Gathering the Threads (The Amish of Summer Grove #3) by Cindy Woodsmall from WaterBrook Multnomah Publishing

My thoughts: The concluding book of the Amish of Summer Grove series, Gathering the Threads, takes an already unusual story for "Amish fiction" and packs a powerful ending as the threads of this group of people thoroughly mended together by family, life, faith, and community are finally sewn together into one beautiful finality.

This is not your typically sweet, quaint story of the people who are of Amish Christian beliefs and live in their strict community. It is one where the outside world has already broken the barriers and now openings to customs, people, problems, thought processes, and solutions so very different from their own bring to the forefront issues long buried or tolerated. And yet into their own rigidly  controlled faith community where the Bishop's rule overrides all thought and even Biblical injunctions, they find that they still have obligations to the laws that government people of all communities.

Interestingly, Gathering the Threads is also a story about an awakening to social injustices and a move to secure the protection of those abused in their homes. There is a need for change and a need for forgiveness.

And there is love or romance that is tenderly woven through and it is, of course, quite discrete and definitely a good, clean read.

While Gathering the Threads, can surely be read as a stand-alone book, it will be more enjoyable to read books one and two in the series. I personally recommend you read the books in succession simply because they are all good reads and worth delving into.

About the book: After three months of draus in da Welt, Ariana has returned to Summer Grove, the Old Order Amish community where she was raised for twenty years, and life with her Brenneman family. Skylar Nash, the Englisch-raised young woman is working in Ariana s cafe while getting to know her birth family and their Plain way of life. Skylar's time in Summer Grove has changed her outlook, just as Ariana has grown to see her personal faith in God in a different light than the manner she was taught while growing up. Both women will have to make decisions about their paths and Ariana must decide what role her childhood friend, ex-Amish Quill Schlabach, will play in her life.
Gathering the Threads is the third and final novel in the Amish of Summer Grove series."

Preorder at http://waterbrookmultnomah.com/pre-order
Book release date: August 15, 2017

About the author: Cindy Woodsmall is a New York Times and CBA bestselling author of numerous works of fiction and one of nonfiction. Her connection with the Amish community has been featured widely in national media. She lives in the foothills of the North Georgia Mountains with her family. Learn more at cindywoodsmall.com.

DISCLOSURE: I received a complimentary copy from WaterBrook Multnomah Publishing to facilitate a review. Opinions are my own and freely given.