The Roll of the Drums (The Amish of Weaver’s Creek Book #2)
Weaver’s Creek, Ohio, seems far from the civil war that devastates many families across the country in 1863. Yet even the Amish people of Weaver’s Creek are affected by the war; one or two young men have left to fight or to serve in military hospitals. However, it is not until Gideon Fischer arrives with his exhausted family and dying wife that the Weaver family face the damages civil war can cause even to quiet farming communities like theirs.
They immediately offer hospitality to the Fischers. Their daughter Ruby Weaver tends Gideon’s wife, Lovinia, and becomes her close friend until her death. She also cares for the Fischer’s four small children. Before she dies, Lovinia asks Gideon to promise to marry Ruby rather than living alone. She tries to extract a similar promise from Ruby: to marry Gideon and care for the children.
Ruby promises to consider it. She does not plan to marry, but she quickly comes to love the children and has an intuitive understanding of them and their behaviour after their mother’s death. Gideon cannot imagine loving anyone as he has loved Lovinia; he cannot see a way out of his grief.
This historical romance is a thoughtfully crafted love story. The reader follows the growing love between Gideon and Ruby, and Ruby’s love for Gideon’s children. We also see the gentle Amish love expressed by the Weaver family as they care for a family of six arriving as strangers in need. However, a fugitive band of raiders threatens to wreck the peace of the community. Amish beliefs are keenly observed and effectively expressed in this novel. It reads like an intricate tapestry of love set against a counterpoint of evil.
