How the Light Gets In

Petersheim (The Alliance) constructs a rich story about grief, the dying of love, and the rekindling of faith. After Ruth’s husband, Chandler, is killed during a hospital bombing in Afghanistan, she and her two daughters, two-year-old Vivienne and six-year-old Sofie, take his ashes to the Wisconsin Mennonite community where he grew up. Elam, her husband’s cousin, invites them to stay at his cranberry farm for the harvest, and Ruth agrees to work in the cranberry bog. She is melancholic, but her sadness is mainly for her daughters; she finds it hard to grieve for a husband she feels she had already lost. Ruth and Chandler had been married for five years, and they adopted Sofie shortly after their marriage. Chandler, a doctor, had been away for most of his children’s lives and, slowly, Chandler and Ruth’s love turned to distant communication and bitterness. During Ruth and her daughters’ stay with the Mennonite community, Ruth’s relationship with her grieving mother-in-law strengthens, and she nurtures a friendship with Elam. Then a phone call makes Ruth question whether Chandler is dead after all. With skillful plotting and vibrant characters, Petersheim reveals the pain of loss and the healing that comes from mercy and forgiveness. (Mar.)