The Letters

August 4, 2008
The bestselling Rice teams up with Monninger in this epistolary novel of an unraveling marriage. Sam and Hadley West separated following the death of their grown son, Paul. Sam is in Laika Star, Alaska, where he is arranging to travel via dog sled to the site where Paul died in a plane crash. Hadley, meanwhile, has moved to an island off the coast of Maine and thinks Sam’s trip is a bad idea. Both Sam and Hadley initially come off as unsympathetic (he too self-centered, she too bitter and jaded), but as the letters pile up and they delve deeper into their anguish while sorting out “what marriage means or how it should end,” they endear themselves to the reader. The book is unabashedly melodramatic, but readers into the sappy will be reaching for a Kleenex by the end.

August 15, 2008
In this epistolary novel by the popular Rice ("Last Kiss") and her friend Monninger ("Home Waters"), Sam West dogsleds across Alaska to the site of the plane crash that killed his only child, Paul, three years earlier. Meanwhile, Sam's wife, Hadley, rents a cabin off the coast of Maine to rekindle her passion for art. Paul had dropped out of Amherst College and was on his way to teach in a remote Inuit village when he died. His death signaled the last breath of the Wests' marriage as well. Or had it been dying long before their son's demise? Sam initiates the correspondence, but soon each spouse comes to view it as a means of being truly honest one last time before their divorce becomes final. As Sam writes, "Something has changed with us]. It makes no sense to name it, though. Not yet. I trust these letters." However Sam's journey alters course and the couple's relationship remodels itself, readers will trust in the privilege of going along for the ride. Though the segmentation of voices leaves one less engaged than one might wish, this is still a satisfying read. Recommended for public libraries. [Prepub Alert, "LJ" 6/1/08.]Bette-Lee Fox, "Library Journal"

Copyright 2008 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

September 15, 2008
A husband and wife on the cusp of dissolving their marriage write back and forth about their personal journeys to rediscover themselves as they figure out what went wrong. Sam is in Alaskaon a dogsled trip to the remote site of their sons plane crash, while Hadley escapes to an isolated island in Maine. Both recognizethe pain and mistakes they made before and after their sons tragic death as they communicateeloquentlyin their letters. With each characterand each authorprovidingvividdescriptions of his and hersurroundings and intense emotions, itshard for the reader to remember that she is reading fiction andnot eavesdropping on personal correspondence saturated withsadness and love.As Sam and Hadley write, thehopethat they may find a way back to each other before it is too late ascends. Rice and Monninger beautifully convey love and hope from two different spheres of reference, taking the reader on a journey of discovery that celebrates thebeauty of letter writing, an art fast disappearing in an age ofinstant communication.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2008, American Library Association.)