Katie's Choice

GIVEAWAY

LILLARD, AMY
KATIE'S CHOICE

Katie Rose Fisher loved Samuel Beachy with an intensity that shook their Amish district. No one doubted they would one day marry, until Samuel turned his back on the church and joined the world of the English.

Alone now in Clover Ridge, Katie Rose dedicates her life to God and the school children she teaches each day. Although she secretly longs for more, Katie knows God’s hand is at work, and she is happy.

News correspondent Zane Carson never even knew Oklahoma had an Amish community until he got the chance to live among them and learn about their day-to-day activities. Their simple way of life is intriguing, but not half as much as the young teacher.

Katie Rose is flattered over the attention she receives from Zane, but she has resolved to never marry. Even if she were to entertain the idea, it surely couldn’t be with an outsider like Zane.

Never one prone to the restraints of organized religion, Zane finds a comfort in the rituals and blessings in the day to day righteous living of this small Amish community. He finds himself, God, and love with Katie Rose.

But as Zane draws closer to Katie Rose, Samuel comes back to repent his ways and return to his place at her side. Can Zane convince Katie Rose that he is committed to adapting to her way of life, or will Samuel win her affections back for himself once again?

My Review:

First off, take a gander at that cover. Doesn’t the pink just pop out at you? I think the colour attracted me before anything else. You don’t see many pink covers in a CBA lineup and this one just made it irresistible. There has to be some science in book cover colour marketing – if there isn’t someone should study up on it because the pink sold me on this book before I even noticed it was Amish or read the back blurb.

Lillard is a new Amish author for me. This is the second in a series and I somehow missed the first, Saving Gideon. I found it an easy story to slip into and the solid cast of secondary characters makes me want to backtrack and read the first book but I didn’t find  Katie's Choice lacking in any way because I hadn’t read the first one.

The author has created a next to impossible love story that supplied plenty of yearning in my sensitive reader’s heart while keeping me captivated. I found it interesting that she chose to begin with the hero’s point of view. In fact, we aren’t even introduced to Katie until about 15 pages in.  It definitely gave me a vested interest in Zane and I liked having a solid lead on the heroine where the hero was concerned.

Zane is a complex character with an intriguing past that at first seems completely at odds with plain living. It is when we delve into his childhood that we begin to see how his upbringing wasn’t so very different from Kate’s and that provides a realistic base for the rest of the story.

I confess to being an armchair Amish ‘scholar’; most of my knowledge gleaned from fiction reading and internet searches. Obviously, I’m no expert, but I did feel that a few aspects of Zane and Kate’s story didn’t ring true to what I’ve learned about the Amish. Admittedly, this Amish community is in Oklahoma and I do know that standards and rules vary from one settlement to the next, but there were still a few scenes that I questioned. They definitely worked in the grand love story scheme of things, but I’m not so sure they have a solid Amish backing to them. It would certainly make a great discussion for a book club though!

Giveway Opportunity:

 If you would like an opportunity to win a copy of Katie's Choice, please leave a comment below or email me at kavluvstoreadATyahooDOTca. If you post a comment and add your email address, please use AT and DOT instead of @ and . in the address to protect yourself from spammers. If you enter the draw via email please remember to put the title in the subject line so that it's easy for me to spot your entry. Draw will be held and winner announced on Sunday May 26 2013. Offer open to international readers. Good luck!