Twenty years after the plane crash, Kachemak Winkel and his aunt Snag still blame themselves for what happened that dismal day, when Kach's parents and older brother slammed into an Alaskan mountain. In their grief and guilt, Kache and Snag have put their lives on hold, but now, 38-year-old Kache has come home to Caboose, Alaska, to face the past and the future in All the Winters After by Seré Prince Halverson (The Underside of Joy).
Anxiously awaiting Kache's return from self-imposed exile, Snag is eager to see her beloved twin brother's son, but dreads what she must confess: she has never in 20 years summoned the courage to visit the family homestead. Kache is resolved to confront painful memories--but fears the house itself has sunk into the Alaskan woods. When Kache catches sight of the cabin--smoke curling from the chimney and grounds well tended--a third character enters the saga.
Even more remote from the village of Caboose than the Winkel homestead are "Old Believer" towns founded by members of the Russian Orthodox sect when Alaska was a Russian territory. Ready to confront the squatter in his family home, Kache discovers Nadia, who fled an abusive arranged marriage and has lived in the cabin, maintaining the property, for a decade. She slowly reveals her story, and the two support their mutual recovery from tragic pasts.
Halverson's three main characters--plus elderly Gram, Caboose locals and Snag's unlikely love interest--are patient and loving as they face old truths and try to plan a future. Conflicts resolve, but not predictably, and the majestic natural wonders of Alaska are a sensory delight throughout. --Cheryl Krocker McKeon, manager, Book Passage, San Francisco