A review by silverliningsandpages
The Snow Child by Eowyn Ivey

emotional hopeful informative inspiring mysterious reflective sad medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

This Bookstagram favourite centres on a middle aged couple who leave comfort and refinement in the 1920s to set up a homestead in a remote part of Alaska.  Seeking a fresh start, they discover that the lonely Arctic wilds can be an unforgiving and harsh environment.  They are also still enveloped in sorrow for a baby they lost a decade earlier.  When a little girl inexplicably appears on their land one night, Jack and Mable are fascinated and delighted, but they are uncertain about what this ethereal child’s mysterious ways can mean for them.

I had no idea that it’s actually a retelling of a story from Old Peter’s Russian Tales, a battered copy of which I have from when my dad bought it for me at a church fair.  Always a lover of fairy tales, I’ve read that book many times, though not recently, so it was lovely to rediscover the original tale.  

Nor did I expect to be utterly transported and swept along by the beautiful, magically woven prose, the descriptions of the savage but wondrous wilderness, and the tenderness of the warm characters within these pages.

It truly is a box of delights, a bittersweet novel about navigating grief, overcoming loss, and finding comfort, love and joy in the most surprising of places.  Some aspects of the story touched raw nerves and took my breath away; from time to time Claire found herself privately sobbing behind her book (and she’s not a frequent book crier)! It is a quiet, yet fierce story, with unforgettable insights on longing and holding onto hope.  If you want a book with just the right balance of magic realism and silver linings, let me recommend this!