Saturday, February 16, 2019

Mending Fences (The Deacon's Family #1) by Suzanne Woods Fisher

About the book:
Every saint has a past. Every sinner has a future.
Luke Schrock is a new and improved man after a stint in rehab, though everyone in Stoney Ridge only remembers the old Luke. They might have forgiven him, but nobody trusts him.

Amos and Fern Lapp allow Luke to live at Windmill Farm under two conditions. First, Luke must make a sincere apology to each person he's hurt--a four-page, single-spaced list. Second, he must ask each victim of mischief to describe the damage he caused.

Simple, Luke thinks. Offering apologies is easy. But discovering the lasting effects his careless actions have caused . . . that isn't so simple. It's gut-wrenching.

And his list keeps growing. Izzy Miller, beautiful and frustratingly aloof, also boards at Windmill Farm. Luke's clumsy efforts to befriend Izzy only insult and annoy her. Eager to impress, Luke sets out to prove himself to her by locating her mother. When he does, her identity sends shock waves through Stoney Ridge.

Bestselling and award-winning author Suzanne Woods Fisher returns to her beloved Stoney Ridge for this brand-new series featuring some of her readers' favorite characters.

My thoughts:

Mending Fences is the first book in the Deacon's Family by Suzanne Woods Fisher.  It has been quite sometime since I read any of the Stoney Ridge books so it took me awhile to get interested in the storyline and the characters, but once I did I started to enjoy the book.

What stood out to me were the flawed characters seeking redemption, admittedly that really isn't a unique storyline at all but the fact that there were several flawed characters was interesting to me.  It took me a few chapters before I started to care for Luke but the thanks to the authors writing and character development  he became one of my favorites.  Luke Schrock has made really bad decisions in his life but back at Stoney Ridge he is desperately trying to make amends but his attempts don't always go as planned and some of them ended up being rather comical.

I liked Izzy Miller from the beginning and even more after Luke came to live at Windmill Farm.  They have a few humorous encounters that had me smiling especially as he's awakened night after night by Bo the horse he shares a barn with. Oh, I forgot to mention that Amos makes Luke sleep in the barn!  It's really not as bad as it seems because it adds some laughs throughout the book.
Speaking of Amos, I really liked him and his wife Fern because they are both good and kind people.

There is more to like about Mending Fences than I originally thought when I started reading it.  Luke is genuinely sorry for his past behavior and the kind gestures he makes to Amos, Fern and anyone else he wronged made for a delightful read.  I'm looking forward to the next book to find out what is going on in Stoney Ridge.

I received a copy of this book through Revell Reads.  I was under no obligation to post a review.  All opinions are my own.


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