In the Midst of Winter: A Novel - Softcover

"A timely message about immigration and the meaning of home."--People

"It's when revealing the characters' harrowing past lives in other countries that the generous and unflagging energy that characterized Allende's debut, The House of the Spirits, can most clearly be felt."--San Francisco Chronicle

"[In the Midst of Winter] forthrightly embraces both harsh realities and whimsy, pleasure and pain in this buoyant adventure, a heartfelt story of resilience and respect that seems just the thing to help us through these darkest of days in our land of exiles."--The Seattle Times

"Allende uses imagination to help readers gain a better understanding of what the immigrant experience is really like for many people in this country."--Chicago Reader

"Devotees of Allende's forays into magical realism (The House of Spirits, The Stories of Eva Luna) will find the universe she creates here--an account of earthly lives lived in an earthly setting--more madcap and macabre."--Newsday

"A syntactically beautiful story with the twists and turns of a telenovela and warmth at its center."--Minneapolis Star Tribune

"Allende's latest tale is heartfelt and raw... The interactions between the characters is well thought out and deep. Readers will come to love them and experience the heartbreak and joy both of their past, present, and future."
--RT Book Reviews

"The lesson is clear in both book and life--passion is possible. So is survival and change and making a difference in the world, in Isabel Allende's grand and inimitable style."--The New Orleans Advocate

"Isabel Allende brings her poetic and compassionate eye to In the Midst of Winter, [which] is being compared with her masterpiece The House of the Spirits."
--CBS' WATCH! Magazine

"Isabel Allende's masterful blend of history, suspense, and rising passion makes for yet another riveting novel."--BBC America

New York Times and worldwide bestselling author Isabel Allende returns with a sweeping novel that journeys from present-day Brooklyn to Guatemala in the recent past to 1970s Chile and Brazil.

An instant New York Times bestseller, In the Midst of Winter is about three very different people who are brought together in a mesmerizing story that offers “a timely message about immigration and the meaning of home” (People).

During the biggest Brooklyn snowstorm in living memory, Richard Bowmaster, a lonely university professor in his sixties, hits the car of Evelyn Ortega, a young undocumented immigrant from Guatemala, and what at first seems an inconvenience takes a more serious turn when Evelyn comes to his house, seeking help. At a loss, the professor asks his tenant, Lucia Maraz, a fellow academic from Chile, for her advice.

As these three lives intertwine, each will discover truths about how they have been shaped by the tragedies they witnessed, and Richard and Lucia will find unexpected, long overdue love. Allende returns here to themes that have propelled some of her finest work: political injustice, the art of survival, and the essential nature of—and our need for—love.