Monday, December 9, 2013

I have nowhere else to write this, but this novel is simply, one of the most beautiful I have read in a very long time.

I cannot remember when I have felt so familiar in sharing fears and hopes and understandings of misunderstandings, in that curious childhood naivete that begs for answers though one does not yet know the question. To be immersed in a world that resounds with such great likeliness to my own childhood, though one is found in a modern America, and another in a rural Sussex.

I see a boy, led by curiosity, loneliness, a seeking wisdom and naive heart who finds a girl, more mature yet impetuous in her own youth and in both of their confidences and fears fall into danger. Ultimately, the boy chooses a path he believes is the simple, right thing to do, sacrificing his heart.  And the girl, in her anguish, sacrifices her heart to save his.

The boy grows up, his life at the cost of the girl's, always an unanswered question if it was worth the sacrifice. And as he grows older, wiser, or perhaps when he finds himself the loneliest and most childlike, his heart starts to emerge and grow again. And the girl waits.

This story is finished, and it finishes on hope and the deep knowledge that there is and will be more.


A reflection of the important women in our lives: The wise mother, the caring wife, the first trust.

She sacrificed herself to save me.

One of the most beautiful novels I have read that carries us into the hopes and fears, curiosities and trusts of our youth, absent or despite the desires, ambitions and lusts of adulthood.