by Janine Turner
In case you were wondering, it’s pronounced “uh-nath-uh-muh.” It describes a loathsome thing, something detested, cursed, devoted to evil, deserving of divine punishment and condemned to eternal destruction.
Not very cheery, is it?
Nothing could be less like Hannah Schwartz, a sweet young Amish woman who is torn between her love for her family and faith and her attraction to an Englisch (non-Amish) sheriff’s deputy. Should she turn her back on all she holds dear? Or cast aside the man she loves?
That decision is taken out of her hands when she returns from a clandestine meeting with Reece only to find her parents have been cruelly murdered.
What happens next?
That would be telling. You’ll have to read the book to find out.
Anathema is as intricate as an Amish quilt and award-winning author Colleen Coble has stitched the plot’s many pieces together with a sure hand. More than a murder mystery, it’s a look at bitterness, forgiveness, and the long-lasting effects of each.
It’s also a really good read. And that’s one thing that is definitely not an “anathema.”
Excerpt
Hannah Schwartz quickened her pace along the path from the farmhouse until she stood on the hillside peering down at the covered bridge. The Indiana winter wind pierced through the black wool cape she wore. She played nervously with the strings on her bonnet.
Had he come already? Oh, she shouldn’t be here. Mamm would be so unhappy with her. But Hannah had made this choice for a good reason.
Flanked by bare maple trees, the opening yawned ahead. She stepped onto the planks of the bridge. A lingering odor of gasoline exhaust made her sneeze three times.
Pausing, she waited until her eyes adjusted to the deeper gloom. She didn’t need light. The interior of the covered bridge was as familiar to her as her own bedroom. Reece would be along in a few minutes. She shivered, but not from the February chill that swept down off the hills of Parke County, Indiana.
It was wrong to be here. If her parents knew . . . and Noah.
She paced the wide wooden boards of the covered bridge, pausing occasionally to listen for the sound of Reece’s truck. She’d expected him to be here waiting for her like usual. If he didn’t come soon, she would have to go back.
She heard an engine and turned with an eager smile, only to face two men she’d never seen, approaching in a small four-door car. She stepped up onto the footpath of the bridge and waited for them to pass, but the car slowed. The window ran down, and a man who looked to be in his thirties leaned out as the car stopped.
His blond hair was thinning on top, and his pale blue eyes gleamed in the light from the car’s dash. “Hey, pretty lady, need a ride?”
“No, I’m waiting for a friend,” she said.
“Well, your friend’s not here, but we are.” The door opened and he got out. The other man hopped out as well. He was about the same age and wore an orange hat. They approached where she stood.
Hannah shrank back. “My friend will be here any minute.”
The man’s smile turned predatory. He grabbed her arm and pulled her toward him. “We can have some fun.”
“No!” She struggled to pull her arm from his grasp, but his other hand snaked around her waist. To her horror, she felt him grappling with the snaps on the back of her dress. “Let go of me!” Panicked now, she began to kick and strike at him.
Where was Reece? She opened her mouth to scream, but the man clapped his hand over it. She smelled tobacco on his fingers and beer on his breath. He tossed her like a rag doll into the car and began to crawl inside with her. She kicked him in the face and scrabbled for the other door, only to find the other man there. A shriek tore from her throat. Hannah’s limbs froze. This couldn’t be happening.
Over the top of the seat, Hannah saw a truck blocking the end of the bridge. Reece stood between the vehicles, gun drawn. The car’s headlamps caught the gleam of his badge.
“Get out of the car!” he shouted. “Hannah, get out of the car.”
Hannah found the strength to grab the lock and flip open the door. The car reversed and backed quickly toward the other side of the bridge.
She lay on the wide wooden boards with the stink of car exhaust filling her lungs. Shudders racked her shoulders, and she rose painfully to her hands and knees. Her palms stung, and her neck muscles throbbed. Running steps sounded on the boards, and Reece called her name.
“I’m here,” she said, her voice trembling as hard as her limbs.
Then his strong arms were lifting her. He held her close to his chest, and she felt the way his heart pounded in her ear. His breathing sounded ragged, and she knew he’d been just as frightened as she. “You saved me,” she whispered.
“Again. You always are there at the right time.”
He cupped his palms on each side of her head and kissed her. “I’ll always be here for you. No one is going to harm my Hannah.”
“I can’t stay long. Someone is at home buying Mamm’s quilts. They’ll miss me in a few minutes.”
He tugged her toward the shadows. “Come sit in the truck with me.” He took her hand and led her to his pickup, a black Dodge he’d bought just last week. He opened the door for her, and she slipped inside. It still smelled new, and her cotton dress slid across the leather seats. She ran her palm across the supple leather. So beautiful.
Reece got in on the other side and drove under a walnut tree, where he parked. He clicked on the auxiliary power. Music spilled from the radio, his favorite, Creedence Clearwater Revival. “Bad Moon Rising” blared from the speakers behind her. He slid out from under the steering wheel and pulled her into his arms. His lips came down on hers. She wanted to savor the sensation of his strong arms, let the music blot out her misgivings. Noah had never even embraced her. It wasn’t allowed. This was wrong, too, but in this moment, she didn’t care. All she knew was the touch of Reece’s hands and the scent of the mint on his breath. She relished the mastery of his hands on her.
She was weak, so weak.
The thought of leaving her family made her lungs ache. Being Amish was as much a part of her body as the bone and sinew that kept her upright. Her life was about laughing and talking around the dinner table with loved ones, working side by side with her mamm. She’d never expected to find herself in this place, loving one of the Englisch when she was engaged to one of her own people.
“Hannah?” Reece reached his hand toward her. “Come back over here, honey. It’s okay. I won’t push you. I just want to take care of you.”
God would punish her if she accepted the invitation in his voice.
From somewhere, she found the courage to grab the door handle and yank it open. She found the motivation to turn and run toward home. Reece called after her, but she didn’t slow. The Bible said to flee temptation. The cool wind brushed against her face and shivered down her back. It slowed the blood pounding along her veins, throbbing in her head. Her feet grew lighter as she sped from the bridge toward home. Harsh breaths heaved in and out of her chest.
Scalding shame swept through her veins. What had she become? Could this relationship be good if it caused her to sin so grievously against her parents, against Noah?
The house was quiet when she opened the back door. Where were her parents? She walked past the wringer washing machine in the utility room and stepped into the kitchen. The empty lemonade packets she’d left by the sink still lay there. Her mother had promised to clean up while Hannah did the barn chores.
“Mamm?” Hannah called. Only silence answered her.
Her feet stuck to spilled lemonade on the floor. Her mother never would have left the kitchen in such a state. Had someone taken ill? Alarms began blaring inside her head, and she quickened her pace to rush into the living room, still calling for her mother.
Her eyes fixed on a bumpy quilt hugging the middle of the living room floor and, oddly, a jumble of feet poked out from under it. Her mind fought to sort what her eyes saw. A quilt she’d never seen lay on the floor, black but bright with her mother’s trademark hummingbird pattern. Datt’s size 13 black shoes extended from one side of the quilt, while Mamm’s size 5 shoes peeked out on the other side.
“Mamm?” she asked. Could this be a joke? Her father loved to tease. They’d hop up any minute, laughing at her gullibility.
No one moved. She bent down and touched her mother’s exposed leg. It was cool. Hannah scrabbled back on her haunches. A scream built behind her teeth, then blared out with such force that her throat went raw. She couldn’t stop screeching. The room began to swirl as she rolled onto her stomach and began to crawl. A red symbol had been painted on the wall. The wheel-and-spokes pattern imprinted itself on the backs of her eyes. A strange word was written just below it. Bile rose in the back of her throat, and she choked it back before stumbling out the door.
Adapted from Anathema, © by Colleen Coble. Used with permission. All Rights Reserved.
Interview
We caught up with Colleen just after a busy weekend of book signings–including one at a covered bridge festival in Indiana, where Anathema is set.
WOF:
Anathema . . . not a word many people are familiar with! What does it mean and why did you choose it as your title?
COLLEEN:
It’s a biblical word; it’s actually in the Bible. It talks about “Let something be an anathema to you.” I was brainstorming with my agent Karen Solem and some others; I had story pretty well fleshed out and we started working on titles. Dr. Mel Hodde came up with the title; he’s half of the writing team Hannah Alexander who won a Christy in romance two or three years ago. (His wife does the actual writing and he vets the medical stuff.) It’s perfect because the meaning is ’shunned, avoided, total avoidance kind of thing’ and since it is an Amish story and Hannah leaves the community after she’s been baptized, she’s shunned. It kind of fit the whole story.
WOF:
You must have done a lot of research on Amish lifestyle and customs. How did you go about that?
COLLEEN:
I did tons and tons of research; I read stacks of books. But what was more helpful than anything is that I have some Amish friends. Being in their home, I could actually see how things were set up. One of the things that was very interesting to me, which I hadn’t realized and I actually put in the book, was that the gas lights make a lot of noise. I didn’t know that! I’d never been around gas lights, but they hiss and sputter and just make a lot of noise.
Sarah, my Amish friend, made me some of the tea I mentioned in the book. It was so good! I observed her making coffee and heating water. They were a really great help in how the sects can be so different. In Indiana, for example, there are two bishops; one on the north side and one on the south side. One of the bishops allows gas-fired hot water heat and one does not. So it depends on what bishop you’re under. You can tell by looking at the buggies what sect they’re from. An open buggy with no covering over it is usually associated with the Swiss Amish, which is what I ended up making Hannah and her family because it was just a little different–and they yodel. [Laughing] It was all about the yodeling.
WOF:
How did your Amish friends feel about you writing a book with Amish characters?
COLLEEN:
I think initially they were a little hesitant because some of the other Amish books that have been out have been very critical. I was trying to go at it as a story that illustrated the Amish life without making judgment calls. I tried to walk that fine balancing act. I certainly didn’t want to offend them because I love them dearly, but I still wanted to show the differences between us Englisch and them. But they loved the book, so that
WOF:
Each chapter begins with a quote from Hannah or her mother. What is the significance of that?
COLLEEN:
Quilting is very important in the Amish community and I wanted to pull in a physical way to illustrate how they believe. So I took a look at quilts and the meaning behind quilts and used that to illustrate some of their faith.
WOF:
Quilts play a major role in the book. Do you make or collect quilts yourself?
COLLEEN:
I do make quilts–at least I did before I had deadlines! Deadlines change everything. I did a lot of quilting before I was writing full-time, now not so much. But I have a new granddaughter, three weeks old today (my first grandchild!) so I’ve been thinking about making her a quilt.
WOF:
At its heart, Anathema is a study of the cause and effects of bitterness and forgiveness. Was that your plan from the beginning?
COLLEEN:
It was. That was how the whole story really came together. I was talking with my agent right after the Amish school shooting. Everyone was just amazed at the way the Amish community reached out to family of the murderer and forgave what had been done. That’s another thing I’ve observed with my Amish friends, they are just so accepting of whatever God’s will is. If God wills it then that’s the way it should be. They just have this calm acceptance somehow. Karen, my agent, and I were bouncing ideas back and forth about what would happen if an Amish young woman couldn’t forgive.
If you read my books, most people have picked up that there’s often a theme of forgiveness. A lot of that comes from my own life, where I’ve seen the effects of bitterness in family members or whatever, and it grieves my heart. I’m a peacemaker. That’s kind of the theme of my life, really, is to forgive and show God’s love and reach out to people who are hurting. This is probably the first book that I went in deliberately in a big way to try to show that. It’s kind of crept into other books; even when I start out with another spiritual theme [forgiveness] always creeps in somehow. I can’t seem to stop it! But with this one that was the main thrust of the story.
WOF:
Hannah asks, “Didn’t God always demand a sacrifice?” It seems that we always want to make deals with God.
COLLEEN:
That’s exactly right. That’s what I wanted to show–that we don’t need to make deals with God. God loves us and he’s already made the sacrifice. We get it so turned around that we put ourselves through things that we don’t have to put ourselves through at all. We make it so much harder than it is. I like to illustrate that and hope people get the take-away value.
WOF:
Reece is an interesting character. As soon as we think we’ve got him pegged, he does something unexpected. What’s your process for making a character well-rounded?
COLLEEN:
Well, he was definitely a bad guy, but there’s good and bad in everyone. When I’m looking at my villain or even my main character, I’m trying to think of all sides of them. Even though he did some horrible things, he loved Hannah as much as he was capable. Although it was a destructive, possessive kind of love, he did love her. He ended up basically sacrificing himself for her. Family trauma and abusive situations happen a lot in our society today. I wanted to try to show a peek into how that comes together. The other side of it, even though it’s wrong and twisted, is how the abuser is looking at a situation–I wanted to show that. Even though they’re wrong, they often have good in them, even though it comes out the wrong way.
WOF:
Do you think you could ever live an Amish lifestyle yourself?
COLLEEN:
I couldn’t live without my computer, so that would be no! What’s interesting is my Amish friends live in northern Indiana, so they’re in one of the more progressive areas. Although in their home they don’t have computers or anything, they have a harmonica, they have hot water and a normal bathroom with a shower and everything because they have hot water heat from propane. The Amish don’t want to be connected to electricity because that’s connected to society, but an individual tank that’s not connected anywhere is OK. My friend Merv, the husband of the family, works at a lumberyard and he has a computer there. I’ll email him and it’s hysterical to me to think about emailing this little Amish guy and him answering me. So their lifestyle wouldn’t be quite as bad as some of the more strict ones, but even so, no, I don’t think I could live an Amish life myself. The other thing is they don’t have the sense of security of the believer that I believe is so important. The Amish believe you have to maintain good works and there’s no real security of knowing you’re going to heaven. They hope they’re going to heaven someday but they don’t have that assurance.
WOF:
We hear (via Twitter) you’re currently writing a gothic novel. Tell us what that means and a little about the book.
COLLEEN:
I’m working on Nightsong right now. It’s set in a creepy old mansion near Charleston surrounded by black water; it’s got some alligators. It’s kind of a modern-day take on Bluebeard’s Castle. The new bride in is in the home, there’s a locked door and she shouldn’t get in that room but of course she IS going to get in that room. The main character is an Irish singer kind of like the Celtic Woman group. (I just love them!) My main character is kind of based on girl who plays fiddle, who flips her hair around as she’s playing and dancing around the stage. My character has remarried and is not in love with her new husband yet and there are some mistaken identity issues. It’s a modern setting; I’m calling it a gothic because of the atmosphere–the old mansion thing and some strange goings-on there.
WOF:
We know you’re dying to, so tell us about little Alexa!
COLLEEN:
Oh my goodness, yes. She is the most beautiful baby I have ever seen in my life! My son said, “Mom, I thought I was the most beautiful baby.” I said, “You’ve just been kicked to number two by your daughter.” The other day I would write a little bit, then look at her picture, then write a little bit, then look at her picture. Then I twittered and said “Somebody send the white coats because I’m now talking to Alexa’s picture.” I thought, I have totally lost it. I didn’t know becoming a grandmother would be so totally obsessive. I had the world’s best grandmother; she taught me about God and she showed me how to live and total acceptance and unconditional love. I want to be able to do that with my grandchild.
WOF:
Is she going to be in any of your books?
COLLEEN:
Actually, Cry in the Night, the book that’s coming out in February, is a new Rock Harbor novel. Oh, Brie is in terrible trouble, I’ll tell you that. There is a baby in that; her caretaker is killed and Samson finds the baby hidden–that baby is Alexa.
My kids say, “Watch what you do because everything you do winds up in a book.” When the kids took up diving, diving went into the books. When my son got a Harley, I had a character who was a Harley rider. Nothing is sacred in the family; it has to end up in
You want to hear a fun story? The Aloha Reef books were set in Hawaii; I made four trips there to research those books. The kids went with us; neither was married at the time. They’re big divers and their favorite dive master, Mark
Reading Group Guide
Reading Group Guide
| 1. | Why do you think guilt is such a powerful motivator? |
| 2. | What actions did Hannah take as a result of guilt? |
| 3. | How big a role does tradition play in your own life? |
| 4. | An unforgiving spirit can lead to a string of bad decisions. How many can you name from this book? |
| 5. | Do you ever long for a simpler time? What sounds the most appealing about it? What would be the most challenging in living that simple life? |
| 6. | Have you ever felt the pressure of prejudice? How should it be handled? |
| 7. | Do you think Reece was ever sincere about wanting to change or was it always a ploy to get Hannah back? |
| 8. | Is it ever okay to tell a lie—even to protect someone else like Matt did? Why or why not? |
| 9. | Is there any difference between an outright lie and subtle deceit? |
| 10. | Which quilt analogy to the Amish faith was your favorite and why? |
| 11. | Why do you think one lie leads to another? |
| 12. | Based on what you’ve read, what do you think is the strongest cord in theAmish faith? |
