What makes a family? That's what twelve-year-old Nicky Dillon wonders after she and her widowed father discover a wailing abandoned baby in the snow-filled woods near their New Hampshire home. Through the days that follow, the Dillons and an unexpected visitor who soon turns up at their door-a young woman evidently haunted by her own terrible choices-face a thicket of decisions, each seeming to carry equal possibilities of heartbreak and redemption. Writing with all the emotional resonance that has drawn millions of readers around the world to her fiction, Anita Shreve unfolds in Light on Snow a tender and surprising novel about love and its consequences.
Light on Snow
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From Publishers Weekly
An after-school stroll leads to a life-altering event for widower Robert Dillon and his 12-year-old daughter, Nicky, in this delicate new novel by acclaimed author Shreve (All He Ever Wanted,etc.). In the woods surrounding their secluded home in Shepherd, N.H., Robert and Nicky make a startling discovery—a baby abandoned and left to die in the snow. The infant survives, but the incident leaves its mark. Still recovering from the painful loss of her mother and infant sister two years earlier, and readjusting to the shock of a sudden move from suburban Westchester to rural Shepherd, Nicky struggles to reconcile her innocent notions of adult integrity with the bleak reality of their discovery. The tenuous sense of normalcy Robert manages to sustain is broken with the appearance of Charlotte, the baby's young mother, on his doorstep. Retold 18 years later by an adult Nicky but written in the present tense, the story shifts brilliantly between childlike visions of a simple world and the growing realization of its cruel ambiguities. Aside from a few saccharine moments and a rather pat ending, Shreve does a skilled job of portraying grief, conflict and anger while leaving room for hope, redemption and renewal. Her characters are sympathetic without being pitiable, and her prose remains deceptively simple and eloquent throughout.
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
From Booklist
The prolific Shreve has been a fixture on best-seller lists ever since Oprah picked The Pilot's Wife (1998) as one of her book-club selections. In her latest, Robert Dillon and his 12-year-old daughter, Nicky, discover a newborn baby abandoned in the snowy woods. As they rush the baby to the hospital, Nicky senses that the vulnerable infant has somehow unleashed her and her father's private demons. Nicky lost her mother and baby sister in an automobile accident more than a year earlier; her father's response to his overwhelming grief was to uproot them from their life in New York and move to rural New Hampshire. He has purposefully isolated himself from the outside world, keeping contact with other people to a minimum. But now the abandoned baby has forced them to act, and the two are suddenly plunged into dealing with the world-weary detective who catches the case and, later, with the distraught mother of the baby, who ends up snowbound in their house for days. Her presence forces Nicky and her father to move beyond their personal tragedy. Although Shreve continually underlines her characters' grief and desperation, their emotions seem too neat and their responses somewhat formulaic. Nevertheless, Shreve's expert pacing produces a fast read that will more than satisfy her many fans. Joanne Wilkinson
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
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2 of 2 people found the following review helpful
By Shara Cooper
Format:Mass Market Paperback
This is the first book I've read in awhile that was a truly enjoyable read. All too often I find myself finding fault with plots that are too incredulous, choppy writing and timelines that don't line up. This book had great drama but it was believable and seemed sincere. Just a girl reflecting on some of the events that happened in her childhood. The story had characters that I missed whenever I put it down (a true test of a good read) and when it was over I felt a little sad but mostly comforted by a good read. I will say that it seemed to lose a bit of momentum towards the end but not to the point of feeling let down.
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful
By Samantha
TOP 500 REVIEWER
Format:Mass Market Paperback|Amazon Verified Purchase
I like Anita Shreve's books, even the less popular ones, but I found this the most emotionally engaging. In the hands of a less skilled writer, the story of a father and daughter finding a baby in the woods would have been predictable, possibly unconvincing, but Shreve masterfully hauled me into those woods and held me captive. Endearing but not saccharine, the characters, the story, are wholly satisfying and the writing leaves nothing to be desired.
3 of 6 people found the following review helpful
By BethDeHart
Format:Hardcover
Not a "Light" book, there are myriad hidden meanings in this little gem. If you're looking for great characters, a plot that moves, and a book that holds together, then "Light on Snow" may be just the ticket for you. The writing is firs-rate-the same kind you'll find in McCrae's "Children's Corner" or some of Seabold's works, and the whole thing is put together with more than just craft-there's heart in this one, too. Check it out!
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