86. Amish Renegade by Rose Doss

read on my iPhone
Independently published in 2018
190 pgs.
Amish Romance
Finished 8/29/18
Goodreads rating:  4.48 - 46 ratings
My rating: 3
Setting:

First line/s:  "Kate Beiler clutched at the small, warm hand of the girl she'd raised since her marriage, numbness gripping her as she stood facing the plain wooden coffins in front of her."

My comments: This latest Amish story seemed a little bit more real to me.  It spoke more of feelings vs. suppressing them.  I think the strongest realization that has come from reading these stories is that Amish suppress feelings, don't talk to each other about anything of importance - everything is "what you see is what you get" and led by God's will, which is pretty much interpreted by the men of the congregation,  This particular story included real human feelings which the two protagonists , because of their teachings and upbringing, didn't really know how to handle well.  There is so much repetition in these books that the real meat of the story could probably be told in one chapter, as a short story, but when I get around all of that this one has appealed to me more than the others.  It actually speaks about love for another human being, which I haven't seen or even felt much in previous books of this type. 

Goodreads synopsis:  Kate must ask her first love to marry her even though she later married another man! When Kate’s only financial support dies in a buggy accident along with her beloved parents, widowed Kate Bieler must find refuge for herself and the young child of her deceased husband. Refusing the bishop’s suggestion that she marry his teenaged son, she very reluctantly asks the only other single Mann in their small Amish settlement to marry her. Unfortunately, Kate and Enoch Miller share a conflicted past. When she went on rumspringa against his wishes, he cut communication and their courtship ceased. Distressed and angry, Kate then married another Mann…but she never stopped loving Enoch. When widowed shortly later, after praying to Gott, she knows she must ask Enoch to marry her and take in the child of the Mann she’d married instead of Enoch. 
          Agreeing to this, Enoch angrily—and out of a deep hurt—deviously determines to make Kate pay. Only he ends up again falling in love with her…and the child of his rival that she brings with her. Can they find the love they once lost?