Snapping the Slump

  Ever been in a reading slump? I just pulled myself out of one, snapping a pitiful 0-for-5 streak of abandoned books that spanned about four weeks. I was the Phillies of the library world. Struggling. Sputtering. Trying to figure things out.  
    But I kept hacking away and taking my swings until one day last week the ball flew out of the park. At long last readers, I connected with a book.
   If you find yourself in a midsummer book funk, try The Snow Child, by first-time author Eowyn Ivey. I’m not sure if it was the title that drew me in on a steamy day or the frosty vibe of the grey and white cover art or the positive reviews I’ve been reading on several book websites. All of the above? Possibly.
      The novel is based on a Russian folk tale about a childless couple that builds a snow child during the winter's first snowfall. It magically comes to life but disappears each spring, only to return the following winter. Mabel and Jack, Alaskan homesteaders living near the Wolverine River in 1920, have an empty home, stale marriage and diminishing pantry. Mabel comes close to suicide in the opening pages, but not long thereafter, the couple’s own snow child arrives. The mysterious, sprightly child runs through the forests with uncanny speed and confidence and offers gifts of berries, homemade baskets and trapped game for the near-starving couple. Her visits are unpredictable but over time the blond, blue-eyed girl comes to trust the couple and becomes part of the family, at least during the winter months.
   There’s a strong fairy-tale thread that runs through this entire book, but it never overtakes the story of Mabel and Jack‘s ongoing battle with the elements, their farm, even their skittish horse. There is harsh Alaskan reality at the novel’s core that kept the story of the fanciful snow child in check. There are trees to fell, fields to plow, seeds to sow, wood to cut, chickens to feed, bread to bake. And half the time it’s cold, dark, snowy and lonely. One thing’s for sure. Alaska, 1920, is no place for the faint of heart, and Ivey gives her readers the total northern exposure experience.
   The author lives and works in Alaska and conjured up the territory so convincingly she’s being compared to Willa Cather, whose fiction has also been a dependable source for understanding the look and feel of the real American prairie. As compliments go, this one must give Ivey the goosebumps, no matter what the temperature in her backyard.

The Push From the Book: each book we read leaves its mark and gives you a push: a new way of thinking, a new take on life, new ideas, new goals. Here's what this book did to me:  It kept me reading outside the box. Novels relying too much on folklore and fairy tales usually disappoint me. Earlier this year I grabbed Tea Obreht’s The Tiger’s Wife, which Ann Patchett called “a marvel of beauty and imagination.” It didn’t strike me the same way, and I wanted to abolish anything like it for the foreseeable future. Good thing I let that notion pass. I would have missed something special had I put The Snow Child back on the shelf. And no doubt my slump would have continued.