Amish Fiction Mystery

The quaint Indiana town of Pleasant Creek is bustling with activity as Christmas draws near. Boston native and innkeeper, Liz Eckardt, is learning to embrace her new home's holiday traditions and welcomes the slower-paced life at the heart of Amish country. The little town is brimming with yuletide cheer, and the brisk air is filled with the smell of freshly baked Christmas cookies and the merry sounds of carolers.

In this first book of a three-book series, author Vannetta Chapman brings a fresh twist to the popular Amish fiction genre. She blends the familiar components consumers love in Amish books - faith, community, simplicity, family - with an innovative who-done-it plot that keeps readers guessing right up to the last stitch in the quilt. When two women - one Amish, one English - each with different motives, join forces to organize a successful on-line quilt auction, neither expects nor wants a friendship.

*** Amazon #1 Best Selling Author *** He’s Amish. She’s not. Each is looking for a change. What happens when God brings them together? Elijah Troyer is eighteen years old when he decides to go on a delayed Rumspringa, an Amish tradition when adolescents venture out into the world to decide whether they want to continue their life in the Amish culture or leave for the ways of the world. He has only been in the city for a month when his life suddenly takes a strange twist. Eve Campbell is a young woman in trouble with crime lords, and they will do anything to stop her from talking. ...

ver a decade ago, beloved Amish bishop Ananias Stoltzfus disappeared without a trace. When skeletal remains showing evidence of foul play are unearthed, his disappearance becomes even more sinister. The town’s elders arrive in Painters Mill to ask chief of police Kate Burkholder for help, but she quickly realizes she has a personal connection to the crime. The handsome Amish man who stands accused of the murder, Jonas Bowman, was Kate’s first love.

Calvin has been keeping a secret from his wife, but it’s not another woman. It’s a little boy. One afternoon when visiting Sarah Anne’s bookmobile, he meets Miles, a 10-year-old living with a foster family down the road. But after spending more time with the boy, Calvin learns that his foster family has no plans to adopt him. Calvin feels a connection with Miles and yearns to give the boy a home, but he’s afraid to tell Miriam, knowing she’s devastated they can’t have children of their own.

Two years ago Joseph King was convicted of murdering his wife and sentenced to life in prison. He was a "fallen" Amish man and, according to local law enforcement, a known drug user with a violent temper. Now King has escaped, and he’s headed for Painters Mill. News of a murderer on the loose travels like wildfire and putting Chief of Police Kate Burkholder and her team of officers on edge. A nightmare scenario becomes reality when King shows up with a gun and kidnaps his five children from their Amish uncle’s house. He’s armed and desperate with nothing left to lose.

When a baby - only hours old - is discovered on the Amish bishop's front porch in Painter's Mill, Ohio, Chief of Police Kate Burkholder is called in to investigate. The newborn is swaddled in an Amish crib quilt, and the only other item found with the child is a hand-carved wood rattle, which Kate also recognizes as Amish.

Daisy's worried one of her employees at Daisy's Tea Garden may be in a spot of trouble. Lately Karina's been loading up on soup and second-day baked goods at the end of her shift - and while the shop's scrumptious treats may be hard to resist, Daisy suspects there's more going on, especially since Karina has been seen hanging out in a rundown part of Willow Creek. Planning her own daughter's wedding is enough to keep her busy, but Daisy can't help feeling a protective maternal instinct - and an instinct to investigate.

Sarah Kauffman sought permission from her church elders to paint murals on a few of the Amish community's barns. Each was designed like an old-fashioned quilt square, representing a piece of the Amish traditions Sarah loved. The works of art were intended to draw more tourists to the Home Valley in the struggling economy. But instead, they invited a menace. One by one, each barn is set ablaze and destroyed.…The arson fires spread fear through the community - amongst Amish and Englischers alike. Now Sarah wonders if she's being punished for her pridefulness…or whether there's a more malevolent will at work.

The death of a teenage Amish girl in a cornfield looks like an accident, but sheriff Serenity Adams suspects foul play. To solve the murder, she must investigate the nearby Amish community with the help of a man who was shunned years ago. At first glance, the case seems obvious. The poor girl was probably accidently shot during hunting season, but when the elders of the Amish community and even the girl's parents react with uncaring subdued behavior, Serenity becomes suspicious.

Pleasant Creek, Indiana's first annual summer arts and crafts fair has Liz Eckardt beaming. Tourists are coming out of the woodwork to get their hands on Amish-inspired goods, and the Olde Mansion Inn, her bed-and-breakfast, is full to the rafters. But when sawbucks start disappearing from the vendors, and Mayor Jackson Cross' furniture samples are marred, it's clear someone is trying to throw a monkey wrench into the festivities.

It's a scorching hot summer in Pleasant Creek, Indiana, but the temperature isn't the only thing that's boiling. Everyone's on edge, including Liz Eckardt and her quilting group, the Material Girls. So when charming Anglophile Cyrus Whittington arrives in an antique car to stay at Liz's bed-and-breakfast, it's like a breath of cool, fresh air. Liz feels an immediate connection with the elderly eccentric. Like her, he came to Pleasant Creek searching for long-lost Amish relatives. She sets out to help him find his family.

It's autumn in Painter's Mill, and 14-year-old Katie Burkholder has been tasked with picking apples in Zimmerman's Orchard with her brother. It's just another day filled with chores - until her best friend, Mattie, arrives to help. Somehow boredom transforms into fun and games whenever the girls are together. The innocent fun comes to an end when Billy Marquardt and his gang of friends interrupt. Katie is no prude, but she knows better than to associate with the older English boys.

Obsessed with books from childhood, Miriam answered her life's calling by working in the towns local bookshop. Although the shops owner is in a difficult situation she respected this hard working Amish girl...A girl who fought to save her life...to no avail. Just as the police arrive...Lucas, the towns newly trained lawyer could be her last hope...Her only friend...Her only chance...Her love of books could mean a final turn of the page. This is the authors favorite of all her books. She hopes you enjoy it also.

As local merchants unite to attract tourists for a much anticipated weekend quilting event, business is sure to spill over into eateries like Daisy's Tea Garden. Reese Masemer had been dating one of Daisy's employees, Tessa, an artist, though their last interaction was as strained as a cup of loose leaf tea. Now Reese has been found dead near a covered bridge where Tessa's been practicing her sketches.

Pleasant Creek, Indiana, loves its history. Each summer the town sponsors Heritage days, a festival commemorating the signing of Pleasant Creek's original town charter. Liz Eckardt couldn't be happier to participate in the star-spangled celebration. Her bed-and-breakfast, the Olde Mansion Inn, is booked solid. But someone else isn't happy. Antique items related to the historic event are being stolen from Pleasant Creek's people and businesses, including Liz herself.

When a young woman is found murdered in a Painters Mill motel, Chief of Police Kate Burkholder is shocked to discover she once knew the victim. Rachael Schwartz was a charming but troubled Amish girl who left the fold years ago and fled Painters Mill. Why was she back in town? And who would kill her so brutally?

It's autumn in Painters Mill, and Chief of Police Kate Burkholder and John Tomasetti are taking a much-needed vacation at a small bed and breakfast an hour outside of town. After closing a difficult case, they're looking forward to some down time, but their relaxation is cut short by rumors that the old house where they're staying is haunted by a girl who disappeared twenty years earlier, leaving nothing behind but some bloody clothes by the river and rumors of a volatile relationship.

Daisy's orange pekoe is flowing at a fundraiser - and she's also made a new friend, Piper, a young woman whose hopes for motherhood were dashed by a foul-up at a fertility clinic. But before they can settle into a long conversation, the event is disrupted by masked protestors who object to building a shelter in Willow Creek. Among the angry crowd is Eli - who left his Amish community some time ago, with help from a lawyer named Hiram.

As a violent thunderstorm rages in Painters Mill, Kate Burkholder receives a call from a frantic young Amish woman: Her two-year-old son is missing. Kate and her officers brave the downpour to search for the toddler, fearing he may have been swept away in the rising creek waters. But an explosive family secret leads Kate to believe this disappearance may be more complicated than anyone is letting on. Can she find the boy and uncover the truth before darkness falls?