- Paperback: 224 pages
- Publisher: Back Bay Books (Jan 3 2006)
- Language: English
- ISBN-10: 0316154385
- ISBN-13: 978-0316154383
- Product Dimensions: 14 x 1.6 x 21 cm
- Shipping Weight: 227 g
- Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
- Amazon Bestsellers Rank: #177,003 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
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Product Details |
Product Description
From Publishers Weekly
Starred Review. "Be careful what you wish for. I know that for a fact. Wishes... burn your tongue the moment they're spoken and you can never take them back." Thus begins Hoffman's (Practical Magic; Here on Earth) stellar 18th novel about healing and transformation. As an eight-year-old, the unnamed narrator makes a terrible wish that comes true; remorseful for the next 30 years, she shuts down emotionally to become a self-proclaimed ice queen. Unlike her brother, Ned, who relies on logic, math and science to make sense of the world, the loner librarian fears the chaotic randomness of existence and is obsessed by death. Then lightning strikes, literally. In a flash, she's jolted out of her rut, noticing for the first time all that she's been taking for granted—even the color red, which after the strike she can no longer see: "How could I have been so stupid to ignore everything I'd had in my life? The color red alone was worth kingdoms." The novel turns sultry when the slowly melting ice queen seeks out reclusive Lazarus Jones, a fellow lightning survivor who came back to life after 40 minutes of death: "I wanted a man like that, one it was impossible to kill, who wouldn't flinch if you wished him dead." Blanketed in prose that has never been dreamier and gloriously vivid imagery, this life-affirming fable is ripe with Hoffman's trademark symbolism and magic, but with a steelier edge: "Every fairy tale had a bloody lining. Every one had teeth and claws." Both longtime fans and newcomers will relish it. Agent, Elaine Markson. 10-city author tour. (Apr. 4)
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 School Library Journal
Adult/High School–At the age of eight, the narrator learns the power of a spoken wish. Angry at her mother, she wishes never to see her again. When the woman dies in a car accident, the child resolves to be quiet and imagines her own fairy tale: a girl turns to ice and her heart becomes hard and unbreakable. As an adult, she becomes a reference librarian and an expert in death and ways of dying. Indifferent and unfeeling, she is unable to have meaningful relationships. She allows her brother to move her to Florida, where another wish is fulfilled: she is struck by lightning. Her hair falls out, she limps, she loses the ability to see the color red, and her heart freezes. Enrolled in a study of lightning victims, she learns about a local recluse who was dead for 40 minutes, then walked away. The nameless woman seeks him out; she wants to know what her mother experienced at the moment of death. They begin a passionate love affair. As opposites (she is ice, he is fire), the only way they can touch is in water. Hoffman incorporates elements of fairy tales (The Snow Queen, Beauty and the Beast), chaos theory, and magic realism. Although the story borders on the trite and the dual imagery (fire/ice, heat/cold, red/colorless) is sometimes overdone, the narration is powerful and the ending is satisfying if a bit predictable. Hoffman's fans will find much that is familiar and appealing.–Sandy Freund, Richard Byrd Library, Fairfax County, VA
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.
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Most helpful customer reviews
5.0 out of 5 stars
AN AFFIRMATION OF LIFE AND ALL THAT IT OFFERS,
By
This review is from: The Ice Queen (Audio CD)
Remember childhood superstitions? "Step on a crack, you'll break your mother's back." So, as youngsters we did all we could do to avoid those sidewalk cracks. How about wishing upon a star? Many of us once believed that if you wished upon the first star you saw at night and wished hard enough that wish just might come true.Fortunately, most of us do not have the ability of Alice Hoffman's narrator who begins her story by saying, "Be careful what you wish for. I know that for a fact. Wishes are brutal, unforgiving things, they burn your tongue the moment they're spoken and you can never take them back. They bruise and bake and come back to haunt you. I've made far too many wishes in my lifetime, the first when I was eight years old." Her wish was that she would never see her mother again, and that proves to be true. A fatal automobile accident on an icy road takes her mother's life and forever changes our heroine who grows up to become a librarian, an ice queen if you will, remaining apart, aloof and trying to convince herself that she does not care. Ned, her older brother by four years, takes a different route. He becomes a meteorologist, studying adverse weather conditions. In adulthood he invites her to join him in Florida. Once there, she is struck by lightning which serves to melt her long nurtured reserve. There are many other survivors of lightning strikes, one in particular - Lazarus Jones, who was supposedly dead for forty minutes after being struck. Once she begins to thaw the ice queen realizes all that she has been missing and seeks out Lazarus. The love affair that develops between them is pure Hoffman - a bit of magic as fire meets ice. Written in impeccable prose, The Ice Queen is superbly crafted, the work of a master wordsmith. This all too brief story is an affirmation of life and all that it offers.; it is one we will not soon forget. Stage, film and television actress Nancy Travis gives a superb voice performance, appropriately reflecting first the pain and then the recovery of a human spirit. - Gail Cooke
3.0 out of 5 stars
magic.......,
By A Customer
This review is from: The Ice Queen: A Novel (Paperback)
i did not enjoy this as much as previous novels,it was very dark & though this is alice's trademark, somehow i found it too depressing, & the story hard to stay with, though for all that, there is something magic about all her books & they all leave you with this odd tingle, a bit like an out of body experience, a journey into another dimension, & also inspire with their own twist on everyday events & occurences & how we take them for granted!
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews on Amazon.com (beta) Amazon.com:
3.8 out of 5 stars (101 customer reviews) 90 of 95 people found the following review helpful
5.0 out of 5 stars
Hoffman delivers another bit of magic,
By Terry Mathews - Published on Amazon.com
This review is from: The Ice Queen: A Novel (Hardcover)
I've been an Alice Hoffman fan since TURTLE MOON. While some of her later efforts have left me a bit flat, THE ICE QUEEN grabbed me and held on until the very last word on the very last page.An almost invisible librarian from New Jersey lives an almost invisible life, carefully removing herself from any emotional attachments after the death of her mother when she was a young girl. Her older brother, Ned, is her portal to the outside world. When their grandmother dies, Ned moves her to Florida, where's he's a married professor. On a particulary hot day, the librarian (whose name is never given) survives a direct hit by lightning. She reluctantly agrees to become part of a study with other lightning strike survivors. She hears of a man named Lazarus Jones . . . nicknamed so because he was apparently dead for 40 minutes after a lightning strike, woke up, and simply walked out the hospital. Our ice queen is compelled to find Lazarus Jones and hear his side of the story. Jones, it seems, is still burning (literally) from the strike, while our heroine's world has gone cold and gray (literally). One of the wonderful things about reading anything Hoffman writes is that you must suspend your traditional beliefs and abandon universal truths to completely "get" her stories. I read the book in one sitting. Mystical. Intriguing. Thought-provoking. Ultimately satisfying. Yep. That's Hoffman at her best. Enjoy!! 73 of 85 people found the following review helpful
3.0 out of 5 stars
"Death by proximity and idle wishes",
By Luan Gaines "luansos" - Published on Amazon.com
This review is from: The Ice Queen: A Novel (Hardcover)
Death is the subject. Not the kind that appears after years and years, almost welcome, but death that snatches loved ones away, leaving survivors to deal with the shock of loss. The girl in the story is eight when she makes her first fateful wish, resentful that her mother is leaving for the evening. The mother dies in an accident and the girl (who remains nameless throughout) believes she caused her mother's death. She turns herself into ice in an effort to avoid any more pain.Later, when the woman's brother, Ned, moves his sister to Florida from New Jersey, the thirty-something woman remains as frozen and isolated as a princess in a fairy tale. Carelessly, she makes another fateful wish, to be struck by lightning. Viola! Once more her wish is granted. Now a survivor of a lightning strike, like others gathered for a scientific study, the woman has great difficulty returning to a normal life. But this lady has already marked herself, believing she has the ability to wish away life or bring on a lightning strike. Through her meetings with other survivors, the woman, like a turtle, gradually pokes her head out to notice the others who inhabit the world, even in this bizarre situation. Piqued by curiosity about a man who is dead for forty minutes before returning to life, she follows an impulse to meet Lazarus Jones. They are opposites, he fire and she ice. They meet in the dark, igniting each other, a combustible romance that cannot last but is impossible to resist. The woman's long, slow awakening is the theme of the novel, her quest to understand death and free herself from the restraints that have turned her life into a hollow shell: "The way to trick death. Breathe in. Breathe out." Unfortunately, there is no spark to ignite this tepid plot, although there is the occasional flash of brilliant language associated with this author's work. The problem lies not in the fable of the girl who turns herself to ice, but in the shallow characters. The woman is never more than one-dimensional, caught in her own childish egocentricity. It is hard to imagine why anyone would go to the trouble to wake up this sleeping, self-obsessed beauty. Even the fire and ice love affair is disappointing. What should be instant combustion produces mere puffs of smoke. How could anyone find relief or completion in this cold-hearted, distant woman? Hoffman is a writer of exquisite sensibilities, with a number of lyrical novels and a devoted following. The Ice Queen is an exception to the rule; Hoffman has a long list of powerful work to reward her readers. Luan Gaines/2005. 15 of 15 people found the following review helpful
5.0 out of 5 stars
Ice Queen's Characters Sizzle,
By R. Long - Published on Amazon.com
This review is from: The Ice Queen: A Novel (Hardcover)
Alice Hoffman has always been a master of character development, and she continues to weave her magic in this electrifying novel. The main character, a self-punishing librarian, takes the reader on a fascinating journey of forgiveness and self-realization. Along the way she learns that things are not always as they seem, and "truths" on which a life is based, may not be true at all. This beautifully written story will be enjoyed by all Hoffman fans. I highly recommend it.
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