Christmas in Apple Ridge Three-in-One Collection
Book One: The Sound
of Sleigh Bells
Beth has been mourning the loss of her fiancé for over a
year. Her friends and family want her to
get beyond the grief and enter into activities and have joy in living
again. But she can’t let go of her
sadness, because she has stuffed secrets about Henry’s death. Beth’s Aunt Lizzy is afraid Beth will be an
old maid, like herself, and miss out on the joys of sharing life with a
family. Lizzy concocts a plan to get
Beth writing Jonah, a wood carver, (whom Beth has never met and she thinks is
an old man), because Lizzy knows Jonah has wisdom to share about surviving loss
and pain.
Lizzy’s plan seems to be working: Beth has renewed interest in life and has
released her secrets to Jonah. But what
will happen when Beth finds out that Jonah is not an old man and she has been
“tricked” into sharing her pain?
Book Two: The
Christmas Singing
I had read The Christmas Singing previously, but I found it
more enjoyable to read this time because of knowing the characters and their
stories already started in Book One.
Mattie has just come to Apple Ridge after her bakery shop in
Ohio burned to the ground. The move puts
her back in the vicinity of Gideon, her first love, who broke up with her four
years ago, letting her believe that he wanted to date non-Amish girls. She didn't know his real reason for breaking
up was to protect her from knowing about him having leukemia, which he did not
expect to survive. In the meantime, she
has a safe, boring relationship with someone else that she hopes would never
hurt her. Should she “settle” for Sol,
or find out what Gideon was and is thinking?
Book Three: The Dawn
of Christmas
In The Dawn of Christmas, Sadie has been lied about by her
fiancé Daniel, whom she caught with her beautiful cousin the day before their
planned wedding day. Broken-hearted, she
moved away from Apple Ridge, learned to be independent and developed a love for
mission trips to Peru.
On a visit to her family, she discovers Levi, injured from
being thrown from a spooked horse. Her
actions save his life and make him eternally grateful to her. They both have sworn off marriage, but they
decide to pretend to be courting to keep their families from bugging them about
their singleness. What will happen when
they find out they love each other at the same time they realize Levi’s brother
Daniel is the one by whom Sadie was betrayed?
I enjoyed reading these books. I like the 3-in-1 version of a series,
because of the continuity of the story line, and getting to read the next one
right away before I forget the characters.
I received the Kindle version of these books for free from
WaterBrook/Multnomah Publishers in exchange for my honest review.
