Sarah Cain is happyAwith her urban townhouse, her BMW, her success as a real estate broker in Portland, Ore. Her days are brimming over with e-mail, phone calls, appointments and closings, and that's just the way she likes it. The best thing about her self-absorbed existence is that she has broken free of the shadow of her controlling older sister, Ivy, a widow who lives with her five children in an Amish community in Lancaster County, Pa. Sarah, a nonbeliever, never supported Ivy's decision to embrace the Plain People. She considers it a type of punishment to keep the children from enjoying a normal American lifestyle. But it's none of her business, at least not until she receives word that Ivy has met an untimely death, and has named Sarah as her children's guardian.
