Saturday Reads - Lancaster

Today's book is based in Lancaster County, and is probably the book that helped put Lancaster County on the radar of most people. For some people it is also the best and worst of Lancaster Co. It is everything kitsch, and it is what defines Lancaster County.

The Shunning follows the story of Katie Lapp, an Amish woman who longs for more, but because of her Amish community, feels constrained. As the series progresses, the character learns she is not Amish by birth, but by adoption, and she proceeds to seek her birth mother ... and find herself.

The story follows, in essence, the standard coming-of-age storyline where the main character must find herself both inwardly through her desires and dreams, and outwardly through her community and chosen path.

To that end, the story is an enjoyable read. It isn't a mystery with dead bodies, but it is an exploration of what it means to be English and Amish. The author, Beverly Lewis, is from Lancaster County, so she writes about a world she knows.

I first read this book while in high school. Oddly enough, I finished a good portion of the Amish romances before they became what they are. For me, the books by Beverly Lewis, the author of The Shunning, was a whiff of home while I was away. Many of the books, The Shunning and its two sequels, The Confession and The Reckoning came out in the mid-nineties, just about the time I moved from Lancaster area to Western NY. My personal favorite series, Summerhill Secrets, is currently out-of-print, but I will discuss that series at another date.

As I said before, The Shunning practically defined the Christian Amish romance genre: main character is Amish, may or may not remain Amish, but the romance is chaste, and the apple streudel fresh from the stove. The ones who are not Amish find peace and healing among the Amish community, and while they rarely become Amish, they feel as though they have discovered family.

I stopped reading most of the Amish romances about the time they started kicking off among the rest of the Christian community. For me, they had become predictable, and if there is one thing to be said against the genre, is its predictability. We know that the main character will ultimately remain among her people (unless of course, like Katie, her people aren't her people). In The Shunning and The Redemption of Sarah Cain, Beverly Lewis does a good job of exploring the relationships between the two peoples: Amish and non-Amish, whom they call English. I'll discuss The Redemption of Sarah Cain later. Beverly Lewis has written several books set in Lancaster County, so you'll hear about her often.


One other aside about the Amish genre: many of them take place outside Lancaster County. In fact, a good majority of them only refer to Lancaster in passing. Part of the reason is that the Amish community is moving away from Lancaster (this has always been a problem, and is nothing new), but if you want to find the heart of Amish country, Lancaster is still your best bet. You can visit it through the novels by Beverly Lewis, or you can visit if physically ... or find the film at your local bookstore or library