Waiting for Summer's Return

This was well written and very engaging! I read it over one weekend and couldn't put out down! On a personal note, I enjoyed reading about the Kansas environment as much of my maternal family settled there and I've visited there with still many Mennonites residing and farming there. A very good read!

Kim Vogel Sawyer created a believable story of a mother and wife suffering the pangs of grief after the loss of her four children and husband. Summer Steadman finds herself alone in a small Mennonite community in Gaeddart, Kansas during the fall of 1894. So deep in mourning that she finds food repugnant, she has allowed her body to become weakened. Her soul has become as emaciated as her body. No longer sure that God loves her or anyone else, Summer's only real wish is to join her family in death. It seems God has other plans for her, though. Peter Ollenburger, a local gristmill owner, is in need of a teacher for his son, Thomas. Since the young boy is housebound after an accident resulting in broken ribs and can't ride his horse to school, he is falling behind in his studies. Peter's wife, Elsa, would be the logical choice to be his teacher, but she died six years earlier. Peter needs someone to live on his property and give the boy his lessons until he is fully recovered. After learning that Summer Steadman has lost her family to illness and has need of a position, he proposes that she come live in his home as Thomas's teacher. When objections to the impropriety of the situation are brought to his attention, Peter agrees that Summer could live in his shariah rather than in the house with the family. Wanting only to be close to the graves of her family, Summer accepts Peter's proposition and moves to his property. What awaits the reader of Waiting for Summer's Return is a journey of relationship renewals. Summer and Peter both travel the path toward new knowledge of people and God. The trip is filled with bumps and ruts much like the road to the town of Gaeddart. As Thomas grows to know his temporary teacher, his affection for her grows to become the love of a child for a mother. Neither Summer nor Peter had planned on this complication. What are they to do? How will God orchestrate the symphony of their lives? Kim Vogel Sawyer's writing is a joy to read. Her characters catch the reader's heart. It is hard to put the book down in order to carry on with life. Waiting for Summer's Return is one of those books you will want to keep reading to the point where the dishes will stack up in the sink and the laundry will go unwashed because you have to read just one more chapter. And that chapter leads to another and then another. Go ahead read those chapters. The dishes and the laundry will be there when you finish the book.

I have to admit that I've read this "story" before. We all have. The grief-stricken widow finds new hope through a widower and his son. HOWEVER, Kim Sawyer has brushed freshness over the plot and inserted twists that erase predictability. Also her writing style is perfection. Waiting for Summer's Return is high on my recommended list.

A Poignant, Tender Story! Kim Sawyer has created a real world and peopled it with unforgettable characters. Summer Steadman, a grieving young widow, is stranded in a small Mennonite town in Kansas in the late 1800's. Peter Ollenburger, a big bear of a man, comes to her rescue. He invites her to stay in his home and tutor his young son, Thomas. Grossmutter lends respectability to the arrangement, but still some of the Mennonites in the community resent the outsider's presence. Problems arise when some of their neighbors accuse Peter of living in sin with the woman. They threaten to cast Peter out of the community if he doesn't send her away. But Peter stands up to the townspeople, refusing to force her to leave. Summer doubts a God who let her husband and young children die. Peter tries to help her understand that God loves her in spite of the fact that he has allowed her to suffer losses. While Summer respects Peter, she is not attracted to him at first. And he still mourns his beloved Elsa. But as Summer's faith grows, she becomes more and more attached to the boy, Thomas--and to his gentle father. And Peter--with a little mild nudging from Thomas and Grossmutter, finds himself falling in love with Summer. Don't pass up this beautiful, story, woven by a master story-teller.

Summer Steadman finds herself stranded in a small Mennonite town in Kansas in the late 1800's after her husband and four young children die of Typhoid. When Summer tries to find a job in the town, widower Peter Ollenburger is the only person, it seems, who is willing to extend her any kindness. He shows up at her hotel to ask her if she would stay on his property and tutor to his nine-year-old son. She has no other prospects, so she accepts. There seems to be no attraction between them at first, even though Peter's neighbors are convinced they are living in sin, even threatening to cast Peter out of the community if he does not send the woman away. But Summer has no family to turn to, and she is determined to stay near her children's gravesite. Peter refuses to force her to leave, gently but firmly standing up to the suspicious townspeople. Kim Sawyer turns in a fine writing performance with her strong, deep characters and gentle story. She uses great depth of insight in treating her delicate subject matter with deftness and reality. Though she is true to the feelings a bereft mother would naturally experience, at no time does the novel sink into despondence. Summer's reluctance to trust God again, her fear of his answering "no" to all of her prayers as he did her prayer to spare her husband and children's lives, will resonate with anyone who has gone through a tough time. I highly recommend this insightful story to all romance readers. It will strengthen your faith in God and leave you remembering the characters fondly, like friends with whom you would enjoy spending more time.

Traveling with her family from Boston to a new life in Oklahoma, Summer Steadman lived a woman's worst nightmare. Fate slammed her dream shut in Gaeddert, Kansas when typhoid fever claimed not only the life of her husband, but all four of her children. Wanting to remain near the graves of her family she sought work-- finding little in the way of employment from the small tightly bound Mennonite community. Hope came in the form of widower Peter Ollenberger, the local gristmill operator whose young son had been injured and needed a tutor to keep from falling behind in his studies. Though Summer was an `outsider' Peter was singularly devoted to providing his son the best education he could provide. Peter would brave the censure from his religious community by offering the Summer room and board for her tutoring services. With little desire to go on living, Peter slowly gave Summer a reason to believe again in the joy of life and by his example, his love of God gave her the inclination to reexamine her relationship with the almighty. While Peter's son Thomas grew attached to Summer, Peter had to determine whether he should marry again for his son's sake or for love. Summer would battle her feelings of guilt over loving another child when hers had died, and rejoice over discovering the joy of truly opening her mind and heart to God. *** Ms. Sawyer debuts with a powerful story of a mothers greatest heartbreak and search to re-discover God after he deserted her and her most fervent prayers. With the help of the widower Peter, his son Thomas, and their Grossmutter, Summer was led back to the land of living with patience and purpose in a moving and deeply emotional journey by discovering the joy of inviting Christ into her barren heart. Sawyer's depiction of the tight knit Mennonite community, their customs, living conditions, and fear of `outsiders' was all skillfully integrated into a fast paced story. This debut author hooked me from the very beginning by breathing the very life and soul into her characterizations in an engrossing and superb debut that I highly recommend. Brava! Marilyn Rondeau, member of Reviewers International Organization (RIO)