I went into this book with high
hopes: I loved Hannah's last book, The
Nightingale, and while that's the only other thing of hers I've read, it
made me want to read everything she's written.
I also loved The Snow Child,
by Eowyn Ivey, which has a lot of similarities to this one. This book seemed like it would be a perfect
fit, but I walked away from it feeling . . . meh.
The Great Alone follows Leni from the
time she's an awkward 13-year old all the way into her adulthood. Leni's father, Ernt, was a soldier in
Vietnam, and he came back very different than how he left. While today we would call it PTSD, there
weren't names or good treatments for what Leni's father experienced back
then. Ernt is always uprooting his family
in the hopes that wherever they settle next will be the place where he can feel
normal. Which takes them to a small town
in Alaska.
If
you don't know, Alaska is not for the faint of heart, especially this small
town where Leni's family settles. They
have to kill and grow their own food, basically rebuild their entire house, and
adapt to living somewhere that is dark most of the day and way, way below zero
in the winter. Needless to say, these
winter circumstances are not good for Leni's dad.
But
Leni and her mother manage to make friends in the town; most importantly, Leni
befriends a boy her age, Matthew, and they become best friends. But when tragedy hits Matthew's family, he
moves away, leaving Leni more alone then ever.
I
don't want to give too much away about the story, because the twists and turns,
mirrored by Alaska's wildness, is one of the enjoyable things about this
novel. While some of it felt too
predictable, there were a few great surprises along the way.
My
main issue with the story, though, was with the main character. Leni starts off shy and insecure, which makes
sense—she's 13, after all, and lives with an unstable father, a mother who puts
up with too much, and she doesn't have any friends. As she becomes an older teenager, she seems
to find some personality and strength—but then, when she's an adult, I felt
like all that disappeared and she started making some really bad decisions. I wanted her to take charge of her life, the
way she seemed to be learning to do in Alaska, but she felt flat and at times
kind of pathetic to me.
My
other criticism is that the book is really long, and by the last third the
story felt too stretched out. Things
just kept happening, and I wanted to
get some kind of resolution.
Overall? This isn't a book I'll be telling a lot of my
friends to read, but I see why a lot of people do like it. Because it is so event-heavy, it might draw
in some people who don't read as much but are looking for a less-fluffy summer
read.
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