The Big Sky series sticks out from the plethora of Amish novels in that it not challenges the readers’ perceptions of the Amish way of life, but it also challenges their own faith. Although Tricia likes to shake things up a bit by addressing certain conflicts within Amish theology, I can honestly say that I come out of these books not wondering whether the Amish are living their lives in a way that is pleasing to God, but whether I’m living my life appropriately. These aren’t books about pleasant young Amish women who like to bake and go on buggy rides with their beaus, but stories of real people struggling with the issues that we Englishers also have to deal with. There’s still romance in this book, but I’d be hard pressed to call this book predictable. If you’ve been intrigued by Amish fiction but you’ve been put off by the pastel coloured covers, this series would be a good place to start – but do begin with Beside Still Waters. This is not a series that can be read out of order, but Beyond Hope’s Valley is well worth the wait in getting there. 

Review title provided by B&H Publishing. 

Evelina - Frances Burney

READ: MARCH 10 - 25, 2012
RATING: 9 OUT OF 10
REASON: REQUIRED READING FOR ENGLISH LIT. CLASS


'Lord Orville did me the honour to hand me to the coach, talking all the way of the honour I had done him! O these fashionable people!' 


Frances Burney's first and most enduringly popular novel is a vivid, satirical, and seductive account of the pleasures and dangers of fashionable life in late eighteenth-century London. As she describes her heroine's entry into society, womanhood and, inevitably, love, Burney exposes the vulnerability of female innocence in an image-conscious and often cruel world where social snobbery and sexual aggression are played out in the public arenas of pleasure-gardens, theatre visits, and balls. But Evelina's innocence also makes her a shrewd commentator on the excesses and absurdities of manners and social ambitions - as well as attracting the attention of the eminently eligible Lord Orville. Evelina, comic and shrewd, is at once a guide to fashionable London, a satirical attack on the new consumerism, an investigation of women's position in the late eighteenth century, and a love story. 


Although this took me a while to read due to other reading commitments, I enjoyed this book vastly. I may be in the minority, but I definitely prefer Burney's humour and romance to Austen's! Although the epistolary style can sometimes interrupt the flow of the story, there were times when I didn't want to put this book down because I needed to find out what would happen to Evelina next. My English tutor claims that there aren't any authors prior to Austen who can create realistic characters with psychological emotions, but I honestly found Evelina to be far more of a believable and flawed heroine than Elizabeth Bennett, who I truthfully believe to be the first unflawed Mary Sue! I laughed at Evelina's etiquette errors, particularly when it came to ballroom rules, and wanted to shake Clement Willoughby by the neck whenever he preyed on Evelina and interfered with her growing relationship with Orville. I got annoyed with Orville's jealousy over Macartney, and wished that Evelina had the ability to tell Orville the truth about her situation. I found Evelina to be far, far more of an engaging and relatable character than any of Austen's heroines, and I felt sufficiently satisfied with her happy ending, no matter how long it took to reach it, and how many times it seemed so far out of her grasp. 

My only real complaints with this book would have to be that sometimes the humorous scenes between secondary characters began to drag, especially those near the end of the novel between Mrs Selwyn and the gentlemen who were visiting Mrs Beaumont. These scenes often started out being quite amusing, but they went on for pages and pages with no purpose other than to provide entertainment, and didn't succeed in moving the plot along. Captain Mirvan's scenes were similar, and while the one with the monkey was funny to begin with, the way it developed (and I don't think the issues between Lovel and Mirvan were ever really concluded?) just made it even more bizarre. Especially since this scene occurred so close to the conclusion of the story. Perhaps I was missing out on some of the humour of the period (although the notes at the end of the Oxford edition of the book are extremely useful, and I'd recommended readers to make use of these as much as possible) but I found some of the humour a bit tiring. 

Despite my displeasure with some of the humour in this novel, I thoroughly enjoyed it, and it has to be my favourite text so far in my class on the Development of the Novel. Although I'm up to my ears in necessary reading for university, for reviews and from recommendations from friends, I would love to read more of Burney's work in the future. Since this is her first novel, I would love to see how her writing develops. While I was initially cautious at reading a novel from 1778, since I had grown quite tiresome of Samuel Richardson's Pamela, which is not much earlier than this novel, I found Burney's writing incredibly compelling, her characters most engaging and capable of developing their own voices and personalities, and her plot seemed far more structured than that of other novels from the period. If you're at all intrigued by this novel, do take the time to read it, for I think you will find it worth the time it takes to read. I think this would be of particular interest to fans of Austen, and I would be intrigued to hear what die-hard Austen fans think of this book. Personally, I've never been a great lover of Austen, although I do enjoy her novels, and I find it interesting that Burney is so much lesser known although she writes of similar subjects, in what I think is a much more engaging manner.  

A Wedding Quilt for Ella - Jerry S. Eicher

READ: FEB 14 - MARCH 09, 2012
RATING: 4 OUT OF 10
REASON: FANS OF AMISH FICTION GROUP READ FOR FEBRUARY

Ella Yoder's wedding with Aden Wengerd and the building of their dream house is set for June. But when Aden is suddenly taken from her, Ella begins to doubt God's love.

When her family pressures her to marry the new young bishop, Ella asks for six months to heal from Aden's death. Meanwhile, Aden's brother, Daniel, helps Ella build her dream house based on a drawing by Ella's sister, Clara and now incorporated into Ella's wedding quilt.

Can healing come through a house? A quilt? A community?

This book took me a long time to read, partly because I had a lot of other books to read for university that I had to finish by specific deadlines, and partly because this book just didn't grip me. For the most part, it was a quick and easy read. While the speech sometimes seems stilted and forced, it wasn't too badly written, so it wasn't as if I was stumbling over awkward prose. A few of my friends adored this book, while others found it difficult to enjoy. I tried not to start this book with a bias, but considering the views of some of my friends I expected that I wasn't going to like this book. So I was surprised to find that I could actually relate to Ella at the beginning of the story. I'm engaged to be married in four months and honestly, I could understand Ella's pain at her situation - she was not yet a wife, yet she's lost the man she was meant to marry. Does she still get the respect of a widow? Do others lessen her pain because she was never truly Aden's wife? This part of the story was probably the most believable and relatable section for me. I actually struggled to read it as I didn't want to think about what I would do if I lost Simon before we were married. It's just too painful to think about. I think Jerry Eicher captured Ella's distress quite well at this point.

But ultimately, this was the best part of the story. After this, the book moved along very slowly, often focusing on every day events that didn't lead anywhere. Although Ella wrote in her diary about how she was coping with her loss, I never felt like I really got inside her head after the funeral. Apart from the first part of the book, I didn't really connect with any of the characters. Everything felt surface-deep and some of the characters (especially Dora) seemed to change personalities to fit the situation they were in.

My biggest problem with this book is the presence of superstition and the way that everyone thinks that there will be a series of three deaths, and that this is God's Will. As another reviewer has noted, this book gave a really negative image of God. While a lot of Amish novels discuss the issue of God's Will, they never put God across as so harsh as it came across in this book. Whenever anyone begins to question the reasons for the deaths, their parents or church elders tell them that it's sinful to question God's ways and that he obviously meant life to turn out this way. I'm sorry, but this is not how I interpret God's will, nor how a lot of other Amish novels have approached it. Bad things happen in life all the time, but I believe that because God has given us free will, these bad things are the consequences of our own actions, not God playing puppet-master and reaching down from heaven to senselessly kill people because they're not conforming to God's will. I would say that God does have a plan for our lives and when bad things happen we need to trust that he will help us get through the situation and that something good will come out of it, but if my fiance suddenly died, I would not believe that God had had killed him because we weren't meant to be together. Seriously, if I were in Ella's situation and everyone was telling me that, actually, it must not have been God's will for me to marry this man - I would lose trust in God. Also, the fact that everyone talked about God's will all the time meant that they never seemed to voice any opinions of their own. No one ever consoled Ella on her loss, they just staunchly told her that it was God's will and she would get over Aden's loss in time. And don't even get me started on the superstitious "Things come in threes" aspect of the story. I don't know why the author used this concept as it didn't seem fitting with the Amish belief system. It displayed a lack of trust in God, in my opinion. Everyone was scared constantly that they would be the next death. God does not want his people to live in fear of when he will next strike someone down. So, I'm sorry to those who did like the pattern of threes in this book, but I really struggled with the "theology" of God put across.

On a lesser note, Eicher switched between actual German and what appeared to be German written as it would be pronounced by the characters' accents throughout this book. As someone who reads a lot of Amish fiction and speaks German, this bugged me. I have to assume that "Da Huh" was "Der Herr"? And so on. But then later in the book he had a character speak an entire sentence in regular German, so I'm not sure why he chose so spell some words in this weird phonetic manner. If you don't speak German this probably won't spoil your reading experience, but as I knew what the characters were actually saying it bugged me.

I really do want to rate this book higher, but I have to admit that if I hadn't bought this book for my book club discussion I probably wouldn't have finished it. Now that I have finished it, I am intrigued to see how Ella's life turns out, but I won't be rushing to buy the next book. I'd borrow it if it was in the library or if a friend leant it to me, though. Ultimately, I finished this book, but I had to make myself pick it up and read it, rather than turning to something more interesting. I think the story of a young Amish woman recovering from the death of her beloved could have great potential, but the characters weren't engaging enough, the story focused on a lot of unnecessary events that lead nowhere, and it ended up becoming a story about a hateful God who made his people superstitious and fearful. If this book had been about how Ella's trust in God had brought her through her period of sadness then maybe I would have enjoyed it more, but this was not the case. The start of this book really did have some potential and I wish Eicher had continued to focus on Ella's emotions more as I did feel emotionally invested in the story for a time.

Others have really enjoyed this book, so check out their reviews as well. This definitely seems like a marmite book - you either love it or hate it. I was somewhere in between to begin with, but ultimately this is one of those books that could have made it to the "okay" rating but ultimately was just a bit disappointing. It gets 4/10 from me.

A Sentimental Journey - Laurence Sterne

READ: MARCH 05 - 06, 2012
RATING: 4 OUT OF 10
REASON: REQUIRED READING FOR ENGLISH LIT. CLASS

A Sentimental Journey is a novel without a plot, a journey without a destination. It records the adventures of the amiable Parson Yorick, as he sets off on his travels through France and Italy, relishing his encounters with all manner of men and women-particularly the pretty ones. Sterne's tale rapidly moves away from the narrative of travel to become a series of dramatic sketches, ironic incidents, philosophical musings, reminiscences, and anecdotes; sharp wit is mixed with gaiety, irony with tender feeling. With A Sentimental Journey, as well as his masterpiece, Tristram Shandy, Sterne forged a truly original style and established himself as the first of the stream-of-consciousness writers. 

This is probably my first dud of 2012. This short, unfinished novel had a few scenes in it that grabbed my attention but was otherwise rather uninspiring. Sometimes I just had absolutely no idea what was going on in this book, whereas at other points the story had some real potential and looked like it was going somewhere - and then it would jump to something else entirely and that thread of the story would be lost. 

According to my lecturer, this book had a lot of literary illusions to other travelogues, novels and classical literature. I'm probably missing a lot of these references, but it seems that perhaps without this prior knowledge there isn't a lot to appreciate about the actual story? Yorick gets into some mildly amusing situations and there are some moments of irony that can't be missed by any readers, but otherwise this is just the unfinished tale of a man's travels across France and into Italy. It was mostly readable (although there were some times that I had to go back and reread chapters as the sequence of events was difficult to understand) a but I didn't find the story or the protagonist terribly compelling. I think that's the problem - there is no real plot and the author is trying to do something in terms of literary criticism, rather than focusing on telling a story. Perhaps I'll appreciate this book more after my tutorial, but I just don't think this is for me.