For Every Season by Cindy Woodsmall

Cindy Woodsmall is one of my top Amish fiction authors to read.  She has never disappointed me and I don't expect that she ever will.  The Amish Vines and Orchards Series have been fabulous and are written well.  Cindy Woodsmall paints beautiful pictures with her words and leaves me feeling like I'm on the Amish farms right in the midst of these characters.  I'm glad that another book is coming out in this series because I'm not ready to say goodbye to the Byler family yet.  I don't suspect that I'll ever be glad for this series to end!

This is the third book in the Amish Vines and Orchards series.  It picks up with the family moved to Maine and trying to start their orchard there.  Rhoda is left feeling lonely and feeling as though she must go home to be free of the tension between Samuel and Jacob King.  Rhoda just can't seem to let go of the orchard, though.  It's her passion and what she was born to do.  

Jacob is hiding some things from his past that if he would only share with Rhoda, then she could understand why he goes missing for days at a time.  He was who she was supposed to marry, but without him explaining his leave of absences, it's left her wondering if she knows him at all.  Since Jacob's brother, Samuel, is left picking up the pieces while Jacob is away, he begins to form a relationship with Rhoda.  So the next book will probably reveal who she chooses, or at least I hope it does!

I liked both of the guys so I'm having a really hard time deciding who she would be happier with.  I liked Jacob because he was first but I just wanted him to tell her where he's been!  I admired Samuel for being there to comfort Rhoda when she felt unloved and I liked watching his love for her come as a surprise.  

The most helpful part of this book is the very first pages, which offer a review of what happened in the first and second books so far.  I think every book in a series needs to have this.  It's so hard to keep track of what happened when so much time passes between a book in the series.  Usually, I have to hunt down the first book and peruse the pages to jog my memory.  I liked that I didn't have to search my shelves and it was right there for me to read.  Please do this in every book for every author! 

Now...to wait until April 2014.  

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I received this book free from Waterbrook Publishers in exchange for my honest opinion of this book.