I was hoping for something like The Princess Bride that I could recommend to students. This had some of the whimsy, but I believe the majority of the humor would go over their heads. It was dry and at times forced. While some of the characters were entertaining, I do not plan to add this to my collection.

A story of the power of love, the mental anguish suffered by veterans and their family members, and the ability to overcome obstacles are all embraced in the is incredible novel. The descriptions of the Alaskan area in the early 1970s was eye opening. Fabulous characters and plot.

This story of 13 year old Leni and her mother and their new life in Alaska is another hit out of the ballpark for Hannah. The same weaving in and out of tragedy, love and the strength we find in the relationships of family and friends, even when we find ourselves alone,  is found in this as her past titles. It is an engaging story set at the edge of Alaskan frontier. It pushes every doubt of supporting those we love to the forefront and then bashes them head on with what could be a true story. Highly recommend.

Another great novel by Kristin Hannah taking on the serious topic of domestic abuse. Setting it in Alaska brings on an extra layer of trying to survive. Loved it.

While I found this one hard to get into initially, Kristen Hannah's writing carried it all the way through, and i found myself extremely invested in the characters, while the Alaska setting took on a life of its own.

Due to an unexpected busy period at work, I was unable to finish reading this book during the NetGalley 54-day window.  However, I was so intrigued by what I had read that I went out and purchased a hardcover copy so that I could finish it.  I was quite glad that I did.

Kristin Hannah is becoming one of my favorite authors. 

The heartbreak and the triumphs of this book. I really want to go visit Alaska now!

Trying to run away from his demons, Vietnam war veteran Ernt takes his wife Cora and teen daughter Leni to the Alaskan wilderness. Unfortunately, people can’t run from their problems and eventually Ernt’s psychoses threatens to harm them all.  In the years they live in Alaska, Leni discovers her inner strength and resilience, qualities that will serve her well as she realizes she must survive all types of challenges. Hannah’s writing captures emotions and experiences so adeptly, the reader can clearly envision all Leni and her family encounter. Fans of Hannah’s work won’t be disappointed with this raw and honest look at domestic violence and its impact in the home and in a community.

I received an advance copy of the book from Net Galley and have provided an objective review.

What touched me so much was the absolutely true feeling of the girl.  Living with a person with addiction or personality disorders leave a child with so much anxiety.   As you go home you never know what you will find.  You don't bring friends home because you are embarrassed or just scared.   You hate to go anywhere with that person because do not know how you will make it home or if you will.   The truthful feelings in this book made me remember my childhood, and how that feeling and that anxiety shadowed your whole life then.  You carry it with you for the rest of your life.

A Vietnam Vet moves his wife and daughter to Alaska to join a survivalist group.. He becomes more and more abusive to his wife and daughter. The affect of being in the Vietnam war and how it effects his personality is riveting

Kristin Hannah does it again; writes an amazing story that is impossible to put down.  The Great Alone follows a man who is disturbed from the war and thinks that moving to somewhere quieter and on the land will help.  He moves his family to a small town and a very simple log cabin.  That works for a while...  The story is mainly about the young daughter growing up in the middle of nowhere.  It is a heart touching tale of love, family and forgiveness- and when it is tie to say enough.

Author Kristin Hannah never disappoints. This is the 7th novel I have read by Hannah, and just like the others I've read, this one was hard to put down, too. I am very excited that the book is going to be made into a movie. Should be epic!

Recommended Read! The Great Alone by Kristin Hannah explores PTSD, preppers, death, fear of death, danger, wild animals, and first love. It’s a lot for a teenager to contend with, as well as for the reader. Absorbing, scary, and heartbreaking – I expected a wilderness adventure, but there is so much more I didn’t anticipate. Wow.

Leni’s life is scary-real and real-life scary. All of it is very believable and realistic in author Kristin Hannah’s capable hands. The 1970s persuasively come alive. I couldn’t stop reading and yet, I was afraid of what would happen next. The setting bursts forth from the pages – making me want to see Alaska and fearing it in tandem. So good!

I would love to see this book become a movie or series. Domestic violence trigger warning. This novel is vivid and deep, but it has a beautiful ending — just tread carefully if you’ve experienced abuse. It’s not an easy road – gut-wrenching at times, but well worth the experience.

Written from a teenage girl’s point of view, the reader often gets a glimpse of the terrible reality of adulthood and what some people do to their kids. Understanding the abused and why they stay with the abuser is expertly portrayed here. Not that I agreed with the characters’ choices all the time, but I could empathize with them due to their isolation and hopelessness.

I loved this book the first time I read it, and I found it just as absorbing the second time. I’m so glad my book club chose it to read this month. It’s rare that I re-read, but I love the main character’s voice – as she sees the world around her as a teenager. So young, and yet, she has experienced too much for her age, like so many of our youth today.

I was probably more shocked at the contents the first time I read this novel. I loved it, but I wasn’t sure how I’d review it. I sat on my thoughts for a long time, so I was glad to read it again to finally articulate how it made me feel. It’s the type of book that you can love and hate at the same time because the characters are so real, and not very nice. But I was always rooting for their survival, hoping they’d find their way out of the darkness.

In the end, I realize these characters will have a lifetime of regret, as well as an understanding that it could be no other way for them at that time in their lives. I’m not sure I could have survived it. It epitomizes “what doesn’t kill you, makes you stronger” in a way that leaves the reader gasping for air.

The Great Alone is deep emotion surrounded by adventure and wrapped up in the best storytelling, starring quirky characters who made me laugh and cry. I may just have to read it a third time. Kristin Hannah proves again why she easily is becoming one of my favorite authors. Now I know she’s also brave – this book took guts.

Review by Dorine, courtesy of TheZestQuest.com. Digital copy provided by the publisher for an honest review. Thanks in advance for sharing this review!

A haunting book dealing with a dysfunctional family moving to Alaska in an effort to start over on land bequeathed from a battlefield friend. The adults do not fare well but the child grows to embody the strength and resilience of the land. She grows strong enough to free her parents from their violent interactions. 

This book will stay with you.  I keep wondering how these characters and their friends are doing.

This book is so well written, I didn't want it to end. The research into the Alaska landscape, people, climate, and wild life was incredible. I felt that I knew the characters, they were so well depicted and I could see the cabin that the main characters lived in. There was plenty of excitement, even a murder, to keep you reading well into the night. Part of the story takes place in Seattle, a city I know well. So sad when a woman allows a man to beat her, but cannot break away. I guess it's quite a common thing.

After reading the Nightingale I was expecting a lot out of this book.  It just wasn't there.  The story is good it was just a basic story to me.  A comparison I would make between the two is that her ending summary/lookback is more well written than the rest of the book.

I am still trying to gather myself after reading this powerful novel.   Ms. Hannah took me on a journey to Alaska, a place I had visited with my family when I was a kid.  I was taken back to the wilderness and the remoteness of the beautiful state.   This book was about survival in so many ways.   Survival comes in different ways for different reasons.   Not just survival in a remote and wild country but also emotional and mental survival that might even be harder to endure and overcome. 

I was living in the  world of Leni and her life with a father who felt he needed to protect his family by isolating them from the world and its dangers he imagined.  Her loyalty to her mother and the abuse they endured were heart wrenching.   Ms. Hannah told a hard story to tell and did it in a "Robert Service" kind of way.   It's not always easy to tell about truths and situations.  I was pulling for Leni the entire book.    I had a hard time putting it down.  

I am so glad I read this book.  The writing of Ms. Hannah really pulled me in and took me on a trip to Alaska and The Great Alone I will never forget.   I could see the beauty of the state and smell the surrounding wilderness.  It was like being there.    
 
     This passage is one that touched me about life:

"Once, a lifetime ago, she had worried about girls, only a few years older than her, who had gone missing.  The stories had given her nightmares at thirteen.  Now she knew there were a hundred ways to be lost and even more ways to be found.   Such a thin veil separated the past from the present; they existed simultaneously in the human heart.  Anything could transport you-the smell of the sea at low tide, the screech of a gull, the turquoise of a glacier-fed river.   A voice in the wind could be both true and imagined.  Especially here."  

I want to thank Netgalley for the opportunity to read this GREAT novel and to Ms. Hannah for writing it.   I would recommend this book to anyone who wants to take an adventure into The Great Alone.

I so loved Kristin Hannah's Nightingale and so couldn't wait to read her latest but I have to say I was disappointed.  Leni a young girl in an abusive family is the main character.  Father is extremely abusive and Mother has no backbone to get herself or her daughter out of it - the Alaska setting was good and descriptive but way too repetitive - I felt much of the continual repetition should of been left out - It was frustrating to read - I had to force myself to finish - way too much melodrama - a tedious read.

Kristin Hannah did it again. The eloquence in her writing and masterful storytelling always allows me to become completely immersed in her books.

The Great Alone is a chilling, emotionally wrenching roller coaster ride. Kristin Hannah has created characters that are believable and realistically populate this story of a couple and their child caught between a parent she loves and cannot abandon and a parent who claims to love her.

When Ernt Allbright and Coraline marry, they are madly and happily in love. Along comes Vietnam and Ernt gets drafted. After fighting, being captured and remaining a POW of 6 years, Ernt comes back a changed man. Ernt can't hold down a job, he is drinking and becoming violent. Morale is at an all-time low and gas prices are at an all time high. The world is in crisis. Bombings, hijacked planes, and now college girls in Washington State have been disappearing. Danger is everywhere. Ernt, Cora and their daughter Leni finally make the move to Alaska where there is freedom in the last frontier, to start a new life. Alaska is a tough place to live and as they struggle to survive, the dark creeps into Ernt and he becomes a man suffering from PTSD and takes it out on his wife. Meanwhile Leni has finally found a place where she feels like she belongs and her first true friend.

I loved this book. An entertaining and emotional read with an engrossing plot and well-developed characters. With some very heavy duty issues covered in this book, keep a box of tissues close by. The say Kristin Hannah described Alaska in all its brilliance and desolation, I could almost like I was there. It was easy to see why Leni felt lost when she was not in Alaska. Leni is an extremely strong young woman. In the midst of becoming a person capable of surviving her family, Alaska, hard choices, and the tragedies that rock her world, Leni discovers the true families that love her. Of course the issue of PTSD and how it was dealt with back in the 70s was terrible to read about. Yet, the compassion, loyalty, friendships, camraderie that develops between the residents of Kaneq Alaska were amazing and loving. After reading many amazing reviews I was worried that this story could not live up to the hype. “The Great Alone” does not disappoint. This was another fascinating, thought-provoking, and captivating read. Heartbreaking at times, but also with moments of great love and unbelievable kindness. A gripping story where I was desperate to know what was going to happen next. A bittersweet but satisfying ending topped off this amazing read. I finished this book a few days ago, but am still thinking about the characters and the setting. I can't say that about all the books that I read. I want to thank St. Martin's Press for generously providing me with a copy of this book to read. The opinions shared are my own.