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Book Cover for: In the Midst of Winter, Isabel Allende

In the Midst of Winter

Isabel Allende

Critic Reviews

Good

Based on 12 reviews on

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New York Times and worldwide bestselling author Isabel Allende returns with a sweeping novel that journeys from present-day Brooklyn to Guatemala in the recent past to 1970s Chile and Brazil that offers "a timely message about immigration and the meaning of home" (People).

During the biggest Brooklyn snowstorm in living memory, Richard Bowmaster, a lonely university professor in his sixties, hits the car of Evelyn Ortega, a young undocumented immigrant from Guatemala, and what at first seems an inconvenience takes a more serious turn when Evelyn comes to his house, seeking help. At a loss, the professor asks his tenant, Lucia Maraz, a fellow academic from Chile, for her advice.

As these three lives intertwine, each will discover truths about how they have been shaped by the tragedies they witnessed, and Richard and Lucia will find unexpected, long overdue love. Allende returns here to themes that have propelled some of her finest work: political injustice, the art of survival, and the essential nature of--and our need for--love.

Book Details

  • Publisher: Atria Books
  • Publish Date: Sep 4th, 2018
  • Pages: 352
  • Language: English
  • Edition: undefined - undefined
  • Dimensions: 8.20in - 5.20in - 1.10in - 0.60lb
  • EAN: 9781501178146
  • Categories: Historical - GeneralRomance - Historical - GeneralLiterary

About the Author

Allende, Isabel: - Isabel Allende, born in Peru and raised in Chile, is a novelist, feminist, and philanthropist. She is one of the most widely read authors in the world, having sold more than eighty million copies of her twenty-eight books across forty-two languages. She is the author of several bestselling and critically acclaimed books, including The Wind Knows My Name, The House of the Spirits, Of Love and Shadows, and Eva Luna. She has received fifteen honorary doctorates, been inducted into the California Hall of Fame, and received the PEN Center Lifetime Achievement Award and the Anisfield-Wolf Lifetime Achievement Award. In 2014, President Barack Obama awarded her the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the nation's highest civilian honor, and in 2018, she received the Medal for Distinguished Contribution to American Letters from the National Book Foundation. She lives in California with her husband and dogs. You can visit Isabel Allende at IsabelAllende.com or follow her on Instagram @AllendeIsabel, on Facebook at Facebook.com/IsabelAllende, and on X @IsabelAllende.

More books by Isabel Allende

Book Cover for: My Name Is Emilia del Valle, Isabel Allende
Book Cover for: The House of the Spirits, Isabel Allende
Book Cover for: The Wind Knows My Name, Isabel Allende
Book Cover for: Violeta [English Edition], Isabel Allende
Book Cover for: La Casa de Los Espiritus / The House of the Spirits, Isabel Allende
Book Cover for: Perla the Mighty Dog, Isabel Allende
Book Cover for: El Viento Conoce Mi Nombre / The Wind Knows My Name, Isabel Allende
Book Cover for: A Long Petal of the Sea, Isabel Allende
Book Cover for: Island Beneath the Sea, Isabel Allende
Book Cover for: The Stories of Eva Luna, Isabel Allende
Book Cover for: Perla La Súper Perrita (Perla the Mighty Dog Spanish Edition), Isabel Allende
Book Cover for: Violeta (Spanish Edition), Isabel Allende
Book Cover for: Largo Pétalo de Mar / A Long Petal of the Sea, Isabel Allende
Book Cover for: La Ciudad de Las Bestias / City of the Beasts, Isabel Allende
Book Cover for: Daughter of Fortune, Isabel Allende
Book Cover for: El Reino del Dragón de Oro / Kingdom of the Golden Dragon, Isabel Allende

Critics’ reviews

Praise for this book

"Allende's latest tale is heartfelt and raw... The interactions between the characters is well thought out and deep. Readers will come to love them and experience the heartbreak and joy both of their past, present, and future."
-- "RT Book Reviews"
"The lesson is clear in both book and life--passion is possible. So is survival and change and making a difference in the world, in Isabel Allende's grand and inimitable style."-- "The New Orleans Advocate"
"Isabel Allende brings her poetic and compassionate eye to In the Midst of Winter, [which] is being compared with her masterpiece The House of the Spirits."
-- "CBS' WATCH! Magazine"
"Isabel Allende's masterful blend of history, suspense, and rising passion makes for yet another riveting novel."-- "BBC America"
"The contrast of a modern-day mystery with the characters' magical worlds of South American culture, makes In the Midst of Winter an absorbing, page-turning adventure."-- "Woodbury"
"[Allende] continues to beguile readers with themes of social justice and love, tied together with a bit of magical realism. In this vivid and fast-paced work of fiction, [she] weaves a suspenseful love story, rendering [its] central trio with generosity, spirit, and passion."-- "National Book Reivew"
"Filled with Allende's signature lyricism and ingenious plotting, the book delves wonderfully into what it means to respect, protect, and love."-- "Publishers Weekly (starred review)"
"Allende has a rare and precious gift for simultaneously challenging and entrancing readers by dramatizing with startling intimacy such dire situations as the desperation behind illegal immigration and domestic violence, then reveling, a page later, in spiritual visions or mischievous sexiness or heroic levity."-- "Booklist (starred review)"
"This winter's tale has something to melt each frozen heart."-- "Kirkus"
"A timely message about immigration and the meaning of home."-- "People"
"It's when revealing the characters' harrowing past lives in other countries that the generous and unflagging energy that characterized Allende's debut, The House of the Spirits, can most clearly be felt."-- "San Francisco Chronicle"
"[In the Midst of Winter] forthrightly embraces both harsh realities and whimsy, pleasure and pain in this buoyant adventure, a heartfelt story of resilience and respect that seems just the thing to help us through these darkest of days in our land of exiles."-- "The Seattle Times"
"Allende uses imagination to help readers gain a better understanding of what the immigrant experience is really like for many people in this country."-- "Chicago Reader"
"Devotees of Allende's forays into magical realism (The House of Spirits, The Stories of Eva Luna) will find the universe she creates here--an account of earthly lives lived in an earthly setting--more madcap and macabre."-- "Newsday"
"A syntactically beautiful story with the twists and turns of a telenovela and warmth at its center."-- "Minneapolis Star Tribune"