ABOUT THE AUTHOR:
I’m Elizabeth, a blessed child of The King. I’m a middle-born daughter, military officer’s wife, homeschooling mama, writer, closet DIYer, and, dare I say it, Downton Abbey addict. May I also mention that I love both my history and my coffee rich.
I am formerly Amish and my heritage is very dear to me and thankful to be so accepted among my still Amish family. I can still speak PA Dutch, too! You can learn more about my Amish family in my first book Seasons: A Real Story of an Amish Girl.
My three book series with Howard Books (a division of Simon & Schuster) is a dream come true. The series is titled The Promise of Sunrise. In this series you will live through World War 2 from an Amish perspective and experience their unique struggles as conscientious objectors during wartime. What happened if one of their members enlisted? What was it like to serve at the Civilian Public Service Camps for years with almost no compensation? How did Amish women and families cope when a son or father was drafted? I look forward to taking you back into the richness of these years of Amish history through fiction.
ABOUT THE BOOK
Orphaned as a child, Esther Detweiler is used to caring for herself and her ailing grandmother. They made the best out of a hard life and poverty without asking for help. They even take in her shunned cousin’s deaf daughter, Daisy, when her mother dies and her father goes off to war. When Esther’s grandmother dies, Daisy is all she has.
When war veteran Joe Garrison returns, all he can think about is recovering from the horrors of war and building a relationship with his seven-year-old daughter. Daisy, however, is unwilling to leave Esther, whom she loves. Joe and Daisy get to know each other again, but Joe struggles with nightmares and fatherhood is proving to be more difficult than he imagined. Esther loves Daisy and despite her Amish ways, Joe finds himself drawn to her as a woman and not just a caregiver.
As their love blossoms, Joe decides to send Daisy away to a school for the deaf which propels their lives into turmoil and a battle for love and family.
My Thoughts:
“Don’t look for your
answers; just wait for them. Now rest.” (p. 334)
Esther Detweiler had reached the end of herself by the time
her friend uttered these words. So much loss, and pain, so much relational
hardship and confusion – Esther has been through much. Fostering a friend’s deaf child, having her
father practically come back from the dead, falling in love with someone
suffering from PTSD, there are few tragedy’s that have passed by Esther’s life.
However, in all of these trials, she has hung onto God’s
promise that everything in her life serves a greater purpose. A higher
purpose. She places her faith in that
promise, and when she is told to rest and wait for her answers, she realizes
that she has been striving a long time to find the answers she seeks. What her answers will be is uncertain, but
she is finally able to rest while she waits.
Elizabeth Byler Younts brings a unique perspective to Amish
fiction as the Amish faith is part of her life history. Promise
to Keep brings The Promise of Sunrise
series to a close, and does so with a solid message of hope in the face of very
realistic life challenges that all readers will be able to identify with on
some level. Readers will fall in love
with Younts’ characters and will be sad to see the series come to a close.
I am happy to recommend this book and entire
series to readers who enjoy realistic and faith challenging fiction!
If you would like to read the first chapter of Promise to Keep, go HERE.
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