Why is this fiction novel under History Corner today?
Because it is based on an old Russian folk tale! AHA- history! Enjoy!
Synopsis: Alaska, 1920: a brutal place to homestead, and especially tough for recent arrivals Jack and Mabel. Childless, they are drifting apart–he breaking under the weight of the work of the farm; she crumbling from loneliness and despair. In a moment of levity during the season’s first snowfall, they build a child out of snow.
The next morning the snow child is gone–but they glimpse a young, blonde-haired girl running through the trees. This little girl, who calls herself Faina, seems to be a child of the woods. She hunts with a red fox at her side, skims lightly across the snow, and somehow survives alone in the Alaskan wilderness. As Jack and Mabel struggle to understand this child who could have stepped from the pages of a fairy tale, they come to love her as their own daughter.
But in this beautiful, violent place things are rarely as they appear, and what they eventually learn about Faina will transform all of them.
About the Author: Eowyn (pronounced A-o-win) Ivey was raised in Alaska and continues to live there with her husband and two daughters. Her mother named her after a character from J. R. R. Tolkien's Lord of the Rings.
Eowyn works at the independent bookstore Fireside Books where she plays matchmaker between readers and books. This book is her debut novel.
Eowyn's husband is a fishery biologist with the state of Alaska. As a family, they harvest salmon and wild berries, keep a vegetable garden, turkeys and chickens, and they hunt caribou and moose for meat. Because they don't have a well, and live outside any public water system, they haul water each week for their holding tank, and gather rainwater for their animals and garden. Their primary source of home heat is a woodstove, and they harvest and cut their own wood.
To learn more about her life in Alaska, visit her blog Letters from Alaska at lettersfromalaska.wordpress.com , and the book website.
Review: This book will grab you and NOT let you go! I finished it in 2 sittings (ok, well layings, since I had to have my foot propped up)! Ivey does a superb job of taking you into the Alaskan wilderness and caring for Jack and Mabel, and their happiness with Faina. From the beginning, you know how the book is going to end, but HOW Ivey actually ends it that will wow you and have you walking away talking about the book!
If you need a great book to cosy up to while it's cold outside, this is the book for you- a fairy tale for grownups!
I am thrilled to be able to offer not one, but THREE copies for giveaway today!
a Rafflecopter giveaway
Disclosure / Disclaimer: I received this book, free of charge, from Little Brown & Co, for review purposes on this blog. No other compensation, monetary or in kind, has been received or implied for this post. Nor was I told how to post about it.
It sounds like a great story, I'm intrigued by the old folk tale.
ReplyDeleteOK - this review has piqued my interest! Sounds very interesting.
ReplyDeleteSnow Child sounds like a wonderful book to read.
ReplyDeleteThank you for this great giveaway.
:) Jeanne