Plain Jayne (Plain and Simple) Hot

I feel obliged to begin these comments with the disclaimer that I am not a reader of romances. Because of that my remarks aren’t the same unalloyed praise as other reviewers’.

This story follows the experiences of a “green tea drinking, laptop-using, motorcycle-riding reporter,” Jayne Tate, who after her father’s death and being turned down for a major newspaper assignment, turns to Oregon’s Amish community in hopes of finding a story that will put her career back on the map. What she finds instead is a lifestyle that challenges her values and leads her back to her Christian roots. The catalyst for this transformation is an Amish man who has left his Amish family, but works in the community near them to stay in contact with them as best he can.

Jayne is invited to stay with his family in order to experience first-hand the strict sense of “Ordnung” that defines the Amish way of life. There are some interesting events that contrast Jayne’s typical urban values with the deeply Christian values of the family members. One of these events is the attempted theft of one of the family’s horses by local boys. Jayne, of course, assumes that the police will be called, while the father of the family asks with sincere concern if the boys need to borrow the horse for some reason. The sharp contrast between their reactions is makes one pause. Jayne’s is immediately judgmental, in fact, self-righteous. The family father, in contrast, takes the situation as it unfolds. He keeps an open mind, which allows him to feel concern for the boys. This situation highlights the gentleness of the Amish way of life.

Another example is the change in Jayne’s perceptions that come from learning to sew. Sewing is a common activity in the Amish household, but completely foreign to Jayne. It takes much coaxing before she’ll even try it, but over the course of time she comes to appreciate the peaceful, meditative quality of this simple activity. This is but one example of how Jayne’s perspectives changed slowly but surely from one of being captivated by fashion and a fast-paced life to gaining an appreciation of choices that increase connection to community.

I would have found these events more compelling and thought provoking except that my trust in the author’s research was shaken when she twice described the family members as speaking “Pennsylvania ‘Dutch.’” This is a common misconception that could have been avoided with a simple online search. The original “Pennsylvania Dutch” were Germanic people. The mistaken use of “Dutch” to describe their language came from its similarity to the words “Deutsch” and “Deitsch” which mean “German.” A mistake this grave clouded my enjoyment of the exploration of the family’s interactions, because I no longer felt confident of the accuracy of what I was reading.

Other details that didn’t become obvious to me until the end of the book further chipped away at my enjoyment. The first of these is that the man who Jayne eventually marries is a carpenter, and worse yet, when they marry, he is 33. I am willing to be corrected if my calculation is wrong, but even the man’s occupation as a carpenter was more than this
German-speaking reader who holds a degree in literature and psychology could bear.