"A Love Undone" by Cindy Woodsmall

About the Book

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 concerning his reality, and he had found peace with the solitary future facing him…until he met Jolene.

As Andy and Jolene find themselves confronted by difficult choices, will they trust in God's guidance—or will the allure of their deepening friendship only lead to further temptation?

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This book was released in September 2014

I received this book from "Blogging for Books" for free,

in exchange for a honest opinion and review of this book.  

No other compensation has been received.

 

My Review

“A Love Undone” by Cindy Woodsmall is a book that just didn't play fair right up until the end. I do admit that I am emotional reader, so it doesn't take much for me to cry, laugh or ache for the characters, but with this book it went so much deeper. My heart broke for the characters, and I got mad at how unfair everything was turning out to be. This book played havoc on my emotions more than any book I have read in the last couple of months that is for sure, and I loved the book dearly.

Here is a great book that seems to shout that life is not fair but we are never alone regardless what trouble we are facing. If we continue to follow God's path and stay within what we believe to be the right path, trouble is still going to be there, forbidden love may come to us, but we can find peace in what is denied us, through holding onto our faith in God, for there is a reason for everything we must go through.

Jolene is a woman who had to make a tough choice between what she wanted and what was best for her family. Choices between dreams and family is sometimes hard to choose between but she never second guessed herself or regretted her choice. Outwardly she appears to be one way but inside things seem to be different, and her secrets seem to be many. Some secrets she is not sure how to bring them to light while others she keeps for self-preservation. Regardless Jolene is a woman whose heart is pure as gold and she is a pretty easy going as well, while staying in the confines of the rules of her Old Amish district, for the most part anyway.

Andy is a man who is caught between a rock and a hard place, for he is not free to move on in life but he wants to do. Andy is also an honorable man who is willing to do what must be done in order to protect those he cares about, regardless the cost to himself, and so that he can remain in his Amish order district. Andy is patient and caring for people and animals which is so obvious with the way he trains horses and deals with those around him.

Beside this book being a great way to show that sometimes life is not fair to us but we are not alone, it is a wonderful example of love and patience. Not exactly the love and patience between a man and woman but the love and patience needed when dealing with siblings. Jolene showed such patience when she dealt with her siblings, even when they seemed to be rebelling against her. Then there is the love and patience one must need in dealing with those around us, even when it is killing us on the inside because of hurt and/or anger that is on the inside.

There are plenty of twists and turns within the book, and I was on the edge of my seat until just about the very end wondering what was going to happen. This is a book that is so different from most Amish books that I found that it was hard to put down even when I needed to get another tissue. I would be so sure that things were going to work one way and then suddenly I wasn't so sure, to the point where I skipped to the last page to read the last two paragraphs. Well all I can say about that, is when I finished those two paragraphs, I was more frustrated for I didn't get the answers I was looking for, which meant I knew that a happy ending was coming I just didn't know with who and how it came about.

This is a book that I highly recommend to anyone who is interested in Amish books that are a little different. If there are other emotional readers out there then I would strongly suggest a box of tissues close by, and everyone else I would say a few tissues for the emotions are powerful throughout the book.

Enjoy the book.