4.5/5
Thanks to Del Rey Books and Netgalley for the ARC.

"But there was nothing detached about his music. It reached a clawed hand right inside Freddie's forgotten heart, alive with things he was too wounded to feel anymore. Regret, tenderness. It was beautiful, and it hurt so much."

This is a story that will stay with you long after you finish. As a fan of Katherine's other series and after following the long, difficult process for her to get this written, it is so, so worth the wait. This is a visceral, achingly beautiful story of a woman's search for her missing brother during WW1. And because it's Katherine, there is a supernatural element to the story. Laura is a former combat nurse who had returned home to Halifax, Nova Scotia after an injury, when she receives a chest with her brother's effects and is told that Freddie is missing. Laura is sure in her heart that Freddie is not dead and finds a way to get back to the front on her mission to find out what happened to him.

Set in 1917 during the push to defend Passchendaele Ridge, the story does not flinch from the horrors of what the soldiers faced during this war that changed the world. I really liked that the story also focused on combat nurses and how they also put their lives and health on the line to help the wounded. I don't want to go into detail about the supernatural element as I think it would spoil the discovery of what is actually happening in the story. Just know that these characters, their journey and how they learn to live with what they have been through is beautifully written, captivating, heart-breaking and so worth taking the time to read.

Wow - this was so great and I cannot recommend it enough.

I was not personally a huge fan of Arden's Winternight trilogy - very much could have been a wrong book, wrong time moment for me. This, however, was hauntingly beautiful and masterfully done. The book is much more speculative fiction than it is fantasy - so get that expectation gone if that matters to you. I would compare the story of this to Divine Rivals, swapping out romantic love for sibling love, and the war aspect done *so* much better (no shade to Rebecca Ross - I loved Divine Rivals). Arden's writing is gorgeous, and she does an incredible job or understanding how an experience from over a century ago would have impacted human beings. Her author's note made me realize just how passionate she is for this era, and it gave me a new perspective on it, as well.

I initially gave this book five stars, but another review for this made me realize that Arden does a lot of hand-waiving plot-wise. While they were not things that bothered me while reading, it was a bit underwhelming to think about after the fact. Regardless, this story gave me so much to think about and contemplate, and I think this would be a fabulous book to discuss with friends or classmates.

Thank you to Del Rey and NetGalley for an ARC in exchange for an honest review!

I’ve put off writing this review, because this is such a beautiful story I’m not sure I can do justice to, and while it wasn’t perfect for me, I love this author and think this will be perfect for the right readers. Ever since I read THE BEAR AND THE NIGHTINGALE and the rest of the Winternight trilogy, I’ve been eagerly awaiting her next adult novel, so I barely needed to even read the description before requesting this book.

THE WARM HANDS OF GHOSTS is a stunning WWI novel with magical realism, strong writing, and a strong brother/sister relationship at its core. Like IN MEMORIAM by Alice Winn, it does not shy away from showing the brutalities of WWI. The author’s note makes it clear how much of herself Arden poured into this book. I haven’t seen this on many 2024 lists so far, but I’m hoping it gets more attention on release!

I’m not a huge historical fiction reader, so this was a bit too slow for my tastes, but I will continue to follow Arden wherever she takes me. I think this has vibes of THE INVISIBLE LIFE OF ADDIE LARUE (which I DNFed) and THE NIGHT CIRCUS (which I should have DNFed), if that tells you anything!

Thank you to NetGalley and Del Rey Books for the free copy in exchange for my honest review!

I was incredibly lucky enough to be invited to take part in a secret read along with Katherine herself and a group like minded bookworms.
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This book truly took you to another time, as someone that doesn't know a lot about war. It was an experience being taken in to the trenches, to see from the point of view of the medical staff and the soldiers themselves. It was a story of mixed emotions so powerful that at times I felt like I was there on the sideline watching.
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Katherine did such an amazing job of researching this time to truly give it the respect that the story needed, while also adding her own person writing flair. Her cast of characters are like none other.
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The story takes place during WW1, we follow Laura a nurse that has returned home after being injured and her brother Freddie who is a soldier still fighting.
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Laura received news that her brother is MIA and presumed dead. She needs to know what happened to him and returns to the war in order to find answers.
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While Freddie and Laura take us on their journey, we met Winter a German Solider and Jones an American doctor. These characters are my absolute favourite in this book. Without these characters the book would not have the impact on the reader that it does.
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Of course, all books need to have their villains. This is where Faland comes in. He is an interesting character to say the least.
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Two timelines that intercept to complete a beautiful and heartbreaking story.

Thank you Del Ray and NetGalley for sending me an advanced copy of The Warm Hands of Ghosts.
I simply adore this book with my entire heart and soul! The characters, the time period, the heartbreak, the entirety of this book was phenomenal. I was at the edge of my seat and never anticipated what was next!
If you enjoy historic fiction, family looking for lost loved ones, a bit of suspense, and a dash of supernatural, this is the book for you

I read a trilogy a few years ago by Katherine Arden and loved it. The Russian mythology woven into the story made it all so compelling.

However, I am not really that into WWI (or II) stories so this one was a little less interesting to me. I liked the writing very much. But the story itself seemed slow and not the sort of thing that grabbed my interest.

I wavered between a 3 and 4 rating. I think my interest is a 3 but the story might be a 4.

Thank you to NetGalley and Ballantine for an e-arc in exchange for an honest review. I struggled to decide what to rate this one. If you have read Arden's Winternight trilogy, I urge you not to go into this novel expecting it to be anything like her previous works. I came in with the wrong expectations entirely and because of that was quite thrown off by the writing style. This honestly feels like an entirely different person wrote this novel and that is not inherently a bad thing, however, I struggled to adjust. I was bored for almost seventy percent of this novel, I want to say. I didn't think I was very attached to the characters and the plot was not holding my interest. But then after seventy percent with a climactic ending, I found myself really enjoying the novel as a whole and the journey it took from beginning to end. I do think this one takes a long time to pay off because the pacing is so extremely slow, but I did think it was worth the read in the end. I also very much appreciated the author's note at the end. This one will not be for everyone and I can see some people not wanting to give it a chance because of it's pacing but I am glad that I had the opportunity to read it and it is a story in which I will think about later.

Canadian war veteran Will Bird believed his younger brother, Steve, had saved him from harm and death several times, and at each of Steve's appearances his flesh still felt warm. Bird's memoir, and the memoirs and letters of many other participants or witnesses to the first world war gave inspiration to Katherin Arden's The Warm Hands of Ghosts. It is a story of survivors seeking love and whatever fragments of their past selves can be rescued from the horrors of war.

Our tale centers on three figures and those they encounter. First are the siblings Iven, Laura and Wilfred, from Halifax Canada. Laura is a nurse who was injured by artillery and discharged in time to survive the deadly Halifax Explosion of 1917, she wants to go back to Europe to find Freddie/ Wilfred, the only one left of her family left alive(?). Wilfred joined the Canadian army and is fighting in the Battle of Passchendaele a savage slog through mud and rain. During an attack on a bunker he is trapped underground alongside a German Soldier, Winter our third central figure. They are both assumed dead, and in order to survive must rely on each other as they seek to escape No Man's Land and the strictures of a military life.

The narrative alternates between Freddie and Laura, not strictly chronologically, but from their two perspectives from 1917 through the end of the war. Both Freddie and Laura encounter a mysterious figure named Faland who is a supernatural devilish character who seems to being playing all the angles for his own benefit. Can our more human trio find each other and the love they so desperately need?

For those not familiar with the First World War One, this book critiques the main hypocrisies of the war, mainly those in power enjoyed a sheltered, privileged position while the common man experienced great physical and mental hardship.

Overall it is okay? For me the best part was the afterword where the author described their influences and why this setting. But as a story it relies heavily on a nebulous supernatural no place and even though it is a war story, has a very small cast.

If you like romance, if you like seeing the testing of the bonds of love and what can bring people together this work might appeal, but for those approaching this from a historical or military perspective much is left wanting as the critiques and points have been more deftly handled elsewhere. Not recommended.

I would like to preface this review with some clarification. The Warm Hands of Ghosts only loosely resembles fantasy. Loosely. I would more accurately categorize it as paranormal with a hint of magical realism. The paranormal elements don’t factor into the story until about 30-40 percent of the way into the narrative, and even then, many are subtle enough to be chalked up to hallucinations. On the other hand, for a low fantasy set during a war, I’ll have to give props to Arden for keeping my attention. I typically like my fantasy high, and I don’t follow war dramas well. Arden manages to make a war story entrancing while delicately weaving the supernatural into the narrative. If you’ve missed Arden since The Nightingale Trilogy, The Warm Hands of Ghosts will definitely satiate your appetite.

Character-driven stories always make the best stories. Arden’s characters have such depth and nuance, I felt a magnetic pull to every one of them. The only successful way to tell a war story, in my opinion, is to write compelling characters. Arden has definitely mastered character development here. Laura, a sulky, embittered and heartbroken nurse pushes through pain and grief in order to help others. Mary and Pen, though side characters, could easily be mains. Freddie and Winter work together and show the human aspect of the trenches, much like the events of Joyeux Noël, which I highly recommend readers watch for a bit of context on the exasperating cost of WWI and how it took such a toll on the humans fighting, they began to refuse to do so. One could also watch Wonder Woman; I feel there are some similarities with Diana’s quest to find Ares and stop the killing and Arden’s characters striving to find each other on the battlefield.

I only had a couple of drawbacks for this one. The first would be the romantic relationships in the book; they felt forced in terms of the characters’ attraction to one another, which might have been more compelling if they had been platonic, as the sense of obligation to one another as members of humanity in general instead of someone for whom there was a more visceral attraction would have made for a more inspiring story. I haven’t seen a lot of characters who stay connected because a sense of non-sexual loyalty lately, and literature could really use more of those. The book market right now is highly driven by romance stories, so I can see why that would be a narrative choice. I just wish maybe there would be more great books with great storytelling that show books can be good even if they aren’t romances. For this one, in both instances, the romance felt like an afterthought.

Additionally, the author’s note at the end makes a point of explaining and showcasing the amount of work and research on World War I Arden underwent while crafting this story. The effort really shows. I have a nurse in the family, and all of the dialogue and habits were familiar to me. What I found lacking, however, was the misinterpretation and misuse of Scripture references, especially the verses from Revelation. A bit of eschatological research would have really tied a nice bow of complementation with the accuracy of the war story. I do appreciate the nuances of the supernatural character(s) and the subtle references to the musical aspect of the violinist hotelier (I’m being deliberately vague so as not to spoil for those who have not read the book).

Overall, I give it a 4-star rating. Well crafted story overall, but some minor stuff that really detracted from how the book could really shine as literature.

My thanks to Netgalley for the eARC, for which I willingly give my own, honest opinion.

Katherine Arden—the author of the Small Spaces quartet and The Winternight Trilogy—has returned to adult fantasy with her latest novel, The Warm Hands of Ghost. Set during World War 1, the story is a superb, devastating, and meticulously plotted historical novel with a dark (and thrilling) fantasy twist.

The Warm Hands of Ghosts is split between the perspectives of two siblings: Laura Iven, a combat nurse honorably discharged, and Freddie, a soldier who, early in the story, is assumed dead.

This book is a challenging read. Anything set during a war typically is, particularly in World War 1 and 2 as well as any of the conflicts that are part of real world history. But Arden doesn’t use it simply as set dressing. The author draws the conflict closer with stark imagery, detailed writing that immerses the reader, and by making it intrinsically personal to the characters.

Laura’s position as a combat nurse put her up close and personal with the wounded, the fighting, and the horror. She was cynical but also caring, skilled at nursing, and desperate for information about her only remaining family. Freddie’s experience is just as harrowing, and that was especially true of his time in the overturned pillbox and the events afterwards—it forever changes him. Even the secondary characters—for example Mrs. Shaw—are touched by the conflict, although they process their grief in different ways (and it spurs different actions). And that’s what makes each member of the cast standout.

The speculative aspects were excellent. They’re in a like vein to The Winter of the Witch, fitting seamlessly with the setting and themes. It was a period of change, and that too had to adapt to the times. And the result was an eerie, terrifying, and clever antagonist.

The Warm Hands of Ghosts is part ghost story and part story of survival. It’s also about family, loss, change, and hope; a tale that was intense and dark, and an incredibly emotional read. And I loved every second of it.

Disclaimer: this copy of the book was provided by the publisher (Del Rey) via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review, thank you!

The writing is top-notch and the story feels meaningful. Dropping five stars here, but I stopped at 3% and ordered the Waterstones special edition copy with sprayed edges. I’m going to wait to read it until I have the gorgeous physical copy in hand. :-)

Thank you to NetGalley and Random House for the ARC.

This was a beautifully languid trudge through the forgotten horrors of WWI. I’m at a loss really. Katherine Arden has some of my favorite prose, and as usual she manages to create a haunting atmosphere that settles deep down in your bones. It’s lyrical and all-consuming to the point where I forget I’m reading. I’m there in the trenches, in the darkness, in the devastation.

It’s not for the faint of heart. At all. There are a lot of terrors explored in the story – worse, they’re real terrors that were undoubtedly experienced by thousands of real soldiers and nurses and civilians. But somehow she weaves a single thread, pulling you through it all – one of hope and life, even in the face of the unspeakable.

The characters felt real and raw; Laura, a wounded nurse returning to Belgium in search of the truth about her brother, and that brother, Freddie, a soldier trying to survive the trenches with Winter, his unlikely German ally. My heart ached for each and every one of them. And I was glad a smidge of romance was eventually thrown into the story, it was a welcomed breath of fresh air amidst all the gloom.

Then there’s “the fiddler,” a mysterious musician wandering the warfront, providing a refuge for those looking to escape their own waking nightmare. His role in particular got me thinking. And will probably continue to make me think. PTSD, grief, survival, the blurred lines between good and evil, and what it even means to be alive are all explored so thoughtfully and authentically.

I was mesmerized from the first page until the last.

Since finishing Katherine Arden’s Winternight Trilogy a few years ago, I’ve been eagerly awaiting word of what her next novel would be and when it would be available. At last, the wait is over with The Warm Hands of Ghosts available soon. Exploring the psychological impact and devastation of World War I with the inclusion of fantasy elements, The Warm Hands of Ghosts proved to be worth the wait. Despite the heavy subject matter, there is a thread of hopefulness that runs through the novel, preventing it from going too dark and yet, the novel’s climactic scenes and resolution anchor it in the harsh realities of war, maintaining a delicate balance.

In late 1917, Laura Iven returned home to Halifax after being wounded as a battlefield nurse but her homecoming didn’t go as planned. First, her parents were among the fatalities of the infamous explosion that all but leveled Halifax. A little over a month later Laura received her younger brother’s effects from the front where he was declared missing, suspected killed in action. But if he were truly missing, how had they gotten his coat and tags to return them to her? Unable to get a clear answer about what exactly had happened and having been told by her spiritualist employers that Freddie was actually alive (even though she doesn’t believe in that sort of thing), Laura and a friend join a volunteer hospital organization and she goes back to Belgium to try and discover the truth of what happened to her brother. What she and her friend find as they near the front are rumors of a man the soldiers call the fiddler who provides a bit of respite from the horrors of war and that some men go mad looking for him again along with the gentle oblivion he offers… and Laura learns the fiddler might have something to do with what happened to Freddie.

Understandably, grief permeates The Warm Hands of Ghosts. It’s interesting that a novel about World War I begins with an incident of so much death that isn’t a major battle. Instead, it’s almost as far from the front as it’s possible to get and yet, it too happens because of the war – the explosion being due to the munitions load carried by one of the ships in the collision. Even having grown up among the lore of the Halifax explosion (because to this day, Halifax sends Boston a Christmas tree in thanks for the city’s support), it wasn’t until reading this novel that the timeline truly clicked into place. At the same time Laura is processing the grief of her parents’ deaths (and the guilt over not having been able to do more to save her mother), she is surrounded by the grief of others. The elderly sisters she works for are spiritualists who hold seances and try to connect grieving widows and families with their husbands, brothers and sons who died fighting an ocean away. But because of this there is an optimism and hope running through that grief that manages to penetrate even Laura’s battlefield-bred cynicism and pragmatism.

Back near the fighting, the grief settles like a fog over everyone involved but it is less directly tied to death and much more abstract. There’s grief for the world as it was and for the sense of self, both of which appear more difficult to work through because there is less understanding for what the grieving process should look like – there doesn’t exist the same template to follow that can carry you safely to the other side and a future that, while different, is recognizable. So much of The Warm Hands of Ghosts explores navigating through that sea of grief and uncertainty. Do you seek to numb the pain or take it out on others? Do you find someone to blame, even if it’s yourself? Do you try to deny what you’re feeling or distract yourself? Let it drive you to be productive (or self-destructive)? And how do you know for sure that you’re on the other side or is there no other side and you’re just stuck in that sea forever? (Despite so much time spent on such dark questions, I found The Warm Hands of Ghosts to actually be quite hopeful and satisfying in many respects.)

The Warm Hands of Ghosts will be available February 13, 2024.

Selected by the Washington Post as one of ten “noteworthy” books to read in February, Katherine Arden takes the reader to the hellscape of 1917 Belgium during World War I and the Third Battle of Ypres. Laura Iven, a seasoned combat nurse, was discharged from the Canadian Nursing Corps in Flanders when a shell casing lodged deep in her leg crippling her. She returns home and is hired by the Parley sisters, a “delightful trio of swindlers,” to serve as a nurse companion, but an explosion in the harbor in Halifax that kills her parents and destroys the family home derails her plans.

While Laura tends to the injured at a YMCA hospital in Nova Scotia, her younger brother, Freddie, is serving in the Canadian army in the trenches near Ypres. A harbor clerk prior to the war who “wrote wretched poems and drew good pictures,” Freddy finds himself in an upended pillbox with a grievously wounded German soldier, Hans Winter. The need for companionship to escape the misery in which they are trapped makes the fact that they are enemy combatants irrelevant. Freddie recognizes that he would have “died a dozen times if not for Winter” and, as they escape the pillbox and find themselves behind Canadian lines, Freddie takes actions “in traitorous defense of the enemy.”

Months later, Laura receives a box containing Freddie’s uniform jacket, identity tags, and other odds and ends, and a mysterious postcard which reads, “I will bring him back if I can. If I don’t, and the war is over, you must ask. . . .” The rest was blotted by a stain. Determined to find out what had happened to her brother, and urged on by Agatha Parley who assures Laura that her brother is alive and that she must go to him, Laura returns to the front accompanied by the beautiful and refined widow Penelope Shaw or Pim, a client of the Parleys whose son died in the war, and Mary Borden, the founder of a private aid station in the early days of the war housed at an abandoned chateau in Belgian.

Intertwined with the grief and heartbreak of war which Arden meticulously renders, is a supernatural element, a hotelier by the name of Falange, who steals his patrons’ souls. This demon ups the ante by providing a threat that is as strange and intense as the emotions of the characters involved in the world at war. Thank you Net Galley and Del Rey for providing me with an advance copy of this historical fantasy.

This was stunning and haunting. While still historical fantasy, The Warm Hands of Ghosts is a pivot for Katherine Arden, after her Winternight trilogy. Her new standalone is not a fairytale but instead more grounded in the horrific realities of World War I, combined with a story of ghosts and a supernatural, perhaps devilish figure known as Faland.

The story follows Laura Iven, a tough, no-nonsense combat nurse returning to the front in search of her missing brother Freddie. Laura is already grieving her mother and determined to find out if her brother has died or gone missing in some other way. Meanwhile, her brother Freddie is left near death with a German soldier named Winter, whom he teams up with to escape and attempt to survive. Freddie and Winter form a bond that transcends their countries and determine to save each other, even after Freddie falls into Faland's mysterious orbit for months. Laura and Freddie deal with deep trauma after serving on the front for most of the war, the devastating explosion in their hometown of Halifax, and the things they have been forced to see and do.

Arden's writing is filled with authentic language and lesser known historical detail - the Halifax disaster, Mary Borden's independent hospital, the women who served abroad as nurses, and more - while remaining in her typical lyrical, sometimes mysterious style. This book is far more eerie, though, and the fantastical elements are as haunting as the realities of the true time and place.

“Ghosts have warm hands, he kept telling me, as though it was the greatest secret in the world.”

I thought Katherine Arden did a beautiful job weaving present with past, reality with magic, the horrors of war with the horror of something fantastical preying on the soldiers and officers alike. In some ways the characters were not well-fleshed out; we know almost nothing of Winter’s past, of who Pim really is, of Laura before the war. But to some extent, isn’t that the point? Isn’t the whole story about losing pieces of yourself until you are distilled down into something that survived and then figuring out if you can move beyond survival?

The plot moved very slowly, which I didn’t mind, and was at times a bit repetitive, which I enjoyed less. But overall this was a gripping, emotional, bittersweet story. I thought it was well written and unique.

I was lucky enough to receive an ARC. I loved this story and couldn’t put it down. It flew by so quickly. The writing was quite frankly beautiful and really lent itself to the magical realism narrative.

I will say though that the characters are not at all developed which may bother a lot of people.
Could the characters and plot be more developed? Absolutely. And I wish it was.

This very much reads like a fairytale where the characters are just moving along and learning and being changed as a person. however it really worked for me regardless of that. And that’s coming from someone who loves slow-burn narratives with developed characters.

Honestly, I love Katherine Arden’s work and I absolutely have her on auto-buy. I can’t wait to reread the Winternight trilogy later this month.

Katherine Arden
The Warm Hands of Ghosts

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

This book had me happy, sad, mad, worried, scared! All of it! I have never read a historical fiction like this! Well done.

About: During the Great War, a combat nurse searches for her brother, believed dead in the trenches despite eerie signs that suggest otherwise.

Favorite Character: Winter! He just gets it. He’s so loyal and kind, I just adore him and feel like I know him.

What I loved: I already love historical fiction, but this book had such an eerie touch to it that was so symbolically beautiful! It was terrifyingly heartbreaking! I will be thinking about this book for a while.

What I disliked: The ending made me sad even though I understood, I guess I just wish it ended a little differently, but it wasn’t a bad ending. I just selfishly wanted it my way.

The entire time reading it I was thinking about re-reading it! This one will definitely make you think and feel it all!

Thank you,

Katherine Arden, Random House Publishing Group and NetGalley for this ARC copy

Posting this review 2/3/24 to my Instagram account and Goodreads account. Both linked to my NetGalley review and profile.

3.75/5 rounded up
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I’ve been a big Katherine Arden fan since reading her Winternight trilogy and seeing she had a new book out, I had to read it. While I’m not usually a big historical fiction fan, this is the book that could change my mind

The plot of this book is realistic in the elements of war, but it somehow plays on the emotions to take it a step farther. This book is a dual POV, told through Laura’s present and her brother’s past. This way of narrating the book really helped create this unique perspective on the story as a whole and the overlap of these siblings. The pacing falls a little bit slow for me personally, but it still moves along in an enjoyable pace. The realistic elements of the novel put you in the middle of the trenches, while the emotional have you feeling what these soldiers and nurses felt. It leaves room for interpretation for these emotions, too. It’s got blood and gore to it, but isn’t too graphic about these elements. The writing of this is beautiful and engrossing. Arden has this way about writing that makes me crave more.

The characters are enjoyable, but a little flat. Laura is incredibly ambitious and driven, set on unraveling the truth of her brother’s whereabouts. Freddie’s perspective really draws on the reader to put themselves in his shoes and feel his emotions. I greatly preferred learning about Freddie, seeing the events of war and what comes. Despite these pros, I just wanted a little more from them. The romances of this book have little buildup, though I still enjoyed them for their endings. The side characters play their roles well in the grand scheme of things. Being so character driven, I wish they all were a little more fleshed out and carefully considered.

What really sold me on this one was the incorporation of this magical realism through the use of Faland. I loved how his character advances the plot of the book, adding this slightly paranormal element to offset the seriousness of the content. It was my favorite device of the book, adding this touch of lightness and fantasy to a heavy topic book. The reality of what he does was interesting to watch play out. I enjoyed this subplot immensely.

I really enjoyed this book. If you love historical fiction and magical realism, it’s worth a pickup.

The Warm Hands of Ghosts was my most anticipated book of the year and I am pleased to say this is an absolute masterpiece. It's hauntingly beautiful and a masterfully crafted story that expertly combines the apocalyptic horrors of World War I with subtle supernatural/fantasy elements (will not say too much about that here because I find this story is best if the mysteries slowly unravel for the reader alongside the characters).

I enjoyed both Laura and Freddie's POVs equally and Arden does a great job of weaving them together. Their sibling relationship is the heart of the story but other equally compelling relationship dynamics emerge as well. It's not necessarily a book that I would call a "love story" but at the same time it is because the families, friendships, and romances explored within this book are the most important part.

While The Warm Hands of Ghosts is quite different than Arden's Winternight trilogy and her middle grade horror Small Spaces quartet, each of her works has a distinct lyrical, magical, and haunting quality that is certainly present here. Once again she has written a book that has immediately become an all time favorite and I will think about it, along with her other books, until the end of time.