Somewhere To Belong By Judith Miller

Just out of curiosity, have any of you heard of the Amana Colonies? Anyone? If you know what they are, bravo. If you don't, well, neither did I. I had heard of them, but didn't know really what they were . . . and who they were.

Somewhere To Belong changed that.

Welcome to the Amana Colonies. Where hard-working Johanna tries to do her best, even as she wonders about her brother in the outside world. Where newcomer Berta struggles to quell her rebellion and discover where her fun-loving spirit fits.

Where secrets lie buried. Secrets that will change everything both Johanna and Berta thought true.

I love Judith Miller's writing style. She gets me inside a character's head from page one. Besides that, her characters are so vibrant and full of quirks that I can't help but follow their adventures to the last page. Even Berta. While Berta's rebellion and attitude could get up on my very last nerve, I'd still stick with her, because I knew why she was acting that way.

As I mentioned above, I knew very little about the Amana Colonies going into this book. I was quickly immersed in their culture, a very intriguing culture. But not only that, it takes us into the reasons this group of Christians formed their hard-working and seemingly strict colonies. It takes us into a community of believers trying to do their best to worship God. It's inspiring.

Somewhere To Belong also shows the reality of dishonesty. Nowhere do we see that keeping secrets never hurt anyone or that you can tell a lie for the right reasons. We see the reasons the characters were motivated to lie and we see the consequences.

I'd say that Somewhere To Belong belongs on my bookshelf.