by Afiena Kamminga ‧ RELEASE DATE: N/A
An engrossing and finely detailed Viking story.
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This second installment of a historical fiction series continues the saga of a Viking woman in North America.
In the late 10th century, Thora Thorvinnsdottir, a Norse settler of Greenland, finds herself stranded on the shores of Westland. Her estranged husband, Ivar Ulfson, and his crew abandoned her during an attack by the natives, leaving Thora alone with only an injured Westlander captive named Elkimu as well as two horses and a dog. Through the winter, Thora catches fish and birds to sustain them, wondering—with some chagrin—why the attractive Elkimu has not made any sexual advances. They hope to build a skin boat from seal hides in order to make it to the man’s Westland home, the island of Unamakik, before they are discovered by the Cliff Dwellers—a rival clan led by Elkimu’s disgraced uncle, Taqtaloq. The unusual pair reaches Elkimu’s island home, and his people welcome Thora into their community. After learning their ways, she formally becomes Elkimu’s wife. Thora finally has something like the life she imagined when she left her native Iceland. But when Norsemen again appear along the shores of Westland, the past returns to haunt Thora in unwanted ways. In this sequel to The Sun Road (2014), Kamminga’s prose is rich and balanced, selling not only the remote setting, but also Thora’s experiences in Westland: “Apikji, the mouse boy, was straining to pull a toboggan loaded with sap-filled containers to the steaming log cauldron by the stream. Behind him came Amu’s sons who had been checking their snares, each dangling a frozen pair of snared snowshoe hares by the hind legs.” The novel manages to work within the realm of the historical while retaining the mystical worldview of its characters and concocting a few turns that readers will not expect. The experience of seeing a re-creation of North American life around the turn of the first millennium is alone worth the price of admission, and the love story between the two unlikely spouses provides a satisfying conclusion to Thora’s difficult tale. Unlike many of the other Norse, who seek to profit from the resources of these new lands, Thora is a recognizable archetype of that more idealistic sort of migrant: the one who is simply looking for a place to belong.
An engrossing and finely detailed Viking story.Pub Date: N/A
ISBN: 978-1-5255-7708-6
Page Count: 175
Publisher: FriesenPress
Review Posted Online: Oct. 26, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2020
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
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by Colleen Hoover ‧ RELEASE DATE: Oct. 18, 2022
Through palpable tension balanced with glimmers of hope, Hoover beautifully captures the heartbreak and joy of starting over.
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New York Times Bestseller
The sequel to It Ends With Us (2016) shows the aftermath of domestic violence through the eyes of a single mother.
Lily Bloom is still running a flower shop; her abusive ex-husband, Ryle Kincaid, is still a surgeon. But now they’re co-parenting a daughter, Emerson, who's almost a year old. Lily won’t send Emerson to her father’s house overnight until she’s old enough to talk—“So she can tell me if something happens”—but she doesn’t want to fight for full custody lest it become an expensive legal drama or, worse, a physical fight. When Lily runs into Atlas Corrigan, a childhood friend who also came from an abusive family, she hopes their friendship can blossom into love. (For new readers, their history unfolds in heartfelt diary entries that Lily addresses to Finding Nemo star Ellen DeGeneres as she considers how Atlas was a calming presence during her turbulent childhood.) Atlas, who is single and running a restaurant, feels the same way. But even though she’s divorced, Lily isn’t exactly free. Behind Ryle’s veneer of civility are his jealousy and resentment. Lily has to plan her dates carefully to avoid a confrontation. Meanwhile, Atlas’ mother returns with shocking news. In between, Lily and Atlas steal away for romantic moments that are even sweeter for their authenticity as Lily struggles with child care, breastfeeding, and running a business while trying to find time for herself.
Through palpable tension balanced with glimmers of hope, Hoover beautifully captures the heartbreak and joy of starting over.Pub Date: Oct. 18, 2022
ISBN: 978-1-668-00122-6
Page Count: 352
Publisher: Atria
Review Posted Online: July 26, 2022
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 2022
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SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
by Kristin Hannah ‧ RELEASE DATE: Feb. 6, 2024
A dramatic, vividly detailed reconstruction of a little-known aspect of the Vietnam War.
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New York Times Bestseller
A young woman’s experience as a nurse in Vietnam casts a deep shadow over her life.
When we learn that the farewell party in the opening scene is for Frances “Frankie” McGrath’s older brother—“a golden boy, a wild child who could make the hardest heart soften”—who is leaving to serve in Vietnam in 1966, we feel pretty certain that poor Finley McGrath is marked for death. Still, it’s a surprise when the fateful doorbell rings less than 20 pages later. His death inspires his sister to enlist as an Army nurse, and this turn of events is just the beginning of a roller coaster of a plot that’s impressive and engrossing if at times a bit formulaic. Hannah renders the experiences of the young women who served in Vietnam in all-encompassing detail. The first half of the book, set in gore-drenched hospital wards, mildewed dorm rooms, and boozy officers’ clubs, is an exciting read, tracking the transformation of virginal, uptight Frankie into a crack surgical nurse and woman of the world. Her tensely platonic romance with a married surgeon ends when his broken, unbreathing body is airlifted out by helicopter; she throws her pent-up passion into a wild affair with a soldier who happens to be her dead brother’s best friend. In the second part of the book, after the war, Frankie seems to experience every possible bad break. A drawback of the story is that none of the secondary characters in her life are fully three-dimensional: Her dismissive, chauvinistic father and tight-lipped, pill-popping mother, her fellow nurses, and her various love interests are more plot devices than people. You’ll wish you could have gone to Vegas and placed a bet on the ending—while it’s against all the odds, you’ll see it coming from a mile away.
A dramatic, vividly detailed reconstruction of a little-known aspect of the Vietnam War.Pub Date: Feb. 6, 2024
ISBN: 9781250178633
Page Count: 480
Publisher: St. Martin's
Review Posted Online: Nov. 4, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2023
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