Instead of trying to find your perfect match in a dating
app, we bring you the βAuthor-Reader Match,β where we introduce readers to authors you may
fall in love with. It's our great pleasure to present Jolina Petersheim!
Writes:
My father was raised Mennonite in Lancaster, Pennsylvania;
my mother Brethren, and I grew up as a caretakerβs daughter on a sprawling Civil Warβera
farm/camp in western Tennessee. This combination allowed me to see the intricaciesβand
complicationsβof community, so I love placing my characters inside morally twisting novels
and then watching how they find their way out. (My newest novel,
How the Light Gets In
, might be the most morally
twisting to date.)
About:
I am happily married to a βstrong, quiet typeβ mountain man
and mother to our three fluffy-haired little girls, ages six, four, and one. Weβve lived in five
different homes in ten years of marriage (one a solar-powered farmhouse in Wisconsin, where
How the Light
Gets In is set). My husbandβwho also has
a Mennonite/Amish backgroundβis busy building our sixth house in the foothills of the
Cumberland Plateau in Tennessee.
We strive to live with the same simplistic, family-oriented
mindset as our ancestors, but due to our many moves and my husbandβs four-year health
journey, right now we donβt even have chickens. But, by George, one day soon I am going to
have another flock of Araucana hens (they lay gorgeous sage-green eggs) and possibly some
hair sheep (you donβt have to shear that kind). If I were not so obsessed with stories, I would
want to be a midwife because I love to nurture women in all areas of life/birth. The goal that
drives me is to live each day to the fullest and to keep my eyes open so I donβt miss one
glimpse of this beautifully challenging world.
What Iβm looking for in my ideal reader match:
You enjoy going deep fast (no water cooler talk for you!). You
are determined, fiery, and love to ask questionsβand the more detailed the answer, the better
because you see a larger narrative connecting everything.
You enjoy conversing with someone who doesnβt hold their
cards close to their chest, but if they do, you enjoy the challenge of getting them to put their
cards on the table. People fascinate you. You believe we are all artists, because we were
formed in the image of the greatest Artist, and you enjoy encouraging others to go for their
dreams because someone who is pursuing the desires of their heart will find that is the
moment their hearts come most alive. Oh, you also must love to be outside and to laugh!
What to expect if weβre compatible:
Loyalty, fun, Tuesday morning coffee dates (Tuesdays are
when my mom watches my girls so I can βgo to townβ and write). Thrift store shopping
adventures. Long hikes filled with laughter and discussions about faith, art, and love.
***
From the highly acclaimed author of
The Outcast andΒ
The AllianceΒ comes an
engrossing novel about marriage and motherhood, loss and moving on.
When Ruth Neufeldβs husband and father-in-law are killed working for a relief organization
overseas, she travels to Wisconsin with her young daughters and mother-in-law Mabel to bury
her husband. She hopes the Mennonite community will be a quiet place to grieve and piece
together next steps.
Ruth and her family are welcomed by Elam, her husbandβs cousin, who invites them to stay at
his cranberry farm through the harvest. Sifting through fields of berries and memories of a
marriage that was broken long before her husband died, Ruth finds solace in the beauty of the
land and healing through hard work and budding friendship. She also encounters the
possibility of new love with Elam, whose gentle encouragement awakens hopes and dreams
she thought sheβd lost forever.
But an unexpected twist threatens to unseat the happy ending Ruth is about to write for
herself. On the precipice of a fresh start and a new marriage, Ruth must make an impossible
decision: which path to choose if her husband isnβt dead after all.
Romance | Inspirational
Romance | Amish [Tyndale House Publishers, On Sale: March 5, 2019, Trade Size / e-
Book, ISBN: 9781496402233 / eISBN: 9781496434579]
Jolina Petersheim is the highly acclaimed author of How the Light Gets In, The Divide, The
Alliance, The Midwife, and The Outcast, which Library Journal called βoutstanding . . . fresh
and inspirationalβ in a starred review and named one of the best books of 2013. That book
also became an ECPA, CBA, and Amazon bestseller and was featured in Huffington Postβs Fall
Picks, USA Today, Publishers Weekly, and the Tennessean. CBA Retailers + Resources called
her second book, The Midwife, βan excellent read [that] will be hard to put down,β and Booklist
selected The Alliance as one of their Top 10 Inspirational Fiction Titles for 2016. The Alliance
was also a finalist for the 2017 Christy Award in the visionary category. The sequel to The
Alliance, The Divide, won the 2018 INSPY Award for speculative fiction. Jolinaβs nonfiction
writing has been featured in Readerβs Digest, Writerβs Digest, Todayβs Christian Woman, and
Proverbs 31 Ministries. She and her husband share the same unique Amish and Mennonite
heritage that originated in Lancaster County, Pennsylvania, but they now live in the mountains
of Tennessee with their three young daughters.
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