I took this novel on holiday with me, thinking to read it in an evening or two. It kept me reading three or four, it has a lot to say, and I learnt a lot of history while engrossed in the story of Ada Rupp who we first met in The Amish Midwife (equally good). Ada is in love with widower Will Gundy, but Will seems to be courting Leah. Ada is set to become a teacher at a nearby Amish school, when away at her sister’s wedding, she hears that Leah has been given ‘her’ job. Not a happy state of affairs, so when she is asked to represent her family in Switzerland where her Mother lives, she realises that God has other plans for her, and accepts willingly. The journey is necessary to resolve a question of land ownership and an agreement, long lost, between Ada’s and Will’s ancestors and a question of saving for posterity an historical Anabaptist site or a hydro-electric plant being built there, desecrating the area for ever. The fictional story is gripping, but it weaves around historical sites and happenings of which I knew nothing. Totally absorbing.