“I learned that the fairy tale had inspired a play with music by Tchaikovsky and a ballet that was first performed in St. Petersburg in the late 1800s. I discovered many versions, many possible endings. This in itself intrigued me. How could such a simple story lead in so many different directions? Marriage. Death. Perpetual, joyful childhood”.
A Pulitzer Prize finalist and first novel by Eowyn Ivey, The Snow Child depicts the magic of a classic Russian fairy tale in the background of Alaska.
The plot revolves around a childless couple in the 1920s who long for intimacy and happiness and have moved from Pennsylvania to Alaska in search for a new beginning. Jack, the husband, works the fields with great effort and not much success and Mabel, the wife, bakes pies to sell in town and keeps the homestead in order.
They would have never thought to experience what was next, building a snow child only to encounter short after a little girl that lives in the woods. As time goes by, the family settles into the new country and makes friends with their distant neighbors the Bensons, who help them in their rustics tasks, while the girl, Faina, appears and disappears as she fancies in front of the old couple first and then the rest of the characters.
It is a big mystery to explore where did she come from and how does she survive alone in the wilderness. Mabel believes in an ancient tale her father used to show her about a snow child that comes to comfort a family who has no children. The readers get trapped in the story as they try to figure out if the fairy tale can be real and how it ends as it gets lost in the Russian translation of the book Mabel holds. One can only guess at the ending by looking at the illustrations.
As we advance, the meaning of family and independence is redefined. The couple learns to love the dark and savage landscape and turn it into an opportunity to have contact with nature and reconnect with themselves.
Eowyn Ivey wrote this novel as she was working for Fireside Books in Alaska and expecting her second child. She found in the version of a Russian fairy tale, Snegurochka or The Snow Maiden the perfect fit for her book and was determined to include Alaska as the setting. Maybe it will not be the last time she writes inspired by the wild and beautiful country she was raised into.
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