Other editions of book Escape from Heart

A fictionalized account with fictionalized characters inspired by true events in the northeast area of Mississippi where the author grew up, Escape from Heart examines what happens when good people are caught up in a power struggle within their own religious community. Young Sarah Ruth Heart loves her Mennonite family and the Mennonite Colony where she lives isolated from the outside world. She also has a love of learning, something which is forbidden now by a new religious leader. She has one other love, a boy named Joshua, who has become one of the most hated Mennonites in the colony. What is the price of individualism and freedom in Heart Colony? Sarah Ruth is about to find out.This digital version contains photographs by the author of the story's setting.

Heart Colony, founded as a Mennonite community striving to be close to God and nature, becomes a place of fear, denial, and injustice under the cruel and evil direction of a new leader, Hezekiel Whittenstone. Sarah Ruth Heart wants one simple thing-to compete in the countywide spelling bee-but her uncle Hezekiel refuses to allow it. Sarah Ruth struggles with her desire to attend school and compete in the spelling bee, to be attractive to the boy she secretly likes, and to overstep the boundaries dictated by the repressive Hezekiel. Her secret rebellion brings danger to herself and her family, and Sarah Ruth is forced to make difficult decisions about her future-with consequences that are more far-reaching than she ever could have imagined.