Reading this book is like walking into a mighty and overwhelming landscape. It also made me very, very frozen. But soon, glimpses of hope and warmth and love come through, tiny and not easily achieved. Navarana, a young Inuit girl, has the spirit of an ice bear, her strength from the old religion and a helper in a gentle Irish monk. But can she save a way of life?
Brendan sat quietly on the sledge while Navarana told the others about how she found him, nearly dead in one of these unpractical houses where the strangers lived. When she told them about the inland ice which suddenly moved and filled the valley, and then crashed the houses, he could hear them whisper: The ice takes it all back. We knew that was going to happen.