Monday, February 19, 2018

The Great Alone by Kristin Hannah - Reshelved Books

Hello Dewey Readers! 

Happy February reading!  I have been in such a reading slump lately, but I promised you that I would get back to it, and I also promised that my next review would be something different from Colleen Hoover.  This is difficult because between this review and the last one, I read Hoover's Maybe Someday and bought November 9.   In the to-read pile the later will go....and so I will stop boring you and proceed to today's review.

I have loved Kristin Hannah's novels ever since I picked up Firefly Lane when I was 19 years old.  Hannah's latest novel, The Great Alone, sort of follows the trend of writing something different from what she previously wrote, which was a turn Hannah took when she published her historical novel The Nightingale last year.  In The Great Alone, we still dive into a novel that is primarily domestic fiction, but instead of focusing on Washington State, this time Hannah takes her readers deep into the Alaskan wilderness.  My co-wokers raved about this novel.  They absoutlely ADORED it, and now they all want to visit Alaska.  While I did enjoy reading it and was thankful that it pulled me out of my reading slump, I didn't relish in it to the point where I too am jumping on the next plane out into the Alaskan wilderness.   

So about the book.  In this novel we travel back in time to 1974 (similar to how Firefly Lane began in the '70s.  VW buses, anyone?)  and we meet the Allbright's, a family of 3, who's patriarch is a Vietnam veteran.  The war has changed Ernt.  He suffers from PTSD, constantly wants to move the family around, and is abusive towards his wife.  In the hopes of healing Ernt and starting fresh, the family moves to the Alaskan wilderness.  It is a place where the winters are brutal and where one mistake can kill you.  This novel is about mistakes. It is about tragedy.  It is about love. And most importantly, it is about survival.  This novel is messy, where the characters lives and emotions are literally a mess no matter which way they turn, and just as mistakes can be deadly, so can luck.  The one issue I had with the novel was the ending.  Without giving it away, I felt like it was almost "too neat" compared to the rest of the book, which is why I will not be giving it 5 coffee beans.  So go ahead, give this one a read, and tell us what you think!       

& until the next read,  I leave you with a rating of 4 out of 5 Coffee Beans.  
Happy Reading! 

~ Jessica 

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