Helpful Score: 3
I still think about this book from time to time, as that's how good it was. Ingrid Hill skillfully weaves together the stories of Ursula's very disparate ancestors who faced difficulties and challenges with courage, humor and sometimes sheer luck.
Helpful Score: 3
2 year old Ursula Wong falls through an abandoned mine shaft while on a picnic with her parents. The plot throughout the rest of this novel is mesmerizing. Ursula's parents' family trees are traced backward, taking the reader on a journey through many countries in different centuries, through good marriages and bad. It is an excellent book, and one I highly recommend.
Helpful Score: 2
I enjoyed this book. It was not a "quick" read, but well worth getting into.
Helpful Score: 2
This was very slow reading. It's a complicated book.
Helpful Score: 1
A very good read. Ambitious book.
Helpful Score: 1
I found this be a long read, but enjoyed the whole trip.
Helpful Score: 1
COuldn't get into this book. It seemed disjointed.
Helpful Score: 1
Unique story of little girl falling down a mineshaft. Unusual history of ancestors.
Ursula falls down an unused mine shaft while picnicing with her parents. As the rescue begins, the reader travels along Ursula's chain of ancestors going back as far as 2000 years and revealing connections to her modern day relatives.
Its been a while since I read this novel, but what really stuck with me is the vast array of characters. The whole book is pretty much a character study, but its one of the best I've read it this genre. Its beautifully international. If you are interested in history and world cultures, this is a gem! The author clearly did a lot of research to write this.
The best part: it chronicles people of all walks of life throughout history around the world, and yet you can identify with each one.
The best part: it chronicles people of all walks of life throughout history around the world, and yet you can identify with each one.
A whimsical book about the Upper Peninsula of Michigan. Being from that neck of the woods myself, I totally enjoyed this read. The local feel of the land was evident in every page.
Washington Post Book World 'Best Book of the Year'. 2 yr old Ursula Wong--part chinese, part Finnish, falls down a disused mine shaft in Michigan's Upper Peninsula. The book travels along the chain of ancestors, across two thousand years, whose lives culminate in the fragile miracle of the little girl underground..
