The Letters

A Novel

By: Luanne Rice

Narrated by: Joseph Monninger, Donna Rawlins, Bruce Turk

Length: 5 hrs and 14 mins

Publisher's summary

Is there any mystery greater than those we love the most? In this remarkable collaboration, New York Times best-selling author Luanne Rice and Joseph Monninger combine their unique talents to create a powerfully moving novel of an estranged husband and wife through a series of searching, intimate letters. By way of a correspondence so achingly real you’ll forget it’s fiction, they trace the history of a love affair and of a family before, and after, the moment that changed the course of two people’s journey forever.

Sam and Hadley West are both trying in their own ways to survive after the unthinkable loss of their only son in Alaska. For Sam, a sports journalist, acceptance means an arduous trek by dogsled across the bleak and beautiful arctic wilderness to find the place where Paul died. For Hadley, it means renting a benignly haunted, salt-soaked cottage off the Maine coast where she begins to paint again. Now, at opposite ends of the country, waiting for their divorce to be finalized, they begin to exchange letters by post, missives filled with longing and truths they’ve never before voiced, as they recall their marriage - its magic moments and its challenges - and begin to rediscover the reasons they fell in love in the first place. As Sam risks his life to reach the remote crash site, Hadley begins an equally hazardous inner journey to a rendezvous with the mad grief of a mother’s heart. At the place where all else is lost, they will meet again...

©2008 Luanne Rice (P)2008 Random House Audio

Critic reviews

"Rice and Monninger beautifully convey love and hope...taking the reading on a journey of discovery.... With each character - and each author - providing vivid descriptions of his and her surroundings and intense emotions, it's hard for the reader to remember that she is reading fiction and not eavesdropping on personal correspondence saturated with sadness and love." ( Booklist)
"[Sam and Hadley] endear themselves to the reader.... [who] will be reaching for a Kleenex by the end." ( Publishers Weekly)

I would not recommend this book.

This is short recording. Yes, it is the entire story, but the book is not great. It is predictable & contrived. It is the story of 2 selfish people that are separated & planning to be divorced. I do not recommend it. I admit it is difficult for me to enjoy a novel when I do not like the protagonist.