Darlo Gemeinhardt lives in Alabama with her husband of 32 years and nine assorted dogs. She has two grown children and 4 grandchildren. She teaches 3 - 5 grade Sunday School. A member of SCBWI she is currently working on a series of middle-grade/tween novels set in the 60’s.Carol Award: Romantic Suspense: Winner: The Silent Order
Title: The Silent Order
Author: Melanie Dobson
Publisher: Summerside Press (Rachel Meisel, Susan Downs, and Ellen Tarver, Editors)
ISBN: 9781609360191
Category: Romantic Suspense
Reviewed by: Darlo Gemeinhardt
The Silent Order by Melanie Dobson is not your normal Amish book. The story is set in the 1920’s during Prohibition and explores the different choices made by two sisters who take opposite paths.
Dobson doesn’t disappoint and the beautiful imagery continues.
The book begins with, “shadows danced along the sculpted wings of an angel trumpeting from the tombstone’s spire” and sets the mood for the novel. Dobson doesn’t disappoint and the beautiful imagery continues throughout. 
Everything from “dust plumed across the cornfield like the funnel of a tornado” to “she guarded the secret of her past like it was a poison that could infect everything around her.”
The Italian mafia in Pittsburg is up to something big. Detective Rollin Wells wants to know what that something is. Wells knows that the Cardano family is behind it. He follows them to Sugar Creek, Ohio, the center of Amish country. Wells escapes a murder attempt and takes refuge in a nearby barn.
Discovered by the beautiful Katie Lehman, Wells immediately notices Katie’s resemblance to a girl he once loved. What is Katie hiding? With the Cardanos searching for him, will he be able to keep Katie and her son safe? Melanie answers these questions as she expertly pulls the reader deeper into the story. The tension builds right up to the final climax. Read The Silent Order and you won’t be able to keep silent about it.
Buy this book
