Search - Crossing Over: One Woman's Escape from Amish Life

If you want to learn something about Amish culture, this book will not work for you. I deal with the Amish at markets, in their saddle and quilt shops, and have gone to their farms to purchase hay and canned goods, and as someone who has lived near Amish communities in three states, I found this book to be very sad. I hesitate to say "one-sided" as of course, she can only tell about the life she led, and as she says, her Old Order Amish family was extremely strict even by their own standards. I'm sure these people are like the rest of us, some good, some bad. You won't learn about Amish ways in this book, as she even admits she has no idea why some things are done. I took a course at Penn State on the history of Germanic peoples in America, including Mennonites, Hutterties and Amish, and the book "The Riddle of Amish Culture" by Donald Kraybill explores in depth the why of their way of life. This author would do well to read it too. It might clear up a few things for her.

This is a very personal story. Still, since there's so little opportunity to see inside such a unique and closed society I found it worthwhile. There were a good many very specific examples of what Amish experience was like for one family and community.

I wouldn't take the family Garrett describes as typical and I'll look forward to other accounts of Amish society to complete my education.

Started off very nicely. But the farther I went, the more I realized I was bored. She was very short on details of ANY kind, and truly, I am not talking about "dirt." No details. I would have been quite annoyed had I paid for this book.

very good