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![Winter Garden by [Kristin Hannah]](https://m.media-amazon.com/images/I/411CcHaYMmL._SY346_.jpg)
Winter Garden Kindle Edition
Kristin Hannah (Author) Find all the books, read about the author, and more. See search results for this author |
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Can a woman ever really know herself if she doesn't know her mother?
From the author of the smash-hit bestseller Firefly Lane and True Colors comes Kristin Hannah's powerful, heartbreaking novel that illuminates the intricate mother-daughter bond and explores the enduring links between the present and the past
Meredith and Nina Whitson are as different as sisters can be. One stayed at home to raise her children and manage the family apple orchard; the other followed a dream and traveled the world to become a famous photojournalist. But when their beloved father falls ill, Meredith and Nina find themselves together again, standing alongside their cold, disapproving mother, Anya, who even now, offers no comfort to her daughters. As children, the only connection between them was the Russian fairy tale Anya sometimes told the girls at night. On his deathbed, their father extracts a promise from the women in his life: the fairy tale will be told one last time—and all the way to the end. Thus begins an unexpected journey into the truth of Anya's life in war-torn Leningrad, more than five decades ago. Alternating between the past and present, Meredith and Nina will finally hear the singular, harrowing story of their mother's life, and what they learn is a secret so terrible and terrifying that it will shake the very foundation of their family and change who they believe they are.
- LanguageEnglish
- PublisherSt. Martin's Press
- Publication dateJanuary 28, 2010
- File size2569 KB
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Editorial Reviews
From Publishers Weekly
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
From Booklist
About the Author
Review
Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.
One
2000Was this what forty looked like? Really? In the past year Meredith had gone from Miss to Ma’am. Just like that, with no transition. Even worse, her skin had begun to lose its elasticity. There were tiny pleats in places that used to be smooth. Her neck was fuller, there was no doubt about it. She hadn’t gone gray yet; that was the one saving grace. Her chestnut-colored hair, cut in a no-nonsense shoulder-length bob, was still full and shiny. But her eyes gave her away. She looked tired. And not only at six in the morning.She turned away from the mirror and stripped out of her old T-shirt and into a pair of black sweats, anklet socks, and a long-sleeved black shirt. Pulling her hair into a stumpy ponytail, she left the bathroom and walked into her darkened bedroom, where the soft strains of her husband’s snoring made her almost want to crawl back into bed. In the old days, she would have done just that, would have snuggled up against him.Leaving the room, she clicked the door shut behind her and headed down the hallway toward the stairs.In the pale glow of a pair of long-outdated night-lights, she passed the closed doors of her children’s bedrooms. Not that they were children anymore. Jillian was nineteen now, a sophomore at UCLA who dreamed of being a doctor, and Maddy—Meredith’s baby—was eighteen and a freshman at Vanderbilt. Without them, this house—and Meredith’s life—felt emptier and quieter than she’d expected. For nearly twenty years, she had devoted herself to being the kind of mother she hadn’t had, and it had worked. She and her daughters had become the best of friends. Their absence left her feeling adrift , a little purposeless. She knew it was silly. It wasn’t as if she didn’t have plenty to do. She just missed the girls; that was all.She kept moving. Lately that seemed to be the best way to handle things.Downstairs, she stopped in the living room just long enough to plug in the Christmas tree lights. In the mudroom, the dogs leaped up at her, yapping and wagging their tails.“Luke, Leia, no jumping,” she scolded the huskies, scratching their ears as she led them to the back door. When she opened it, cold air rushed in. Snow had fallen again last night, and though it was still dark on this mid-December morning, she could make out the pale pearlescence of road and field. Her breath turned into vapory plumes.By the time they were all outside and on their way, it was 6:10 and the sky was a deep purplish gray.Right on time.Meredith ran slowly at first, acclimating herself to the cold. As she did every weekday morning, she ran along the gravel road that led from her house, down past her parents’ house, and out to the old single-lane road that ended about a mile up the hill. From there, she followed the loop out to the golf course and back. Four miles exactly. It was a routine she rarely missed; she had no choice, really. Everything about Meredith was big by nature. She was tall, with broad shoulders, curvy hips, and big feet. Even her features seemed just a little too much for her pale, oval face—she had a big Julia Roberts– type mouth, huge brown eyes, full eyebrows, and thick hair. Only constant exercise, a vigilant diet, good hair products, and an industrial-sized pair of tweezers could keep her looking good.As she turned back onto her road, the rising sun illuminated the mountains, turned their snowcapped peaks lavender and pink.On either side of her, thousands of bare, spindly apple trees showed through the snow like brown stitches on white fabric. This fertile cleft of land had belonged to their family for fifty years, and there, in the center of it all, tall and proud, was the home in which she’d grown up. Belye Nochi. Even in the half-light it looked ridiculously out of place and ostentatious.Meredith kept running up the hill, faster and faster, until she could barely breathe and there was a stitch in her side.She came to a stop at her own front porch as the valley filled with bright golden light. She fed the dogs and then hurried upstairs. She was just going into the bathroom as Jeff was coming out. Wearing only a towel, with his graying blond hair still dripping wet, he turned sideways to let her pass, and she did the same. Neither one of them spoke.By 7:20, she was drying her hair, and by 7:30—right on time—she was dressed for work in a pair of black jeans and a fitted green blouse. A little eyeliner, some blush and mascara, a coat of lipstick, and she was ready to go.Downstairs, she found Jeff at the kitchen table, sitting in his regular chair, reading The New York Times. The dogs were asleep at his feet.She went to the coffeepot and poured herself a cup. “You need a refill?”“I’m good,” he said without looking up.Meredith stirred soy milk into her coffee, watching the color change. It occurred to her that she and Jeff only talked at a distance lately, like strangers—or disillusioned partners—and only about work or the kids. She tried idly to remember the last time they’d made love, and couldn’t.Maybe that was normal. Certainly it was. When you’d been married as long as they had, there were bound to be quiet times. Still, it saddened her sometimes to remember how passionate they used to be. She’d been fourteen on their first date (they’d gone to see Young Frankenstein; it was still one of their favorites), and to be honest, that was the last time she’d ever really looked at another guy. It was strange when she thought about that now; she didn’t consider herself a romantic woman, but she’d fallen in love practically at first sight. He’d been a part of her for as long as she could remember.They’d married early—too early, really—and she’d followed him to college in Seattle, working nights and weekends in smoky bars to pay tuition. She’d been happy in their cramped, tiny U District apartment. Then, when they were seniors, she’d gotten pregnant. It had terrified her at first. She’d worried that she was like her mother, and that parenthood wouldn’t be a good thing. But she discovered, to her profound relief, that she was the complete opposite of her own mother. Perhaps her youth had helped in that. God knew Mom had not been young when Meredith was born.Jeff shook his head. It was a minute gesture, barely even a movement, but she saw it. She had always been attuned to him, and lately their mutual disappointments seemed to create sound, like a high-pitched whistle that only she could hear.“What?” she said.“Nothing.”“You didn’t shake your head over nothing. What’s the matter?”“I just asked you something.”“I didn’t hear you. Ask me again.”“It doesn’t matter.”“Fine.” She took her coffee and headed toward the dining room.It was something she’d done a hundred times, and yet just then, as she passed under the old-fashioned ceiling light with its useless bit of plastic mistletoe, her view changed.She saw herself as if from a distance: a forty-year-old woman, holding a cup of coffee, looking at two empty places at the table, and at the husband who was still here, and for a split second she wondered what other life that woman could have lived. What if she hadn’t come home to run the orchard and raise her children? What if she hadn’t gotten married so young? What kind of woman could she have become?And then it was gone like a soap bubble, and she was back where she belonged.“Will you be home for dinner?”“Aren’t I always?”“Seven o’clock,” she said.“By all means,” he said, turning the page. “Let’s set a time.”Meredith was at her desk by eight o’clock. As usual, she was the first to arrive and went about the cubicle-divided space on the ware house’s second floor flipping on lights. She passed by her dad’s office—empty now—pausing only long enough to glance at the plaques by his door. Thirteen times he’d been voted Grower of the Year and his advice was still sought out by competitors on a regular basis. It didn’t matter that he only occasionally came into the office, or that he’d been semi-retired for ten years. He was still the face of the Belye Nochi orchard, the man who had pioneered Golden Delicious apples in the early sixties, Granny Smiths in the seventies, and championed the Braeburn and Fuji in the nineties. His designs for cold storage had revolutionized the business and helped make it possible to export the very best apples to world markets.She had had a part to play in the company’s growth and success, to be sure. Under her leadership, the cold storage ware house had been expanded and a big part of their business was now storing fruit for other growers. She’d turned the old roadside apple stand into a gift shop that sold hundreds of locally made craft items, specialty foods, and Belye Nochi memorabilia. At this time of year—the holidays—when train-loads of tourists arrived in Leavenworth for the world-famous tree-lighting ceremony, more than a few found their way to the gift shop.The first thing she did was pick up the phone to call her youngest daughter. It was just past ten in Tennessee.“Hello?” Maddy grumbled.“Good morning,” Meredith said brightly. “It sounds like someone slept in.”“Oh. Mom. Hi. I was up late last night. Studying.”“Madison Elizabeth,” was all Meredith had to say to make her point.Maddy sighed. “Okay. So it was a Lambda Chi party.”“I know how fun it all is, and how much you want to experience every moment of college, but your first final is next week. Tuesday morning, right?”“Right.”“You have to learn to balance schoolwork and fun. So get your lily-white ass out of bed and get to class. It’s a life skill—partying all night and still getting up on time.”“The world won’t end if I miss one Spanish class...
From the Back Cover
Meredith and Nina are as different as sisters can be. One stayed at home to raise her children and manage the family apple orchard, the other followed a dream and traveled the world to become a famous photojournalist. But when their father falls ill, Meredith and Nina find themselves together again, standing alongside their cold, disapproving mother, Anya, who even now, offers no comfort whatsoever to her daughters.
As children, the only connection between them was the Russian fairy tale Anya often told the girls at night. On his deathbed, their father extracts a promise from the women in his life: the fairy tale will be told one last time -- and all the way to the end. Thus begins an unexpected journey into the truth of Anya's life in war-torn Leningrad. Meredith and Nina will finally hear the singular, harrowing story of their mother's life, and what they learn is a secret so terrible that it will shake the very foundation of their family and change who they believe they are.
--This text refers to an alternate kindle_edition edition.Product details
- ASIN : B003672JHG
- Publisher : St. Martin's Press; First edition (January 28, 2010)
- Publication date : January 28, 2010
- Language : English
- File size : 2569 KB
- Text-to-Speech : Enabled
- Screen Reader : Supported
- Enhanced typesetting : Enabled
- X-Ray : Not Enabled
- Word Wise : Enabled
- Print length : 401 pages
- Lending : Not Enabled
- Best Sellers Rank: #522 in Kindle Store (See Top 100 in Kindle Store)
- Customer Reviews:
About the author

Kristin Hannah is the award-winning and bestselling author of more than 20 novels including the international blockbuster, The Nightingale, which was named Goodreads Best Historical fiction novel for 2015 and won the coveted People's Choice award for best fiction in the same year. It was also named a Best Book of the Year by Amazon, iTunes, Buzzfeed, the Wall Street Journal, Paste, and The Week. In 2018, The Great Alone became an instant New York Times #1 bestseller and was named the Best Historical Novel of the Year by Goodreads.
The Four Winds was published in February of 2021 and immediately hit #1 on the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, USA Today, and Indie bookstore's bestseller lists. Additionally, it was selected as a book club pick by the both Today Show and The Book Of the Month club.
The Nightingale is currently in production at Tri Star, with Dakota and Elle Fanning set to star. Tri Star has also optioned The Great Alone and it is in development. Firefly Lane, her novel about two best friends, was the #1 Netflix show around the world, in the week it came out. The popular tv show stars Katherine Heigl and Sarah Chalke and Season Two is currently being filmed.
www.kristinhannah.com
Customer reviews
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Reviewed in the United States on December 21, 2020
Top reviews from the United States
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A while ago I came across and read “The Nightingale” by Kristin Hannah and loved it so when this book was recommended by a friend and knowing that it was also about WWII era I picked it up enthusiastically. Unfortunately it turned out to be a HUGE disappointment as it does not compare in any way to her former book.
The characters in this book are extremely flat, one dimensional and unrelatable. They are outright cold and unlikable and no matter the horrible experiences they go through I couldn’t bring myself to feel sorry for them. The first half of the book is a constant repetition of how damaged the relationship between the mother and her daughters is and how disconnected they are from each other and themselves. The plot barely advances and there is no deeper insight into the characters either, a complete drag. When the parallel WWII Russia story starts the plot somewhat gains momentum but again the book does very little to connect you to that era. It feels to me like despite the valuable research Mrs Hannah has done on Stalin era Leningrad she has very little understanding and appreciation of the nuances and intricacies of the culture and the place she writes about. As such her description of the events and characters in that era is superficial at best.
And the ending was the worst part. It is so sugar coated it feels completely fake and unrealistic as if she wanted to reward her readers with cheap candy for perseveringly through the misery of the rest of it.
All in all this book was definitely not for me or anyone looking for a good piece of literarure or realistic account of WWII Russia and its survivors. Please save your time and money and read something else!
I say skip it read one of her others for example the Nightingale now there was a great book !
Top reviews from other countries


This story follows the lives of the Whitson family - sisters Meredith and Nina and their elderly parents Evan and Anya. The story is ultimately Anya's story. Anya has never been a loving or affectionate mother and through a series of stories we learn why Anya is the way she is. What unfolds is a vivid and heartbreaking account of survival and loss through Stalin's reign of terror in Russia.
Kristen Hannah is excellent at drawing you into the worlds that she creates so you can visualise every tiny detail. The only reason I didn't award the full 5 stars is because the story doesn't really take off until just after the halfway point of the book. Once this happens, the story is riveting but up until that point it can be a bit repetitive by times however it still held my interest.
All in all I loved this book and would highly recommend it. The other book I've read by this author is The Nightingale which was just phenomenal so if you liked Winter Garden and haven't already done so, I strongly urge you to read The Nightingale.


