Amy Harmon – What the Wind Knows – ARC Review

Release date:
Hardcover: February 1, 2019
E-book, paperback & audio: March 1, 2019

Now available in hardcover and in Amazon First Reads for the month of February. 

Hardcover: https://amzn.to/2QoYmYi
February’s pick: https://amzn.to/2MH7eH1

Synopsis

In an unforgettable love story, a woman’s impossible journey through the ages could change everything…

Anne Gallagher grew up enchanted by her grandfather’s stories of Ireland. Heartbroken at his death, she travels to his childhood home to spread his ashes. There, overcome with memories of the man she adored and consumed by a history she never knew, she is pulled into another time.

The Ireland of 1921, teetering on the edge of war, is a dangerous place in which to awaken. But there Anne finds herself, hurt, disoriented, and under the care of Dr. Thomas Smith, guardian to a young boy who is oddly familiar. Mistaken for the boy’s long-missing mother, Anne adopts her identity, convinced the woman’s disappearance is connected to her own.

As tensions rise, Thomas joins the struggle for Ireland’s independence and Anne is drawn into the conflict beside him. Caught between history and her heart, she must decide whether she’s willing to let go of the life she knew for a love she never thought she’d find. But in the end, is the choice actually hers to make?

*ARC generously provided by the author in exchange for an honest review*

Véleményem a könyvről

Amy Harmon egy csodálatos történetmesélő. Minden egyes alkalommal valami különlegeset képes alkotni, azonban egyvalami közös a könyveiben: nem tudom őket letenni, ugyanakkor nem akarom, hogy valaha is véget érjenek. Ez alkalommal az írónő Írország messzi tájára repített el minket egy szó szerinti időutazás során, ahol történelem és képzelet kéz a kézben járt táncot a lapokon a szél dallamára. Varázslatos volt.

Anne Gallagher gyásszal és fájdalommal sújtva érkezik meg Írországba, hogy teljesítse szeretett nagyapja, Eoin utolsó kívánságát, hogy hamvait az egykori szülővárosának közelében lévő Gill-tóba szórja. Azonban végső búcsú során rejtélyes és megmagyarázhatatlan dolog történik a tavon, aminek köszönhetően Anne hirtelen 1921-ben találja magát, Írország egy igencsak nehéz, forradalmi időszakában. Anne-re Eoin egykori vigyázója, Dr. Thomas Smith talál rá, aki szülei halála után a kisfiút apja helyett apjaként nevelte fel. Mivel Anne dédnagymamájának kiköpött mása, így mindenki azt hiszi, hogy a kis Eoin forradalmi harcok során eltűnt édesanyja tért vissza. A lány végül kénytelen a dédnagymama bőrébe bújni, amíg ki nem találja, hogy hogyan tovább…

Azt hiszem, minden nemzetnek megvan a maga keresztje. Írország rengeteget szenvedett a 20. században, nem csak a világháborúk, de az angol elnyomás elleni forradalom, majd a polgárháború és az ország kettészakadása is hatalmas sebeket ejtett a népen. Tetszett ahogy az igazi történelem megelevenedett a lapokon, és ahogy az írónő a tőle megszokott tehetséggel és finomsággal megtörtént eseményeket és valós történelmi személyeket szőtt bele a történetbe, ezáltal még érdekesebbé és lebilincselőbbé varázsolva a regényt.

Bár egyébként is jóval kevesebb alváshoz jutok mostanában, de még ebből a kevésből is muszáj volt feláldoznom, és jóformán átolvasni az éjszakát, annyira letehetetlen volt ez a könyv. A szereplők igazán a szívemhez nőttek, és ha éppen nem olvastam, akkor is csak rajtuk járt az eszem, és azon, hogy vajon mi fog velük történni, hogy végül megtalálják-e majd a boldogságukat.

Ez egy különleges, váratlan, izgalmas és komplex történet volt, az írónőtől megszokott szépséges stílusban megírva. Egy gyönyörű, időtlen szerelem története. Feledhetetlen élmény volt.  

My Review in English

Amy Harmon is a wonderful storyteller. Every single time she is able to create something extraordinary but there is one thing that every book of hers has in common: I can’t put them down but I also don’t want them to ever end.  This time the author took us on a journey far-far away, to the beautiful Ireland in the course of a literal time travel, where history and fiction danced hand in hand on the pages to the sound of the wind. It was magical.

Anne Gallagher arrives to Ireland with grief and pain in her heart, to fulfill the last wish of her beloved grandfather, Eoin, to spread his ashes into Lough Gill, the lake near his hometown. But during her last goodbye something mysterious and inexplicable happens and Anne suddenly finds herself in 1921, in a very hard and revolutionary period of Ireland. The man who finds Anne is no other than Thomas Smith, the doctor who helped to raise little Eoin after his parents died and who was like a father to him. Because Anne is so much alike her great grandmother, everybody thinks that Eoin’s mother came home who has gone missing during the revolutionary fights in 1916. At the end Anne has no other choice than pretend to be her great grandmother till she figures out what to do…

I think every nation has a cross to bear. Ireland suffered a lot in the twentieth century, not just during the world wars, but the revolution against the British rule in Ireland, the civil war and then the division of the island also left huge scars on the country. I liked how history came alive on the pages, and how the Author waved real historical events and significant historical figures into the story with her usual talent and care, thus making the novel even more interesting and engaging.

Even though I get much less sleep nowadays, I still had to sacrifice some even from this little for reading almost all night, because I just couldn’t stop reading this story. I fell in love with the characters and I couldn’t stop thinking about them and wondering what would happen in the next pages and if they will eventually find their happiness.

It was a unique, unexpected, exciting and complex story written in the author’s stunning writing style. A story of a beautiful, timeless love. It was an unforgettable experience.

My Favorite Quotes From the Book

“I loved churches the way I loved cemeteries and books. All three were markers of humanity, of time, of life.”

Aithníonn an gaoithe. The wind knows everything,” 

“The pain in my chest was a physical thing, biting and twisting, and I bore down to combat it, to extinguish it, but it grew like Medusa’s hair, the writhing tendrils slipping up and out of my eyes in hot, wet rivulets.”

“I can’t imagine all men love their women the way I love Anne. If they did, the streets would be empty, and the fields would grow fallow. Industry would rumble to a halt and markets would tumble as men bowed at the feet of their wives, unable to need or notice anything but her. If all men loved their wives the way I love Anne, we would be a useless lot. Or maybe the world would know peace. Maybe the wars would end, and the strife would cease as we centred our lives on loving and being loved.”

“I fell so fast, so hard, and so completely. Not because love is blind, but because . . . it’s not. Love isn’t blind, it’s blinding. Glaring. I looked at you, and from the very first day, I knew you. Your faith and your friendship, your goodness and your devotion. I saw it all, and I fell so hard. And the feeling continues to grow. My love is so big and full and brimming that I can’t breathe around it. It’s terrifying to love so much, knowing how fragile our existence really is. You’re going to have to hold on to me, or I’ll burst . . . or maybe I’ll just float away. Up into the sky, out into the lough.”

“I knew that Ireland wouldn’t know the peace found in the pages of our book for a long, long time. But peace would come. It would come in layers, in pieces, in chapters, just like in a story. And Ireland—the Ireland of the green hills and abundant stone, of the rocky history and the turbulent emotions—would endure.”

“I love her with an intensity I didn’t think myself capable of. Yeats writes about being changed utterly. I am changed utterly. Irrevocably. And though love is indeed a terrible beauty, especially given the circumstances, I can only revel in all its gory gloriousness.”

 

6 – timeless – stars

Purchase Links

Kindle: https://amzn.to/2NyJsQq
Hardcover: https://amzn.to/2QoYmYi
Paperback: https://amzn.to/2CCbA0I
MP3: https://amzn.to/2N2SfuG
Audio: http://a.co/8ALDz6H



UK READERS! The paperback is now ONLY £3.99 on AMAZON.UK!!! –> https://amzn.to/2S1YBgq

 

About the Author

Amy Harmon is a Wall Street JournalUSA Today, and New York Times Bestselling author. Amy knew at an early age that writing was something she wanted to do, and she divided her time between writing songs and stories as she grew. Having grown up in the middle of wheat fields without a television, with only her books and her siblings to entertain her, she developed a strong sense of what made a good story. Her books are now being published in eighteen different languages, truly a dream come true for a little country girl from Levan, Utah.

Amy Harmon has written thirteen novels – the USA Today Bestsellers The Smallest Part, The Bird and The Sword, Making Faces and Running Barefoot, as well as the #1 Amazon bestselling historical From Sand and Ash, The Queen and The Cure, The Law of Moses, The Song of David, Infinity + One, Slow Dance in Purgatory, Prom Night in Purgatory, and the New York Times Bestseller, A Different Blue. Her novels The Bird and the Sword and From Sand and Ash were Goodreads Best Books of 2016 and 2017 finalists.

 

 

Find Amy online

Website: www.authoramyharmon.com

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Twitter: https://twitter.com/aharmon_author

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Amazon: http://www.amazon.com/Amy-Harmon/e/B007V3HXUY

Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/5829056.Amy_Harmon

BookBub: https://www.bookbub.com/authors/amy-harmon

Newsletter: http://eepurl.com/P5AJP

Pinterest: https://www.pinterest.com/authoramyharmon/

 

 

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