The Way the Crow Flies
By Ann-Marie MacDonald
(Harper, Hardcover, 9780060578954, 736pp.)
Publication Date: October 2003
Other Editions of This Title: Google eBook, Paperback
Categories: General
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In her highly anticipated new novel, Ann-Marie MacDonald takes us back to a postwar world. For Madeleine McCarthy, high-spirited and eight years old, her family's posting to a quiet air force base near the Canadian-American border is at first welcome, secure as she is in the love of her family and unaware that her father, Jack, is caught up in his own web of secrets. The early sixties, a time of optimism infused with the excitement of the space race and overshadowed by the menace of the Cold War, is filtered through the rich imagination of a child as Madeleine draws us into her world.
But the base is host to some intriguing inhabitants, including the unconventional Froehlich family, and the odd Mr. March, whose power over the children is a secret burden that they carry. Then tragedy strikes, and a very local murder intersects with global forces, binding the participants for life. As the tension in the McCarthys' household builds, Jack must decide where his loyalties lie, and Madeleine learns about the ambiguity of human morality -- a lesson that will become clear only when the quest for the truth, and the killer, is renewed twenty years later.
The Way the Crow Flies is a novel that is as compelling as it is rich. With her unerring eye for the whimsical, the absurd, and the quintessentially human, Ann-Marie MacDonald stunningly evokes the pain, confusion, and humor of childhood in a perilous adult world. At once a loving portrayal and indictment of an era, The Way the Crow Flies is a work of great heart and soaring intelligence.
Novelist and dramatist Ann-Marie MacDonald is the author of the internationally bestselling and award-winning novel Fall on Your Knees. She is also the playwright of Goodnight Desdemona, Good Morning Juliet, which won the Governor General's Award for Drama. She lives in Toronto.
“A powerful story, delicately layered with complex secrets, told with a masterful command of narrative and a strong moral message.”
-Publishers Weekly (starred review)
“Beautifully crafted … To submit to … THE WAY THE CROW FLIES is to be both transported and haunted.”
-Seattle Times
“Ambitious … interesting …tender, generous …[THE WAY THE CROW FLIES] is both an unblinking and a big hearted book.”
-St. Louis Post-Dispatch
“Astonishing in its depth and breath, it artfully weaves one family’s struggles into the fabric of the Cold War.”
-People
“Ambitious … intriguing … A grand sweeping saga.”
-Kirkus Reviews
“Rich and complex … hard to put down … MacDonald deserves another prize for THE WAY THE CROW FLIES.”
-San Diego Union-Tribune
“MacDonald’s most impressive accomplishment is her uncanny ability … to vividly re-create the wonder, humor, and fears of childhood.”
-Booklist (starred review)
“Heartbreaking, startling, profound.”
-New Jersey Courier Post
“Both terrifying and moving.”
-New York Times Book Review
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