Owl Always Be Reading: Blog Tour: Rachel's Deception by Karen Ann Hopkins

Welcome to our stop on Rachel's Deception by Karen Ann Hopkin's blog tour hosted by my friend, Deitre at A Leisure Moment.

Rachel’s Deception

by: Karen Ann Hopkins

Release Date: May 8th, 2015

Growing up Amish is difficult…but leaving it behind is even harder.

Noah was Amish...Rose wasn't. Being together should have been impossible. But somehow they found a way to make it work. They are finally a family, but their happily-ever-after is still a long off. Will Rose and her friends be able to force real change in the community?

Karen Ann Hopkins returns with a gripping new book in the YA Temptation series. The powerful family saga continues with Rachel's Deception, as events spiral out of control in the sleepy farming community of Meadowview. And Rachel Miller has her own secrets to hide. Noah’s younger sister has been living a double life. That is, until Justin Cameron, Rose's little brother, catches her in the act. Rachel is not the obedient Amish girl that her sister was, and her rebelliousness takes her to a very dangerous world. A world that only her true friends can help her escape from.

As Rachel questions all she has been taught about love, family, and commitment, Rose discovers what it really means to be shunned. And an evil shadow looms on the horizon, threatening not only Rose, but everyone she holds dear.

A day in the life of an Amish teen: Hard work and responsibility are a large part of every Amish teen’s life. Whether girl or boy, they’re expected to contribute to the household’s income and livelihood. After graduating in the eighth grade, Amish teens are finished with schooling and thrust into the workforce, either leaving home for a forty hour work week or putting that much time into in a family business. Jobs include carpentry, metal work, farming, and welding for the boys; and butchery, bakery, woodworking, retail, teaching, child care, and housecleaning for the girls. Usually, 90% of a teen’s income is given to the family as an intricate part of the family’s financial survival. Part of the ten percent that the teens retain is saved towards the teen’s future married life, while the rest is for their own enjoyment.

Even though Amish teens work hard, they also play hard. Oftentimes, they will take short trips with their church groups, visit relatives and friends, and participate in activities such as hunting, horseback riding, and skiing. A usual day for an Amish teen begins at five o’clock in the morning, followed by prayer, breakfast, and morning chores. After working an eight hour work day, the youth will arrive home to afternoon chores before dinner with the family. The evenings are playtime for the young people. They can be found at the church’s youth group gatherings, such as singings, and ball games or they may be seen riding their horses or bikes on the roadways.

Amish teens face many of the same conflicts of growing up that ordinary teens do. Courting, life choices, and rebelliousness affect them, sometimes in monumental ways. All in all, the Amish teens I’ve observed and known are happy with their existence and hopeful for their futures. A few have ultimately left their culture, being helped by other people who’ve walked away from the Amish before. These youth were shunned by their Amish families, but they handled their circumstance well, furthering their education, getting jobs of their choices, driving their own cars, and becoming part of the English world.

I wrote the Temptation series and my Amish mystery series, Serenity’s Plain Secrets, from my own personal observations and experiences with the young people in the Amish community I lived in. Even for all the strangeness of the Amish teenager’s lifestyle, they are loved by their family and community, and most of them are happy. And in the end, that’s all that really matters.

Thank you so much for your interest in Rachel’s Deception, the Temptation series, and my other books: Embers (YA paranormal), Lamb to the Slaughter and Whispers from the Dead (adult Amish mysteries)! I love to connect with readers and I’d be happy to answer questions about the Amish way of life. Please contact me at my website: www.karenannhopkins.com or you can message me on FB, Twitter, and Instagram.

Happy Reading,

Karen Ann Hopkins

Karen Ann Hopkins resides in northern Kentucky with her family on a farm that boasts a menagerie of horses, goats, peacocks, chickens, ducks, rabbits, dogs and cats. Karen's main job is home schooling the kids, but she finds time to give riding lessons, coach a youth equestrian drill team, and of course, write. She was inspired to create her first book, Temptation, by the Amish community she lived in. The experiential knowledge she gained through her interactions with her neighbors drove her to create the story of the star-crossed lovers, Rose and Noah.

Karen grew up about a mile from Lake Ontario in Upstate New York. She was bitten by the horse bug at the age of five, and after diligently taking riding lessons for several years, was rewarded with her first horse at the age of eleven. The feisty horse's name was Lady, a Quarter Horse-Thoroughbred cross, who became Karen's steadfast companion. Through the years, the constant force in her life was horses. Eventually, she found her place as a riding instructor herself. Before accepting her fate in the barnyard, she worked a short stint as a paralegal, traveled abroad, and guided tourists on horseback riding tours in the Smoky Mountains of Tennessee.

Karen is currently working on her Amish mystery series, Serenity's Plain Secrets, along with the YA paranormal/fantasy series, The Wings of War. Karen is also excited to announce the Temptation series has been optioned for TV by Pilgrim Studios and is available on Audible.