When Sarah, a young widow with an infant son, is advised by her mother that the best course for her would be to move far away to a cabin in the woods of northern Minnesota, she is not particularly convinced that this plan makes much sense. The cabin offers no luxury; actually, it offers no modern conveniences to speak of.
Yet Sarah and Charlie do move there, and Sarah manages to make a life for herself despite everything she’s facing. She learns to appreciate things that really matter, grows up quickly in many ways, and actually forms some quite formidable friendships. All of that makes her realize that maybe her mother knew very well why she suggested such a weird sounding thing in the first place.
Home Fire by Nancy Ann is a charming, but extremely slow moving story. The writing is competent, but not exciting. The characters in the story are pleasant, but I found them very difficult to relate to. With the exception of descriptions of daily challenges that Sarah and Charlie face, and long pages of rather lightweight dialogue, nothing much happens in the book, and although this is supposedly the first one in a trilogy, I do not think I will be looking for the sequels.
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