Book Review: Love Bears All Things by Beth Wiseman

Love Bear All Things (Amish Secrets #2)

Author:  Beth Wiseman

Publisher:  Thomas Nelson (2016)

318 pages

Genre:  Christian Amish Fiction

Charlotte Dolinsky is trying to get her life back on track after a breakup with her boyfriend.  She is a freelance editor and work has been slow.  The very day she receives an eviction notice, Jacob shows up on her doorstep.  He is the son of her Amish friends in Pennsylvania.  They are worried sick about him because he left home without telling them where he was going.  He had been engaged to be married, but just couldn't bring himself to remain in the Amish community.  Charlotte does her best to convince him to return home, but he refuses.  Since she has no where else to go, she decides the only way to get Jacob home is to take him there herself.  

Daniel Byler is the older brother of Annie, who was engaged to Jacob.  As he recently was betrayed by his fiancee, he feels deeply for his sister.  How could Jacob abandon his sister when he had made a commitment to her?  When Charlotte returns to Pennsylvania without Jacob, he wonders why she is there.  He can't forget that not too long ago she deceived them all by pretending to be Amish in order to find out what happened to her brother.  Will he be able to trust again?  

This is the second book in the Amish Secrets series.  It has been a couple of years since I read the first book, but it wasn't long before I was able to remember what had happened.  I would recommend starting with the first book, Her Brother's Keeper.  This novel is somewhat unique in the Amish genre in that it deals with some really hard issues and not as much with daily life in an Amish community.  I missed that aspect in this book as those daily details are one of the things I love about this genre.  It did deal with Amish life and the difficulties and complications of modern conveniences, especially cell phones.  Most of the characters in this Amish community have cell phones, but they are supposed to be used only for emergencies.  When Jacob goes missing, many of them come to rely on their cell phones as they wait to hear some news.  It becomes difficult to break that habit once Jacob is safe. 

Some of the hard issues dealt with in the story are pregnancy outside of marriage, drug use, addiction, betrayal, and depression.  While this could be a really heavy story, the author does a good job of balancing the hard issues with the love of family and friends, hope in the future, and a growing faith in Charlotte and Daniel.  

This was a thought-provoking and interesting read.