Blood Of The Prodigal

It began in a small town of Millsburg in the Amish Community of Holmes County. Here the Old Order Amish still reign amid the local English people in keeping their separate lives as they can. Until today.

Jonah Miller was part of the Old Order, but what some would call a dreamer of a young student who puts too tight of a roll on his trouser cuffs and ended up living a life of smoking, drinking, fast-living scoundrel who deserted his pregnant girl friend, drove her to suicide, kidnapped his own son ten years later, and is being hunted by his father who shunned him, and by the girl's brother, who has vowed to kill him.

The only person who seems to have a clue to what is going on is Bishop Eli Miller who has hired an English professor to find his grandson. His only beginning to his search is a letter that the Bishop has handed him with the promise not to involve the local police and respect the Amish custom for privacy.

The note reads:

Dear Father.

I want my boy to see some of the world. You'll have him back in time for harvest. Do not try to find us.

Jonah.

Will the Professor be able to locate the Jonah and return his grandson back to the Bishop? Has the boy truly been kidnapped? Who has something to gain by taking Jeremiah from the Bishop?

To find out, read the latest novel, Blood of the Prodigal by P.L. Gaus, an Amish Country Mystery. I received this book, compliments of Christian Fiction Blog Alliance for my honest review and must say, I did not see how this one would turn out. I was pleasantly surprises when a great Christian Amish mystery can hold you captive until the very last suspense-filled moment. You'll love this book if you're a fan of Christian, Amish or Mystery Books. This one rates 5 out of 5 stars.

This book is the first in a new series of Amish-Country Mystery's and is available in paperback format. Here's even more information about the book, the author and even a first chapter sneak peek.

This week, the Christian Fiction Blog Alliance is introducing Blood of the Prodigal Plume; Reprint edition (September 28, 2010) by P.L. Gaus
ABOUT THE AUTHOR:

Paul took an interest in writing fiction in 1993, and with the advice and encouragement of author Tony Hillerman, he began writing mystery novels set among the Amish in Holmes County, Ohio. The first of Gaus's mysteries, Blood of the Prodigal, An Ohio Amish Mystery, was published by Ohio University Press in June of 1999, and a total of six novels have appeared in this series: Broken English, 2000, Clouds Without Rain, 2001, Cast a Blue Shadow, 2003, A Prayer for the Night, 2006, and Separate from the World, 2008. A seventh novel in the series is in preparation.

All of Paul's stories have now been republished by Plume (a division of Penguin Group USA) as The Amish-Country Mysteries, and these editions have been embraced by Christian retailers such as CBD.com, Family Christian Stores, and LifeWay. Future mysteries in the series will still first be published in hard cover editions, as The Amish-Country Mysteries by Ohio University Press, with Plume bringing out the soft cover editions some time later.

Paul and his wife Madonna still travel frequently in Holmes County. He lectures widely about Amish culture at libraries, bookstores, literary societies, and the like, and his books have been featured at Book Expo America and similar professional shows around the country. Paul's novels have been reviewed in prominent journals and newspapers, for instance, Kirkus Reviews, ForeWord Magazine, Publishers Weekly, Library Journal, Booklist, Ohioana Quarterly, and the New York Times Book Review.

ABOUT THE BOOK

For Jonah Miller, shunned by his Old Order sect and cast into the wider world, the summer begins with his decision to kidnap his ten-year-old son from the home of the bishop who had exiled Miller a decade earlier. In his desperation to retrieve the boy, the bishop appeals for help to the only "English" men the sect would ever approve.

Professor Michael Branden and Pastor Caleb Troyer had been looking forward to the kind of sleepy rural summer they had enjoyed as boyhood friends growing up in the small college town of Millersburg. Instead, they plunge into the normally closed Amish culture to find the boy. When the kidnapping leads to murder, they can no longer keep the case from the law. Working sometimes at cross purposes with his friend Sheriff Bruce Robertson, Professor Branden digs through the past to uncover truths that many would prefer to leave undisturbed. Little does he suspect that even the anguished bishop, torn by an insoluble moral dilemma, tragically does not tell everything he knows about the case. Suddenly the vast tangle of Amish and Mennonite settlements that sprawl among several thousand small farms and homesteads seems less bucolic than unknowable and impenetrable.

As they inquire delicately among the peaceful ones, Branden and Troyer learn that the troubles of Jonah Miller began far earlier than the kidnapping, with his Rumschpringe - the customary wild year before taking Amish vows. But his grand Rumschpringe had exploded into a decade of drugs, whiskey, and women, in the company of people no Amish person should meet.

In the tradition of Tony Hillerman, P. L. Gaus depicts a culture that successfully stands outside the mainstream yet interacts with it in complex and fascinating ways, a culture that is every bit as susceptible to the undertow of the human spirit as any we might know.

If you would like to read the first chapter of Blood of the Prodigal, go HERE