A Northern Light
Jennifer Donnelly does it again... Well, this is technically her debut YA novel, but not the first one I read so... anyway, semantics!A Northern Light centres around small American country, and Mattie, who's a young woman yearning for more than her farming community can promise her.
I liked Mattie a lot. She reminded me so much of myself at that age. I even came from a farming community myself! I remember wanting to make more of myself, while still dreaming of a "normal" life with a loving husband and kids. It's such a difficult age to be... when you have to be an adult and start making choices. When you realise your choices are going to affect the rest of your life!
Mattie's story pulled me in and I was rooting for her to follow her dreams and go to college, never mind her ornery father or the shady boy that only wants her for her dad's farm.
The other characters were just as well developed! Weaver, Mattie's best friend. The first freeborn person in his family and an aspiring lawyer, who is determined to uphold justice. Weaver's mama, a hard-working widow hell bent on sending her son to college. Royal Loomis, the would-be "loving" hubby who only cares about his harvest... and of course Mattie's family... honestly I just loved everyone in this book.
I never realised that Grace Brown was real, and so was her letters. I found her letters to be excessively whiny, though, and along with her "friend", they were the only two characters that I didn't like. Which is sad because turns out they're the real characters after all. I am glad Chester got what was coming to him though...
I'm not going to lie. The plot itself wasn't mind blowing, and most of the time it was pretty obvious where the story was going. But man the prose was just so damn good that I didn't care if I had already guessed the ending... I thoroughly enjoyed the journey!
