Would Katie choose her inherited wealth, or go back to the Amish?

books:


	• The Reckoning (The Heritage of Lancaster County 3) Beverly Lewis Bethany House, 1998 - 288 pages average customer review:based on 31 reviews view larger image
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highly recommended

highly recommended

All things are seen

I liked this one too.If you get this one,get all the rest.You will be hooked.Nadia Rehmani

amish life style

I fell in love with the Bev Lewis books and could not stop reading till I had finished this book.

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Would Katie choose her inherited wealth, or go back to the Amish?

In this last book of the trilogy, Katie, or Katherine as she now calls herself has inherited her surrogate mother's wealth. Living in the huge estate in New York, she has servants waiting on her hand and foot. There's also Justin Wirth, Katie's new love.

But Katie really and truly isn't sure that this is for her. She finds new outlets to keep her busy. She volunteers at the hospice house, and meets many special people there. Especially a boy, Willie, who is slowly dying of brain cancer. She finds in this boy, and instant friendship.

Katie also starts a quilting club, the way her Amish folks at home had. Many of the women fall for it, and 2 of them are Amish themselves. They are trying to put a large quilt together for the Hospice Katie is working for, using it to hopefully donate a large sum of money for that cause and help others at the same time.

Jason Fisher, Katie's very first love who has not really died but disappeared for awhile, is coming after Katie there in her new home. But when he looks her up, there is a rude awakening to him, as Katie is very angry; not understanding how Jason could just pretend to have been dead all these years when he wasn't, and not coming back to her. She turns him away, and Jason goes away broken-hearted. It is not until later on that the two through circumstances back in Hickory Hollow, meet up again and maybe come to terms.

Mary Stolzfus, Katie's best friend is in love with the bishop John Beiler. They become romantically involved and eventually get married. Mary has always felt guilty that she took Katie's place with John there after Katie ran out on her wedding day with John. And she feels she must make peace with Katie over this matter. And moreso since she is also mother to John's five children. Katie had promised John's youngest son that she would be his new mommy, and when the wedding fell through, the boy was devastated.

Rebecca, whom I identify as Katie's real mom longs to see her daughter again. And they do find each other again later in the book. Her Amish dad, Samuel never does get over Katie's transgressions as far as he's concerned and never really speaks to his only daughter again. And there are several people in the Amish community that still feel this way.

Katie, through all of these new life ventures, between plain vs. fancy, discover really what the true God is, and where God wants her to be in her life. The conclusion I thought was a bit predictable, yet it seemed the way that things would turn out in the end.

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Just wondering...

What was Justin Wirth's reaction to Katherine not marrying him? Again, the author seems to leave out important parts of the story because she does not know what to write. Was he angry, heartbroken?

Even though Katie had many friends at Mayfield Manor and out, like Natalie Judah, not to mention her handsome suitor, Justin Wirth, I still felt she felt somewhat solitary and isolated compared to the life she had led with the Amish, where there were always frolics and things to do and people to do it with. The Mormon Church is the same way. When I left it after five years, I felt so lonely because I was not used to being alone, it is so easy to make friends in the Mormon Church because everyone shares the same beliefs and that right there separates you from most of the rest of the world, thus making it hard to relate to anyone on the outside, so the only friends you have are Mormon, but after more than a year of "breaking away" (and I was lucky, because my family wasn't Mormon like Katie's was Amish), I am finally starting to make friends in the real world again, and I was lucky to have a friend like Mary Stoltzfus, though Mary stayed, my friend did not--we were baptized around the same time and left around the same time, I had someone to make the exodus with me, Katie was pretty much alone, even Peter and Lydia Miller, her Mennonite cousins, could not completely understand why she wanted to be all worldly. I would say, from my understanding of the book, that the Mennonites are that healthy balance between faith and works. Laura's life was extravagant, but that did not make her happy, it was her faith in Jesus that made her happy, but the comforts like electricity did make her life a little easier.

Laura's journals were boring and could have been left out. I would have much rather heard one of Rebecca Lapp's famous stories or even an authentic Amish recipe favorite of the author's would have been better. Katie must have gotten her strength from her biological father because Laura seemed like such a weak individual, allowing both her first boyfriend and her husband to use her. I can understand being young and naive at seventeen, but at twenty-six (when she married the dastardly Dylan), at thirty-nine (which I figured was how old she was when she passed away)? Katie was never that naive, even when she and Dan were going together in Hickory Hollow.

Katie was half fancy (by nature), half Plain (by nurture), so I suppose it was inevitable she become a Mennonite (as her beloved Daniel is Mennonite), but just as she could not see the reason why she had to wear the Amish kapp, why does she then wear the Mennonite head covering, as she says "in obedience to God and my husband"? God does not require it, just as He does not require the Amish bonnet.

Obedience to one's husband is very important in Mrs. Lewis's books, because Laura wanted to have a Bible study in her home (since she was too sick to attend church, I am assuming) but Dylan did not want those people coming over and so she obeyed, just hoping someday he would find Jesus. I do not think obeying one's husband is equal to obeying God; I think sometimes we obey God when we disobey our disbelieving husbands, and there was another thing. Ruth Stine, the girl Owen and Eve Hess (Dan Fisher's Mennonite friends), were trying to get him to see, still lived under her parents' roof, which she was going to do until she married, Mrs. Lewis makes it sound like this is what God wants for all women (and just women), but according to the Bible, the same standard should be applied to men, because a man leaves his father and mother and cleaves unto his wife, indicating he is still living at home. I do believe all girls are better off living at home (if it is a loving one) for safety reasons more than anything else, but also financial ones.

All in all, this was a consistently very good series, though a bit heavy on the preaching, a little too much telling and not enough showing in parts, but worth reading over and over again.

P.S. Not everyone has a glow about them or is suddenly happy when they get saved. When I was saved, I looked and felt no different than before, yet I have faith that I was saved. I do not need proof (I am not saying Katie did, I am just saying Christian authors try to make it sound like getting saved is that way for everyone, which may lead some people to doubt their own salvation). Christian authors need to be careful of this.

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reviews: page 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7

Katherine Mayfield must find peace before she can embrace her first love again. Heritage of Lancaster County book 1.

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