Amish Fiction

A student at heart, Ruth is finally a teacher at the Amish schoolhouse. But after her first day, she wonders if she's made a mistake. The students want nothing to do with learning. Deflated, she makes a promise to herself to not give up - not yet.

With her daughter newly married, widow Charlotte Burkhart should have been content to find a companion for her later years in Amish widower Glenn Esh. Yet, Charlotte longs for more than life has offered her thus far. When she discovers a baby on her doorstep, the child seems like the miracle Charlotte's been praying for. Unfortunately, Glenn doesn't feel the same way. What's a single woman aching to experience motherhood once more to do?

Best-selling author Amy Clipston's Kauffman Amish Bakery series chronicles the tensions, loves, faiths, and challenges of the residents in the Amish community of Bird-in-Hand, Pennsylvania. In A Life of Joy, the fourth installment in the series, 18-year-old Lindsay Bedford has reached a crossroads. Should she stay in the small Amish community she's known and loved for four years or return to the "English" life of her hometown in Virginia?

Tricia Troyer is thrilled when Brandt Massey, her cousin's English friend, joins the Troyers's holiday gathering for the second year in a row. When Brandt asks Tricia to be his girlfriend, they both know she'll have important choices to make about her future. But the two aren't as different as some believe-and with open hearts and understanding, their very own Christmas miracle just might be possible . . .

Lillian's first 27 years have been challenging at best. Her decision to get reacquainted with her Amish grandparents in Lancaster County, PA, is an attempt at finding peace in a complicated world. But her plan has a flaw.... Lillian is practicing the Amish lifestyle with no real understanding or relationship with God. And despite her best efforts, complications arise when she takes a fancy to Amish widower Samuel Stoltzfus who has an 11-year-old son, David.

For abandoned wife Annabelle Beachey, Promise Lodge is a refuge where she's gained confidence and self-sufficiency. But she and others are dismayed when newly arrived Bishop Clayton King claims the community is too progressive and sets out to change its ways. Worse, her husband, Phineas returns, expecting her to give up her faith as he has. And he won't leave Promise Lodge without her. But little by little, Annabelle's determination and new forthrightness make Phineas realize his mistakes - and truly hear his wife for the first time.

A year after her boyfriend was killed, a traumatized Katie Miller returns to her Amish community in Indiana, struggling with depression and panic attacks. Will she ever find the courage to face her inner demons? Freeman Bontrager has been interested in Katie ever since they were in school. Now that Katie is home, Freeman finds excuses to spend time at the Miller house. Is there any future for him with this emotionally scarred woman, or should he turn to the fair beauty Eunice Byler?

On a warm spring day, Sadie Lapp returns home to her quiet, unassertive life in Stoney Ridge after spending the winter in Ohio. Gideon Smucker, an awkward schoolteacher, has been in love with Sadie since childhood and eagerly awaits her return. But does Sadie feel the same about him?Will Stoltz, a charming and impetuous college student, has been banished for a semester and sent to babysit endangered peregrine falcons nesting at the Lapp farm. He’d rather be anywhere else...until he befriends Sadie. As the hopes and ambitions of these three young people converge, life in Stoney Ridge may never be the same.

After receiving a desperate and confusing call from her sister, Hannah Lapp reluctantly returns to the Old Order Amish community of her Pennsylvania childhood. Having fled in disgrace more than two years earlier, she finally has settled into a satisfying role in the Englischer world. She also has found love and a new family with the wealthy Martin Palmer and the children she is helping him raise.

Danielle Kent is anything but Amish. But as destiny would have it, she has fallen in love with an Amish man. Now she’s 18, pregnant, and hopeful that the child’s Amish father—Matthew Lapp—will do the right thing and marry her. She knows Matthew plans to leave his Colorado settlement for a life in the Englisch world. But that plan never included a baby. When Matthew walks away from her and their unborn child, she has nowhere to turn. Her unlikely friendship with Levi offers some comfort—yet they have so little in common.

Ivy Zimmerman is successfully navigating her life as a young Mennonite woman, one generation removed from her parents' Old Order Amish upbringing. But when her parents are killed in a tragic accident, Ivy's way of life is upended. As she deals with her grief, her sisters' needs, and her Dawdi and Mammi's strict rules, Ivy finds solace in both an upcoming trip to Germany for an international Mennonite youth gathering and in her great-aunt's story about Ivy's great-grandmother's visit to Germany in the late 1930s.

Miriam Raber enjoys life in her Old Order Amish community, and she is hopeful that Saul Fisher will propose to her soon. But when Saul starts talking about leaving the only world either of them has ever known, Miriam imagines what her life might look like as an Englischer. One thing she knows for certain, she loves Saul and feels he’s the one God has chosen for her. But Saul’s indecision has come at an inconvenient time, as Miriam is noticing advances from Jesse Dienner, a man she went to school with and who wants to marry.

Annie's life is deliciously full as the Christmas season approaches. She helps her husband, Samuel, attend to the community's minor medical needs. She occasionally assists Belinda, the local midwife, and most days, she finds herself delivering the buggy to her brother Adam. Annie's sister-in-law Leah is due to deliver their first child before Christmas morning, and Annie is determined to finish a crib quilt before the boppli arrives. With six weeks to go, she should have no problem....

Ever since the Helmuths' grandson, Ben, abruptly broke his engagement and moved to Florida, Emma Nelson has kept busy tending her vegetable garden and raising award-winning pumpkins. She can put her heartache aside to help Ben's mother with her own pumpkin patch. At least until Ben shows up to lend support to his ailing father.Gardening side by side with pretty, nurturing Emma is a sweet kind of torture for Ben.

Phineas King knows better than to expect anything but shock and pity wherever he shows his face. Horribly scarred from the tragic accident that claimed his mother's life, he chooses to keep his distance from everyone, focusing his time and energy on the bees his family raises. So why does he start finding excuses to seek out Deborah Lantz, the beautiful new arrival in town?

Sadie Kuhns has a lot happening in her life. She is creating a unique quilt by blending a traditional Amish pattern with a Hawaiian pattern as a tribute to her time spent in the islands, and she is working on a self-published book. But her relationship with Wyman Kauffman has stagnated after six months of courtship. He can't seem to commit to a profession that would secure a future, and he is jealous of the time Sadie gives to her own pursuits.

Shunned from the Amish life she once knew, Katherine Mayfield finds solace in her volunteer work and the delights of the modern world. Unknown to Katherine, her long-lost love, Daniel Fisher, is desperate to locate his "sweetheart girl", only to be frustrated at nearly every turn. Once again, Katherine is compelled to face the heritage of her past and recognize that God's love is always present.

Declan Miller has always had feelings for Bethel King. Back when they were in school, she was the smartest girl in the class and, in his opinion, by far the prettiest. Now, the two of them are in their twenties and while the attraction is still there, Declan is as hesitant as ever to let Bethel know how he feels. His corny jokes and wisecracks cover a heart that's afraid of rejection.

When Leora Ebersole sees the small plane crash in her Old Order Mennonite community, she has no idea it's a foreshadowing of things to come. Soon after the young pilot, Moses Hughes, regains consciousness, they realize his instruments were destroyed by the same power outage that killed the electricity at the community store, where Englischers are stranded with dead cell phones and cars that won't start.

Recently widowed after twenty years of marriage, Frances Lehman is only just tasting the freedom and opportunity that her Promise Lodge friends enjoy. So she's not about to be pressured into marriage by her widowed brother-in-law, even if she and her daughter have no real means of support. Much more promising is her new friendship with Preacher Marlin Kurtz, though their respective families don't see their relationship as proper.