Promise Lodge
by Charlotte Hubbard
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GENRE: Amish/Inspirational
Romance
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BLURB:
Energetic
widow Mattie Bender Schwartz is working day and night to get Promise Lodge
going. She’s also hoping the change will help her son Noah’s heart to heal
after his broken engagement. But his former fiancée, Deborah, is looking for a
fresh start too. Filled with regret, and cast out by her dat for a reason she
can’t yet reveal, Deborah can only pray Noah will forgive her foolishness.
Deborah is the last person Noah expected to show up at Promise Lodge. But with
her cruel words still ringing in his head, he’s reluctant to accept her
apology—even if the Old Order ways demand he try. If only he could obey
Christ’s most important commandment: love one another. But one thing is
certain—his mother and aunts, and their beloved Preacher Amos, will do their
best to help him get there.
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EXCERPTS (Exclusive Excerpt):
Deborah awoke with a start to discover that the sunrise was
already a bright pink blush on the horizon. The salty-sweet aroma of bacon
mingling with the fragrances of coffee and cinnamon told her that breakfast
preparations were well underway, so she splashed her face at the sink and
dressed quickly. Her body felt heavy from lack of sleep and her eyes stung from
crying, but she couldn’t let her worries overwhelm her.
I will lift up mine eyes unto the hills, from whence cometh
my help. My help cometh from The Lord, which made Heaven and Earth, she
reminded herself. If God be for me, who can be against me?
Deborah arranged her kapp over her freshly wound bun and
resolutely smoothed its long strings down the front of her lavender dress. She
could do this. She could make herself so useful—could paint so carefully and
efficiently—that Preacher Amos and the others would be glad she was here even
if Noah wanted nothing more to do with her.
She swung open the cabin door and shrieked, nearly tripping
over a body. And then she saw the gun. “Noah! I didn’t know you were—”
Queenie sprang up from Noah’s lap, barking loudly, as though
to insist she had not fallen asleep on the job.
“Sorry,” Noah muttered as he rolled away from Deborah, into
the grass.
When he stood up, with his hair sticking out in clumps and
his shirt half untucked beneath his suspenders, Deborah realized he’d slept in
the clothes he’d worn yesterday. But why did Noah have a rifle? Had he thought
she might steal away in the night—or steal from the lodge? Had he lost all
trust in her?
“Coyotes,” he rasped in a voice heavy with sleep. “Come on,
Queenie, let’s go. Enough of your racket.”
Noah hurried toward the lodge with his dog at his side,
leaving Deborah at a loss. Of all the places where he could have positioned
himself last night, why had he fallen asleep outside her door? Rosetta kept her
chickens and goats in a shed on the other side of the lodge, so wouldn’t
coyotes have been prowling over there rather than near her cabin?
Deborah started toward the kitchen door at the back of the
lodge, wondering if she would ever understand how Noah’s mind worked. She used
to think she knew him inside and out, but either he’d changed dramatically
since moving to Promise or she had totally misunderstood him when they’d been
courting.
Her unsettling thoughts disappeared as she entered the
kitchen. Rosetta stood at the stove, turning strips of bacon that sizzled in a
cast iron skillet while Christine set a table in the dining room and Mattie
pulled a large pan from the oven. Deborah didn’t want to interrupt their snappy
rendition of “Simple Gifts”, but she couldn’t help exclaiming over the largest
cinnamon rolls she’d ever seen.
“I’d intended to help you make breakfast,” she protested as
she gazed at Mattie’s rolls. They were baked to puffy perfection, spiraled
around a filling of raisins, cinnamon, and nuts, and they smelled so good.
“What’s the occasion, that you’ve made such luscious—surely you haven’t been up
since the wee hours to bake these for an everyday breakfast,” Deborah
stammered.
Mattie chuckled as she set the pan on a rack. “You are the
occasion, Deborah!”
“I was looking for a reason to try this new recipe—testing
it for when we have new residents eating with us until their homes are built,”
Rosetta explained. “And what better reason could I have than you? We made the
dough last night and kept it in the refrigerator, which shortened the process
this morning.”
“You can stir up the glaze, if you’d like, ” Mattie said,
gesturing toward a bowl of powdered sugar with a measuring cup of milk beside
it. “We’d never think you were shirking, Deborah. You’re not made that way.”
Deborah was so stunned that she could only gawk at them.
“You—you baked these rolls for me?”
Rosetta grinned as she placed crisp strips of bacon on a
platter. “I call it planning for happiness,” she said, her brown eyes
sparkling. “We’ve been so busy, working to keep everyone clothed and fed while
we’re putting our new settlement together, that it’s time to celebrate our
progress—and your visit! All work and no play will make us dull girls.”
“And cranky,” Mattie added with a laugh. “We were all
getting a little crisp around the edges, so it’s time to ease up. To count our
blessings.”
“Jah, God didn’t create His world without taking a break,
and neither should we,” Christine reasoned as she spooned coffee into the
percolator basket. “And now we’ve got a head start on tomorrow’s breakfast,
too.”
“If you hide some of these rolls where the men won’t find
them,” Mattie added with a laugh.
As the three sisters gazed fondly at her, Deborah’s heart
swelled with gratitude. “It’s so gut to see you all again,” she murmured.
“Things haven’t been the same at home without you and the girls.”
“We’ve missed you, too, dear,” Mattie said wistfully. “While
we believe we’ve done the right thing by starting a new colony, it’s been
harder than we anticipated to leave our friends behind.”
My Review:
I do not often read books known to have a religious flair to them, I am more into paranormal and romance. At first I passed this book up, but the more I thought about the blurb the more I wanted to read it. The blurb just made this book intriguing to me. Now that I am finished with the book, I must admit, I am so glad I changed my mind. I will also be looking into other books like this one.
I really enjoyed the book and would love this to turn into a series. I would love to know more of the story on how the Promise Lodge turns out once it is really up and running. I made friends with the characters in this book the few days I spent reading it.
Contrary to my belief when I first looked at this book, there really was not that much religion in the book. And I have nothing against religion, after all my Father was a ordained minister. I just usually find that religion based books are usually more of a Sunday sermon then a story. This book was a wonderful story.
In the book 3 Old Order Amish sisters, 2 are widows one is a Maidel, their children and a friend who happens to be a Preacher, all sell their farms and buy property to start their own colony. Which causes lots of slack with their friends they left behind as well as their religious leaders in their old colony. The family and friend set out to make their wish for a new colony come true. The property they buy used to be a old church camp. There is a large lodge house, several cabins, barns and more but everything need lots of repairs. As they all work on the place another old friend shows up. Deborah is also one of the boys ex-fiance.
As the story goes on, you get to see if Noah and Deborah work out their problems, if they are able to fix up the old camp and make a go of their dreams. It really is a very good story.
I really hope Ms. Hubbard decides to make a series out of this book. I would be the first one to read it if she did.
I was given my copy in exchange for a honest review. And honestly, I really really enjoyed this book.
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AUTHOR Bio and Links:
Many moons
ago—like, in 1983 while she was still a school librarian—Charlotte Hubbard sold
her first story to True Story. This launched her into writing around seventy of
those “true confessions” stories over the years, and she’s been a slave to her
overactive imagination ever since. Over the course of her writing career, she
has sold nearly 50 books—most recently, Amish romance series she’s written as
Charlotte Hubbard or Naomi King.
Charlotte lived
in Missouri for most of her life, so her Amish stories are set in imaginary
Missouri towns. These days she lives in St. Paul, MN with her husband of 40
years and their Border collie, Ramona.
BUY LINKS
Promise Lodge,
Book 1
Zebra (February
26, 2016)
ISBN-13:
9781420139419 •• ISBN-10: 142013941X
Click on these
links to buy this book now!
Ebook:
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GIVEAWAY INFORMATION
Charlotte will be awarding a $15 Amazon
or B/N GC to a randomly drawn winner via rafflecopter during the tour, and a
$25 Amazon or B/N GC to a randomly drawn host.
