Forty-three-year-old Eleanor Stewart lives in New Mexico
as a sought
after jewelry designer. She goes home to South Haven,
Michigan after
receiving a call that her mother has suddenly passed. Her
father Jacob is
ninety-four and she intends to be there for him. Nel
leaves her boyfriend, Dr. Sam
Tucker, intending to continue the relationship but not
desiring it to be
permanent. After the funeral Jakob breaks a hip in a fall
and requires
surgery, making Nel re-think her position in returning to
New Mexico with
concern for her father uppermost in her mind.
Jakob has increasing dementia with disturbing nightmares.
He is an
accomplished gemologist, cutting the various gems to
acquire excellence
in color and shine. Deciding to use his older equipment,
Nel continues
her trade and fills her special jewelry orders from her
father's home. Nel
revives her friendship with David Butler, her high school
prom date, along
with their close neighbor Mattie and the three manage to
nurse Jakob
back to health. In the process, Nel discovers a rare cup
which hides an
even rarer stone, resembling the Star of David design.
Finding research
her mother had started, she begins to uncover her father's
history as she
finds a letter from Immigration with pictures of two young
boys. She is
heartbroken at realizing the two Maevski Jewish brothers,
Jakob and
Peter, deflected from Ukraine, under Russia's influence,
where the
Holocaust was beginning at the time. Adopted in New York
by the
Stewarts, the boys began a new life away from the Jewish
horrors left
behind. Nel would only be horrified when she leventually
earns the whole
story from her father of their trek to the U.S. and the
horrible events they
witnessed and left behind before their adoption at the
ages of Jacob's four
and Peter's fourteen.
THEN SINGS MY SOUL is the most phenomenal and heartrending
story I have ever read.
This struck my heart and soul and will remain in my memory
forever. The
horrific treatment of the Jews during the holocaust will
never be forgotten.
Amy K. Sorrells could not have described the events
happening with more
authenticity and description than she did. If this story
doesn't "get" you,
no others will. I could not stop crying and cannot stop
thinking of this
tale. It was so well written that I felt I too, was
living through the hell
forced upon the Jewish. Some things are just so horrible
to witness that I
could barely fathom. Kudos to this extremely talented
author for a truly
outstanding novel. THEN SINGS MY SOUL has to be one of
the most difficult novels I have
ever read, but absolutely could not put down.
When Nel Stewart returns home due to the sudden death of
her mother, she realizes her beloved father, Jakob, is
struggling with dementia.
With the reappearance of a high-school sweetheart,
deliveries from Ukraine addressed to her, and the
discovery of a mysterious, vintage aquamarine gemstone,
Nel senses God is pulling her into the past to restore
their faith and their futures. Told partially through
Jakob\'s flashbacks of fleeing genocide-ridden eastern
Europe at the turn of the twentieth century, the novel
combines elements of mystery, history, faith and romance
to reveal how God redeems the broken years ... and our
future.