Crow Lake by Mary Lawson

When I read Joanne Harris's (Chocolat) comments on Lawson's first novel I was impressed that such an accolade could be bestowed by a recognised author onto an apparent "rookie" in the profession. And, Harris was right to praise this work - this is a sensitive, passionate tale of a bereaved family of 4 young orphans in the rural outback of Canada. The descriptions of each individual's hunger and thirst for, and pleasure and disappointment with life, all different, but inexorably intermingled with each other, will have you reaching for the tissues in either sympathy and/or empathy before the last page praying for a conceivable resolution - and Lawson doesn't thwart our appeal.