I wanted to love this book, I really did. Everyone seems to adore Kristin Hannah so much and I was down for the premise. An abusive father in Alaska in the 1970s? Yes please. But I didn't enjoy this much. It was barely a 3 star for me, and even then I gave solid thought to giving it two. However, I did enjoy the story and I was entertained by it. I read it in a day and was down for it the entire time, so while it was riddled with issues, overall it was fine.

Small points to get out of the way first- the dialogue felt so stiff and awkward to me. It was full of exposition. None of it ever sounded the way people actually talk. The historical fiction aspect seemed not well done. I've read wonderful ones that surround you in the atmosphere of the time, but this felt like it was just referencing major news events to remind you it was set in the 70s. And it was also super predictable and generic. I'm okay with predictable, but literally every "plot twist" toward the end was just the most generic route this story could take, and it was annoying.

This felt very obvious in the same way Beartown did for me, like the author was spoon feeding me information and talking down to me. When there's an A+B=C equation in a book, I don't need or want the whole equation. I want A+B and then the opportunity to extrapolate C for myself. I want to be given the space to think. I felt as though I didn't have to think at all in this book because Hannah was spelling out the information for me.

It also felt simultaneously too fast and too slow. The events happened at a very slow pace, which I'm fine with. I love slow books. But when it came to character growth and change, it felt like there would be nothing for a long time, and then it'd happen all at once.

Both those points made this book feel much too simplistic and almost black and white, which is again, similar to issues I had with Beartown. For all the characters had horrific things happen to them, it felt too easy within the story development. So I guess what I'm saying is that if you like Beartown, you'd probably love this.

My last point is the unhealthy relationship. Not between Leni's parents (she had a physically abusive father), but rather between Leni and her boyfriend. For the longest time, I thought it was intentional. I thought Hannah was drawing parallels between Leni's parents' unhealthy relationship and her own unhealthy relationship, although they were very different. I thought that was a great element of the story. Until I realized that wasn't Hannah's intention at all. It was written as though it was healthy, even though Leni would frequently talk about how much she needed him or she'd die if she didn't see him. I really dislike when unhealthy relationships aren't treated as such.

Overall, definitely not for me, although I am disappointed I didn't fall in love with this the way everyone else seemed to. I will still be trying some of Hannah's other books and hopefully enjoy them more.