Customer Reviews

The Ghost's Child

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Matilda, an elderly woman who lives in a small house surrounded by beautiful artifacts from a life spent journeying to the far corners of the globe, comes home one day to find a stranger --- a young boy --- sitting in her living room. After offering him biscuits and tea, she also offers him a story --- of her long life, a life filled with beauty, love and heartrending loss.

Matilda (who was known as Maddy when she was young) came from a well-off family in a seaside town. She was independent, unconventional and often lonely as a child, never seeming to fit in with those of her own age and social standing. After finishing boarding school, Maddy was taken on a worldwide tour by her father, a pursuit of one question: "What is the world's most beautiful thing?"

Maddy thinks she finds the answer during her journey, but she only discovers the truly most beautiful thing, the thing that will shape the rest of her life, upon returning home. There, on the beach near her parents' home, she find a young man, Feather, who lives with the sea birds she also adores. Feather owns nothing and cares for no one --- and Maddy falls hopelessly in love with his freedom, his quietness, his gentle strength.

"She knew for certain that Feather, homeless on the beach, tousled and tameless as a flash of lightning, was the most beautiful thing in the world. Cathedrals were ruins, compared to him. Stained-glass windows were mud." Overcoming her parents' objections to their relationship by promising that she and Feather will live a more conventional life, she fails to anticipate the consequences of trying to tame someone as wild as Feather.

Maddy's history of heartbreak and loss defines much of her life, which is also marked by achievement, sacrifice and a bittersweet homecoming. Fantastical elements abound as well, from an imaginary protector to talking sea creatures to Feather himself. These elements, combined with Sonya Hartnett's lyrical language, give the book the feeling of a fairy tale, even as it reinforces the notion that fairy-tale lives rarely exist, even in novels.

Although teens will certainly respond to its fantasy aspects as well as its meditations on love, loss and identity, adult readers may most readily grasp and respond to the novel's emotional heft and wisdom and recognize themselves and their relationships in passages like this one: "The days of sitting together idly watching the waves were a long time in the past. Before there'd been leaks to plug and garments to mend, they'd had nothing to do but linger and talk. Now they toiled and slept, and not much more. They no longer searched for faces in the clouds, or walked through the forest at midnight. They spoke a lot about the house, and hardly ever about the people who lived in it."

Adults who stumble upon this lovely novel will recognize themselves in its message of the bittersweet pain of love lost; younger readers will respond to its romantic notions and spirit of adventure. Like the best fables, THE GHOST'S CHILD can be read and enjoyed on many levels --- as a fantasy tale, a love story, an exquisite metaphor for the life each of us crafts for ourselves.

--- Reviewed by Norah Piehl

This is one of the most poignant tales of love and loss I've ever read. Full of sad regret and a mysterious, impenetrable mystique, it is a book I expect to reread many times.

An old woman, Maddy, tells the tale of her life to a young boy -- an unexpected visitor who shows up at her door. What she weaves for him is a beautiful, touching tale of a life full many beautiful experiences that shaped her. Her heart is lost early in her life to a windswept ocean waif, but their imperfect love casts a shadow on her entire life. There are bits of the fantastic -- though we almost wonder if they are only allegorical, metaphor -- and the bits are marked by a stunning, cold realism.

I honestly cannot do justice to this book in review. I have read few books more touching, and even fewer better written. An astoundingly beautiful tale that I am honored to have had the pleasure of reading.

Matilda comes home one day to find a young boy sitting on her sofa. They have tea, and she tells him about her past. At that time, she went by Maddy, and she longed for a fairy tale life.

When Maddy finished school, she came home to her family's house by the sea. Her father asked her what she thought the most beautiful thing in the world was. She answered, "sea eagles." Her father decided that the two of them together would travel the world in search of the world's most beautiful thing, since he was not satisfied with her answer. After their travels, she was asked the question again. And she realized that she was the answer her father was looking for.

One day when she was back home, she went to the beach. She saw a young man and found herself walking towards him, scaring away the pelican that he was holding. She went to see him every day after that. She called him Feather. She married Feather, and they moved into a cottage in the forest.

He left one day, to be at his one place where he could be happy. Maddy could not come though, he told her. Weeks after, she wondered why he went to this one place and if he was happy. She decided that she needed to know the answer, so she had a sailboat made, and she set to sea. She saw many things, and spoke to sea life. She found Feather, and got her answer.

When she got back to her home, she left the cottage, unable to live there any longer. She decided she wanted to work in the war. She nursed injured soldiers, and from there decided that she wanted to be a doctor. From then on, she was Matilda. She helped people and then began to age. She was getting older, and lived in a house by herself. She ended her days in that house.

This was a very intriguing book. I was confused with the boy, but by the last chapter, I knew exactly who he was and why he was there. The life that Maddy lived was amazing. She went through so much, and many of those things weren't so good, which is very easy to relate to. Her parents were odd. Her father wanted Maddy to be who she wanted to be, whereas her mother just wanted her daughter to marry a rich man and not care about being happy, which bothered me. Feather was also confusing. He appeared out of nowhere. I was happy they married, but unhappy when he left her.

Overall, this was a very interesting book, and was hard to put down. I enjoyed it very much.

Reviewed by: Ashley B

The Ghost's Child is beautiful book that reads almost like poetry, like a sigh at the end of a good life. It's written in prose, so no worries for those who dislike reading books written in poems, but there's a dreamlike quality to it that makes this book a fascinating read. It's told from the viewpoint of an old woman at the end of her long life, who tells a young boy about the story of her youth. It goes from realistic to fantastical without ever losing track of the main thread of the tale. Definitely a great book to read, and great for a wide range of ages.

The plot, I didn't like so much.
The writing in this book is lovely. Lyrical but not overly adorned, a few sections border on poetry without becoming obscure.

But I seriously couldn't find it in myself to like the characters very much. Matilda/Maddy was at times likeably strong and defiant, but she sunk donw to meekness soon enough. And Feather reminds me of many "artists" I've met, too self-absorbed to be any good.

Still, it is a nice twist to find a YA book which covers an entire life, instead of a small span of time or one event in the characters' life. The final "twist" (which shouldn't be *that* much a surprise) is a lovely touch. It's an enjoyable book, but it didn't blow me away.

There are few books that come to me the way in which this book came to me. After reading the book I question more whether I am the fantasy filled Maddy searching for the answers to her questions, or the character Feather who is always looking to escape to his Island of Stillness, away from the troubles and worries of this world. Both of the characters speak to me on so many levels, and I see myself tied to both of them as much as both the sun and the moon are indicated by Maddy to be of importance. I began reading this book with a question, for it came to me in my dreams, so I wondered what this book might tell me about the answers I have sought after. In the dream, a person close to me, who I later discovered could not have children of her own, handed me a slip of paper and said, "I think this is for you." On the piece of paper was written, "Ghost Child." These words surfaced in my consciousness while I slept and upon waking up I Googled the words, which led me to this book. And so I approached this book looking for answers myself,and rather than receiving an answer, which perhaps I have, I received a question: Will you be a Feather, or will you like Maddy turn suffering into joy? Perhaps Feather was true to himself, and there is something to be said in that, but on the other hand one might feel a certain kind of disdain for him, even though I have pondered living a similar life myself. Perhaps many have considered escaping to their little safe haven where nothing could do them harm, and there was nothing. Perhaps many throughout history have pondered, are the troubles of humanity so consequential, or are they really just trivial affairs to be washed away with time? The great majority of humanity considers this life to be of importance, and they are willing to suffer for it, given no other choice but to live or do nothing and die. A small minority though, has no walls, no home,no doors, no shoes, no shirt, and all that we are told to value by society, these people claim has no relevance for them. Maddy thought she could keep Feather locked in the prison of her heart, though as Feather interestingly asserted, there was no prison. He could have left at any time. The fact that he had stayed was a sign of his love. And so Feather and Maddy represent two striking paradigms, which I can realte to.

I was spellbound by the parallels between the book, my own life, and my dream. In the book the gift of life and children play a central role. In my dream, the person who handed me the note, herself experienced this loss or inability to have children, which the book indicated is one of the most beautiful things in the world, and yet is one of the happiest people I have ever met. And myself, I have always looked at such loss in a rather negative way. I always imagined that if I were a soldier who lost his arm or leg, I would just want to give up and die. I have had this thought, and so I was spellbound to find a chapter about this topic that spoke directly to me. And this is the paradox of life that the book showed me (in reference to the soldiers), "She saw men struggling to surface from drowning despair; men who, suffering dreadfully, nevertheless managed to laugh. These men had lost much, but had somehow kept their humor, their goodness, their trust. They had not let anyone take from them these things that were most worth keeping. They made Maddy, sometimes, ashamed of herself." (pg. 158) And I have felt the same feelings when looking upon others less fortunate than myself. People have told me, why are you miserable or sad when you have so much to be happy about. They say, look at the soldiers, look at the disabled, and look at how much you have that they do not. I feel the shame, and at the same time, like Maddy a sense of indignation.
Maddy felt shame because she knew the soldiers were worse off than herself, and by definition most people would say to the Maddys of the world, be happy, what do you have to be sad about? For the Maddys though, they seem to struggle with the very concept of life and suffering, and finding true happiness and beauty in life. And I think this leads to one of the key points in the book, "When she could not give sight, she'd tried to give mettle: change your sorrow into joy."(pg.166)I can only hope that I can like Maddy in my own way help others and find ways to make positive changes. I have often imagined that the thing I wanted most, like Feather, was peace and serenity, and perhaps that is why this quote by Zephyrus, the west wind, sticks out, "I like you, you know. You remind me of me, and I really like me. You don't want peace or sameness. You know that life is for going, not for stopping. Maddy asked, "Do I?" The wind said,"You do. But when life goes, it goes fast, Maddy: so be careful. Don't waste your time wanting what you can't have."(pg.152-153) To affect the suffering in the world, it seems there is a cost to pay, and Maddy came to understand it, you have to give up your peace and serenity, or at least come to find it through suffering and loss. You have to be willing to take chances and lose. As a character, I admire her for trying and never giving up. Like her, I see myself as a searcher and a dreamer who finds his way not by compass or map, but by dreams and wind, and I am glad that I read this book. I am certain that it will continue to speak to me in the future. I have discovered some answers to my questions, but as Maddy notes in her old age, "I searched for the answer to a question. I sailed the world trying to find it, and eventually I did. But some answers don't finish a quest - they merely start it." (pg.14) The Zephyrus of my dreams brought me to this book, and perhaps too will you be led to reading it.