The Great Alone

Such a beautifully written, yet tragic novel that deals with so many hard issues- and that is what makes this book so good. Please be aware before you read this that there is a lot of talk of domestic abuse in this book.The Great Alone follows from Leni's POV as her family (Leni, Mom and Dad) picks up their life in Seattle and moves to off the grid Alaska following her dad's return from being a POW in the Vietnam War. however, none of them were prepared for what was to come living in the middle of nowhere Alaska, especially when winter hits.Leni's perseverance in this book is unmatched- she went through so much as a child and into her adulthood, and she just kept pushing on. The way that her and Matthew were able to open up to one another and rely on each other's friendship to get through some of their hardest times really emphasizes the theme of love in this book (and that love is shown in different ways by different people, but not always shown in the relationships in this book). The side characters were also really well developed and guided the story along.Some people felt the ending was really rushed, and while I kind of agree, I also think that's representative of life and how sometimes you just can't catch a break. But I do understand it from both sides.Overall, this book was heartbreaking to read at times, but held such a beautiful message and was written so well. Highly recommend!

I was captivated from this novel from the beginning. So many factors are involved: Broken people with broken souls; family abuse; a sad portrait of a woman who tolerates abuse; the effects of abuse on a child; the tragedy of a Viet Nam Vet's post-war mental breakdown of his once good soul. For me, however, the most poignant and educational factors were the descriptions of a wild, desolate, beautiful Alaska in the 1970's. And the stories behind the characters involved who lived there - and played vital roles to the main characters. The tension is palpable. The story is mesmerizing, soulful, heartbreaking, suspenseful. It's one of those rare novels that had me breaking my rule of reading only at bedtime...I had to find out 'what's happening next?".If the following passages do not whet the appetite, I don't know what will:"Two kinds of folks come up to Alaska, Cora. People running to something and people running away from something. The second kind-you want to keep your eye out for them. And it isn't just the people you need to watch out for, either. Alaska herself can be Sleeping Beauty one minute and a bitch with a sawed-off shotgun the next. There's a saying: Up here you can make one mistake. The second one will kill you.""Even her laugh seemed at home here, an echo of the bells that tinkled from wind chimes in front of the shops.""Leni stared down at the sea, rolling inexorably toward her. Nothing you did could hold back that rising tide. One mistake or miscalculation and you could be stranded or washed away. All you could do was protect yourself by reading the charts and being prepared and making smart choices.""She was sweating hard, scooping a bucket of water from the creek, slopping it across her boots, when night fell. And she meant FELL; it hit hard and fast, like a lid clanging down on its pot.""Dad's intentions were good, but even so, it was like living with a wild animal. Like those crazy hippies the Alaskans talked about who lived with wolves and bears and invariably ended up getting killed. The natural-born predator could seem domesticated, even friendly, could lick your throat affectionately or rub up against you to get a back scratch. But you knew, or should know, that it was a wild thing you lived with, that a collar and leash and a bowl of food might tame the actions of the beast, but couldn't change its essential nature. In a split second,, less time than it took to exhale a breath, that wolf could claim its nature and turn, fangs bared.""A girl was like a kite; without her mother's strong, steady hold on the string, she might just flat away, be lost somewhere among the clouds.""Fear and shame she understood. Fear made you run and hide and shame made you stay quiet, but this anger wanted something else. Release.""There it was: the sad truth. Mama loved him too much to leave him. Still, even now, with her face bruised and swollen. Maybe what she'd always said was true, maybe she couldn't breathe without him, maybe she'd wilt like a flower without the sunshine of his adoration.""Everyone up here had two stories: the life before and the life now. If you wanted to pray to a weirdo god or live in a school bus or marry a goose, no one in Alaska was going to say crap to you. No one cared if you had an old car on your deck, let alone a rusted fridge. Any life that could be imagined could be lived up here.""It made Leni feel as if she were a coil of rope drawn around a cleat with the wind pulling at it, tugging, the rope creaking in resistance, slipping. If the line wasn't perfectly tied down, it would all come undone, be torn away, maybe the wind would pull the cleat from its home in fury.""There were a lot of bumper stickers like that out here, deep in Alaska's wild interior, far from the tourist destinations of the coast or the majestic beauty of Denali. Alaska was full of fringe-ists. People who believed in weirdo things and prayed to exclusionary Gods and filled their basements with equal measures of guns and Bibles. If you wanted to live in a place where no one told you what to do and didn't care if you parked a trailer in your yard or had a fridge on your porch, Alaska was the state for you.""The farther away you got from civilization, the stranger things got. Most people spent one dark, bleak, eight-month winter in Fairbanks and left the state screaming. The few who stayed-misfits, adventurers, romantics, loners-rarely left again.""Sometimes you had to go backward in order to go forward.""He hadn't realized how time could unspool the years of your life until for a second you were fourteen again, crying from a place so deep it seemed to predate you, desperate to be whole again.""Time was not something she usually paid much attention to. On the homestead, the bigger picture mattered-the darkening of the sky, the ebbing of the tide, the snow hares changing color, the birds returning or flying south. That was how they marked the passage of time, in growing seasons and salmon runs, and the first snowfall.""After that and all the way home, he said nothing, which should have been better than yelling, but it wasn't. Yelling was like a bomb in the corner: you saw it, watched the fuse burn, and you knew when it would explode and you needed to run for cover. Not speaking was a killer somewhere in your house with a gun when you were sleeping.""Love and fear. The most destructive forces on earth. Fear had turned her inside out, love had made her stupid.""Five out of every thousand people went missing in Alaska every year, were lost. That was a known fact. They fell down crevasses, lost their way on trails, drowned in a rising tide. Alaska. The Great Alone.""Someone said to me once that Alaska didn't create character; it revealed it.""This state, this place, is like no other. It is beauty and horror; savior and destroyer. Here, where survival is a choice that must be made over and over, in the wildest place in America, on the edge of civilization, where water in all its forms can kill you, you learn who you are........You learn what you will do to survive. That lesson, that revelation, as my mother once told me about love, is Alaska's great and terrible gift. Those who come for beauty alone, or for some imaginary life, or those who seek safety, will fail. In the vast expanse of this unpredictable wilderness, you will either become your best self and flourish, or you will run away, screaming, from the dark and the cold and the hardship. There is no middle ground, no safe place; not here, in the Great Alone."The physical descriptions throughout the novel are ethereal...you can touch and feel and see what the author paints for you.I think the author did an exquisite job with this novel - my one-time journey through Alaska will never be forgotten.

This is the first time I have read this author. The fact that the story takes place in Alaska immediately grabbed my attention as I am intrigued by that place. And while much of the story takes place there I found that this story is more about relations than a place. And the relations weren't always good (trying to avoid a spoiler here). With a 'any time the shoe will drop' presence darkness seem to permeate the story even though relational triumphs were presented as well. There was constant tension in the story which is generally what one wants in a good read. That did keep me flipping the pages. But in the end, despite the author's amazing attention to detail & her ability to write almost in a poetic fashion at times, I was exhausted by the characters. This author is very talented & I will read another work from her but I sure hope it will be on the lighter side of things.

Her books are not only great reading but I learn so much about certain era’s and in this case, living in places like Alaska. I’m fascinated with the 18 hours of day or night during certain months. It doesn’t take long to realize that this book is focused on the daughter. The abuse her mother suffered from her Dad was hidden in Seattle but very visible in Alaska. He had post war issues and she was blinded by her love for him and put up with it because she felt he was broken from the war. There are a lot of twists and turns and the characters are well developed. I enjoyed this book as well as the four winds and the women. I have 2 more of her books coming this week. They are all so different in story line and time periods which makes it interesting. I don’t really like sequel books all the time. I want different reads. Enjoy!

I rarely write reviews but in this case ...This is, by far, one of the best books I've read in a long time. As always, Kristin Hannah spins a wonderful tale .... plot, character development, everything is outstanding, but what grabbed me by the throat emotionally was her obvious visceral love for the State of Alaska. It shone through on every page. I'm not a crier but this story had me in tearsI'm happy to give it 5 stars - wish I could have rated it higher.

Beautifully written, so vivid and enthralling. This is a story that has you immersed in its splendour, its beauty, ugliness, pain and ultimately, love. You will come out the other side, having been on such a journey that you feel connected to the characters for ever.Lainy J. Thomas

I have just received my book and it either wasn’t in sufficient packaging to protect it or it is not new. I haven’t read the book yet.

It is beautiful story written beautifully. I love it. Leni and Cora both were the fighters. I admire them both. Looking forward to visiting Alaska very soon.

The book is well written and the author manages to make us imagine and even visualize the expanse of the Alaskan landscape. Also, the protagonist and her father are well defined characters. With Cora, though, the writer fails to give us a true character: she is flat, pathetic, with no backbone. A victim of the worst kind. The plot, too, is not particularly interesting. Something could have been improved.