Night Road: A Novel

I have no hesitation in giving this book five stars. It's inciteful about life, love and the frailties of the human spirit, sad and happy, touchingly heartbreaking yet enlightening and uplifting; cuttingly honest about how good and bad we are at handling situations. The decisions we make which impact on the lives of those we love. I saw myself in aspects of each of the characters. I understood the shy child, the lost girl, the controlling mother, the need to keep everyone happy and safe and the all-consuming anger of grief and loss. Yet the message of love, forgivness, redemption and hope is the overriding theme. I was so engrossed that I couldn't put it down and read it untill well after 3am, when my eyes refused to work any longer. I finished it this morning and cried most of the way through. It's a book I will certainly retun to and read again.

I stayed up until 2am on a work night to finish this book....that's how wonderful it is. Tells the story of Lexi, a teenager who has not been dealt the greatest hand in terms of family life, who meets up with Mia and her twin brother Zach. Mia and Lexi's friendship is cemented very early on in the book. From the outset you see that the twins are very much loved (and controlled) by their mother - living an idyllic life with a "functional" family setting....or so it seems. The story skips on 3-5 years and then a further 5 years. I cannot explain too much without spoiling the book. Yes, there are 2 parts to it. The Before and the After, I think are mentioned in the book. All the characters are wonderful, I found myself liking them all. Initially I found it hard to relate to Jude, the mother of the twins. But I have a close relative who has gone through her turmoil and it made me more understanding of her personality and what she had to go through. There are lots of references to motherhood. I particularly loved the angst regarding that time in your life when you are teetering on the cusp of teenage and adulthood. The author totally got all the personalities and genders and characters spot on - so clever to be able to write about life through the eyes of a diverse range of ages - from a confused 5 year old, who has taken on the character which is moulded by the adults around her, to the middle-aged adults who are suffering their own miseries with life. Just shows that even though from the outside looking in, that all seems perfect, quite often, it is far from it. Will be looking out for similar by this author.

Loved this book, despite wondering whether it was for me at the start. It was emotionally gripping and I found it hard to put down. I loved all the characters and the setting of Pine Island. Sometimes it made me feel so involved I was there watching them all from behind the trees! A great read.

I love Kristin Hannah and all of her books that I have read so far (started with the Nightingale and have read 7 total). This book though - I have never cried like this from a book EVER. It was so emotional and so deep. STOP READING TO AVOID SPOILERS: It is every parent's biggest fear- losing a child. Jude's grief is exactly how I imagine I would feel. I hate how she treats Lexy after though. Had it actually been Zach and not Lexy, driving the car, I dont think Jude would have responded the same way. I also hate how Jude treated Zach and her husband after but at the same time, I dont know that I would do a better job if I were ever in that situation. This book impacted me to the core and just made me so afraid for my kids to be teenagers. I was bawling so hard through like the last 2 hours of the book that I could barely see. While I would never read this again or probably even recommend it to someone because of how SAD it made me, it was incredibly written and draws you in so deep and for that, I give it 5 stars!

Love the writing style of this author. I didn't want to stop reading and read to the early morning hours. You just felt for each of the characters as you could relate to each one. It's a tragic story but so common I have to think in this day and age of under age drinking and driving. The mother in this story, Jude, was a helicopter mom but I know a very loving mother but I could see how her children never wanted to disappoint her. But she was also an irritating parent who wanted to control just too much. How her children did not rebel more in this book is amazing. That she lost her only daughter, a twin to her son, was so tragic that affected her to the bone as any parent would feel the loss just as deep. It did take her a while to finally come back to her family, I mean six years of feeling nothing for her other family members and her first granddaughter, the child of her son and Lexi the teenager who was driving the awful night the daughter Mia was killed. I did love Lexi and her strong personality in how she stood up to Jude to make her feelings known and give Jude a reality check. But one thing I found out of unbelievable was the vocabulary of the granddaughter, Grace, at five years old seemed a bit too much for a child her age and more in line to a child of 8-10 I would think. It just didn't fit for a five year old. Other than that very good story.