Wanda Brunstetter and Vickie McDonough have sold millions

Sales of Wanda E. Brunstetter’s books have topped 8 million copies, Barbour Publishing announced in the fall. Readers have purchased 1 million copies in each of the last two years, the publisher said.

The announcement was made as Brunstetter, branded as “Amish Country’s Most Beloved Storyteller,” was visiting with readers during her fan-filled weekend in Ohio’s Amish country.

That same weekend Brunstetter and Barbour were celebrating the news that sales of her August novel, The Healing Quilt, had sent the third installment in her series about an Amish couple teaching quilting lessons to the No. 1 slot on the Evangelical Christian Publishers Association Fiction list and to placement on the Publishers Weekly list as well. Barbour also reported that sales of Amish Friends Christmas Cookbook are well on their way to propelling her to the 9 million mark.

Brunstetter’s Amish books resonate well with readers in part because of her relationships with the Plain People via family heritage and Amish friends across the country. These close acquaintances, whom Brunstetter and her photographer-husband, Richard, visit frequently, enable her to portray the Amish lifestyle accurately, affectionately and with a voice of authority, according to her publisher.

During her tour to promote The Healing Quilt, she visited the homes of Amish friends while signing and speaking in Pennsylvania and Ohio. Some of her signings were scheduled in conjunction with performances of Half-Stitched—the Musical. The play is based on Brunstetter’s 2012 novel, The Half-Stitched Amish Quilting Club.

Along with Brunstetter, Vickie McDonough has seen recent success. In October, it was announced that she hit and surpassed her first million-copies-sold mark with Barbour.

“Barbour Publishing appreciates Vickie McDonough’s hard work and congratulates her for hitting the 1 million mark in sales,” the company said in a statement.

McDonough has authored more than 30 published books and novellas that have appeared frequently on best-seller lists from CBA and the Evangelical Christian Publishers Association. Her titles have won numerous Heartsong Presents’ annual readers’ contests and Inspirational Reader’s Choice contests. McDonough also is an American Christian Fiction Writers Carol Awards finalist. In 2013, she was the winner of an OWFI (Oklahoma Writers’ Federation Inc.) award for Best Novel and had a Romantic Times Recommended Inspirational Book.

McDonough’s next release with Barbour is the first installment of the “Land Rush Dreams” series, Gabriel’s Atonement (Shiloh Run Press, Jan. 1).

In addition, the company’s novelists, including Brunstetter and McDonough, took half of the spots on the October fiction best-sellers list from the Evangelical Christian Publishers Association. —Johnson

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