I Am Hutterite:
The Fascinating True Story of a Young Woman’s Journey to Reclaim Her Heritage
I had no idea what a Hutterite was. I have read various books regarding the Amish communities and I adore most of them! I thought maybe a Hutterite was just another form of Amish community. Well, it is like community living, but it is more centered on sharing and true community living. The women share the workload of cooking, washing laundry, gardening, caring for the babies and kids and the men share the workload of the farm as well. There is centralized leadership. They do have cars - well, the community owns cars and they are given permission to use them if it is an emergency or for business (e.g. delivering eggs to the store to sell). They seem like a religious sect, but the book didn’t go into much regarding the specific religion they practice. Now regarding this particular young woman’s experience with the community - wow! What a fantastic book! She starts with her grandparents story of how they met and their experience with the community and moves down the generations from there. You fall in love with this little girl’s family, so much that you can imagine packing your few belongings and joining her in the esenschuel for lunch. Her father makes a bold move and decides (amazingly) to leave the community life when she is around 10 and she talks about how hard it is to be away from the colony, but also how hard it is to fit in with the “world”. They are very poor when they leave the colony (with almost nothing) but they are hard working and diligent. I loved this book and I would highly recommend it for anyone who enjoys the Amish books. This is a true story about a woman with an amazing family and it was a joy to read!
