Margi Preus

In nineteenth-century Norway, fourteen-year-old Astri, whose aunt has sold her to a mean goatherder, dreams of joining her father in America.

West of the Moon

Kim Tyo-Dickerson

Moments of magical storytelling taking on the orphan's archetypal quest, an enchanting/enchanted setting in the Norwegian woods, big bad villains, and a vibrant heroine struggling with her dark and light sides makes this novel a compelling read. Preus weaves a mix of fable, quest, classic retellings of Scandinavian fairy tales and historical fiction, and I'm left feeling that she tread the limbic a little too well. Is it magic at the heart of the story or is it turn of the century psychological stress resulting in an over-active imagination? The narrative exists in the shadows and fractures of the main character, Astri's, mind and experiences. What is real and what is purposeful develops, her indenture to a goat farmer after her mother's death, her dreams of escaping to America to join her father who has already immigrated, then suddenly the tone shifts and I was left asking what is coincidence and what is fate, is the goat farmer Svaalberd somehow a version of Bluebeard or Rumpelstiltskin, all the references to "East of the Sun and West of the Moon" notwithstanding? Is the girl locked in the tower spinning thread an enchanted princess? Those were the questions following me as I traveled through the Norwegian woods with Astri and her sister, moving back and forth in the historical setting and the fairy tales running alongside. I'm left with more questions than answers, but I know that I will think about Preus' Death sitting either at the head or the foot of a sick bed, doling out hope, slivers of recovery or absolute endings, for a long time to come.

West of the Moon

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