The Clearing – Heather Davis (2010)

misskleber
Jan 9, 2018
2 min read

Updated: Jan 12, 2018

After breaking up with her abusive boyfriend Amy moves in with her spinster Aunt Mae in boonies to start over.

Beginning her last year of high school in a town were everyone has known each other since the nursery Amy feels more alone than ever, until she meets Henry.

Henry and his family live in a pocket in time.

On Henry’s side of the clearing, it’s still 1944.

Life-affirming, bittersweet, and strong.

The whole book passes with Amy discouraged about her lack of strength, when the reader can recognize that incredibly positive steps which she has already taken to put her own life back in order.

While the story deals with the aftermath of domestic abuse at the hands of a high school boyfriend, the story shows Amy the possibilities for real love, and what True Love looks like. Helping her to mend herself and those around her.

Not uncommonly to teen fiction there is friction between Amy and her mother.

She’d known I was lying. I remember seeing it in her eyes. And I stood there wanting her to save me, to put a stop to something even I didn’t feel I could stop. And she’d said nothing.

Though this book is quick to illustrate that often teens find adults other than parents to relate too, illustrating what a functional and trust-based relationship can look like.

Demonstrating that importance of parent figures to believe and trust as well as illustrating what partners have a right to expect from a relationship.

This book is beautiful and gets me every time.