Rhonda's Doings !

Review of When Mercy Rains  by Kim Vogel  Sawyer  She left, heavily weighted with secrets. But God reveals all things, in His timing.  And He redeems them.  Suzanne Zimmerman was only seventeen and pregnant when her shamed mother quietly sent her away from their Old Order Mennonite community in Kansas. With her old home, family, and first love firmly behind her, Suzanne moved to Indiana, became a nurse, and raised a daughter, Alexa, on her own.  Now, nearly twenty years later, an unexpected letter arrives from Kansas. Her brother asks her to bring her nursing abilities home and care for their ailing mother. His request requires that Suzanne face a family that may not have forgiven her and a strict faith community. It also means seeing Paul Aldrich, her first love.  Paul, widowed with an eight-year-old son, is relieved to see Suzanne again, giving him the chance to beg her forgiveness for his past indiscretion. But when he meets Alexa, his...

Review of   A Love Undone: An Amish Novel of Shattered Dreams and God's Unfailing Grace by Cindy Woodsmall A husband and son abandoned to forge a path alone. A young woman who sacrificed her dreams. How will the God of grace and hope help them find their way?   At nineteen years old, Old Order Amish Jolene Keim was on the brink of happily-ever-after when everything changed, stealing the future she expected and burdening her with an unbearable decision. For the next ten years, Jolene throws herself into family life—and then she meets Andy Fisher. The horse trainer and father to a sweet nine year-old challenges her and holds up a mirror to issues Jolene has been unwilling to face. Andy is cautious about his deepening friendship with Jolene, but he believes she knows the truth about him – that he is a grass widower. As a man whose wife has abandoned him six years past, he is unable to divorce or remarry according to the Amish ways. Andy has wrestled with God conc...

Review of 940 Saturdays  by Harley Robart, M. D.  There are 940 Saturdays between a child’s birth and the day he or she turns 18.   That may sound like a lot when there are adventures to plan and hours to fill. But as your child learns to walk, ride a bicycle, and drive, the years pass quickly. This beautiful package includes both a removable booklet with a thousand ideas for family activities that you and your child will love at every age, and a keepsake journal for preserving what you saw and did, thought and felt, so you can savor these memories in the years to come. My Review:   This is a beautiful hardcover journal for parents to record 940 fun Saturday events with their child/children.  The book consists of blank pages marked with the day (as in Day One).  The pages are lined for easy recording.   There is a small pocket at the back which holds a small paperback book with ideas for activities to do for children birth thru teens...

Review of Seasons of Tomorrow  Amish Vines and Orchards, Book 4  by Cindy Woodsmall As love restores Rhoda, a sudden tragedy is the test of faith she never saw coming...  More settled in her heart than ever before, Rhoda Byler feels a newfound confidence living in the Old Order Amish settlement she helped establish in Orchard Bend, Maine. Though it has been almost a year since one brother left, Rhoda is happy to be working alongside the other brother as they tend and nurture the settlement's orchard. Time has helped to heal Rhoda's wounds, and she finds that even her unusual gift of profound intuition is less of a burden as she continues to seek God's wisdom and purpose for her life.  But when an Englischer friend's grandchild is taken deeper into hiding from her grandmother, can Rhoda's gift make a difference or will it simply be a catalyst to another season of doubt and misunderstanding? As she resolves to stay on course, suddenly a shocking tragedy cha...

Review of A Broken Kind of Beautiful by Katie Ganshert  Fashion is a fickle industry, a frightening fact for twenty-four-year-old model Ivy Clark. Ten years in and she's learned a sacred truth -- appearance is everything. Nobody cares about her broken past as long as she looks beautiful for the camera. This is the only life Ivy knows -- so when it starts to unravel, she'll do anything to hold on. Even if that means moving to the quaint island town of Greenbrier, South Carolina, to be the new face of her stepmother's bridal wear line -- an irony too rich for words, since Ivy is far from the pure bride in white. MY REVIEW:  Ever wondered just how glamourous the life of a fashion model is?  You will find the answer to that question and many others as you read. Modeling is a fickle career as the youngest are considered the most desirable. Ivy has had a long run of success from age 14 to 24.    Can a 24-year-old truly become the undesirable simply due to...

Review of Through the Deep Waters by Kim Vogel Sawyer Born to an unloving prostitute in a popular Chicago brothel, timid seventeen-year-old Dinah Hubley was raised amidst the secrets held in every dark, grimy room of her home. Anxious to escape, Dinah pursues her dream of becoming a Harvey Girl, waiting tables along the railroad in an upscale hotel. But when she finds out she isn't old enough, her only option is to accept a job as a chambermaid at the Clifton Hotel in Florence, Kansas. Eager to put everything behind her, Dinah feels more worthless than ever, based on a single horrible decision she made to survive. MY REVIEW: " After easing onto the edge of the bed, Dinah clutched her hands together and whispered, 'You.' She swallowed.  'I know you're sick, Ma.'  Tori's face pinched into a horrible grimace.  'I told her not to say nothin' to you. An'don't call me Ma.'"    Through the Deep Waters  truly touched a deep...

Review of Th e Quilted Heart Omnibus (Quilted Hearts, #1-3) by Mona Hodgson Like a beautiful patchwork quilt, the three novellas in The Quilted Heart tell stories of lives stitched together with love and God’s unending grace.  Once a week, Elsa Brantenberg hosts the Saint Charles Quilting Circle at her farmhouse on the outskirts of the riverside town of St. Charles, Missouri. The ladies who gather there have all experienced heartache related to the intense hardships of the Civil War, and together, they are facing their painful circumstances with friendship and prayer. Can the tattered pieces of their hearts be stitched together by God’s grace?  Dandelions on the Wind When Maren Jensen took a job on Elsa Brantenberg’s St. Charles, Missouri farm, she never expected to call the place her home. As she grows to love Mrs. Brantenberg and her granddaughter, Gabi, Maren is transformed from a lonely mail-order bride-without-a-groom to a beloved member of the Brantenberg hous...

Review of Echoes of Mercy by Kim Vogel Sawyer When a suspicious accident occurs at the Dinsmore Chocolate Factory in Sinclair, Kansas, in 1904, Caroline Lang goes undercover as a factory worker to investigate. Oliver Dinsmore, heir to the Dinsmore candy dynasty, has his own investigation to conduct. Posing as a common worker known as “Ollie Moore,” he aims to find out all he can about the family business before he takes over for his father. MY REVIEW:    To work in a chocolate factory brings memories of Lucy & Ethel in the chocolate factory and mess and mishaps abounding.    But this factory hires children to work because they can offer them a low pay.  Caroline goes in to work there as an undercover worker to find out what is going on and what happened to the previous investigator who died in an elevator accident.   Caroline begins to fall in love with Ollie  and neither of them knows the truth about the other.   Will they find the...

Review of The Dawn of Christmas by Cindy Woodsmall This Christmas, experience learning to trust alongside the Plain folk of Apple Ridge, Pennsylvania in this heart-warming tale of second chances.   Sadie enjoys her freedom away from home and her mission trips to Peru, but after four years, her Old Order Amish family insists it’s time to come home and settle down. Levi, a bachelor who distrusts women after a family heartbreak, also has no desire for romance. To keep their families from meddling in their lives, Sadie and Levi devise a plan—but soon discover that the walls around their hearts are breaking down. Can they let go of their prejudices, learn to trust each other, and embrace a future together? My Review:   Who doesn't love a wonderful Christmas book set amidst the lovely snowfilled Amish country?  Cindy Woodsmall has once again created a delightful getaway with the magic of her words.   Sadie and Levi both plan to avoid marriage but God may just h...

Review of For Every Season (Book 3 in Amish Vines & Orchards) by Cindy Woodsmall Working hard to develop a new Amish community outside of Unity, Maine, Rhoda Byler is fully committed to rehabilitating an orchard with business partner Samuel King. But an impulsive decision has created an unexpected strain in her relationship with her beau, Samuel’s brother, Jacob, threatening plans for the orchard. Amidst mounting tension in matters of the heart and business, Rhoda finds that this fledging settlement feels like the home she has always longed for, and she begins to embrace the God-given, heightened intuition that has always felt like a burden to her. She longs for Jacob to fully be free of his past, so they can work towards the future together.   But as Rhoda uses her gift to unpack an old secret with her Englisch neighbors, it is not her beau but an unlikely ally that cheers her on. With the orchard on shaky ground and Jacob’s plans in question, Rhoda is determined to s...

Review of What Once Was Lost by Kim Vogel Sawyer God Makes All Thing New…in Kim Vogel Sawyer’s New Novel In What Once Was Lost, award winning author, Kim Vogel Sawyer, invites readers to join a woman meant to serve, a child in the dark, and a man standing apart—as they embrace a God with new plans for them. A small Kansas farm is the setting as Christina Willems lovingly shepherds a group of poor and displaced individuals, who count on her leadership and have come to see the Brambleville Asylum for the Poor as their home. But when a fire breaks out in the kitchen leaving the house inhabitable, she must scramble to find shelter for all in her care, scattering her dear “family.” With no other options, Christina is forced to approach Levi Jonnson, a reclusive mill owner, to take in a young blind boy named Tommy Kilgore. Levi agrees with reluctance but finds himself surprised by the bond that quickly grows between he and Tommy.  Christina begins to question her leadership abil...