Reading Diary: The Crane Husband by Kelly Barnhill

Here is a synopsis from the publisher's website:

“Mothers fly away like migrating birds. This is why farmers have daughters.”

A fifteen-year-old teenager is the backbone of her small Midwestern family, budgeting the household finances and raising her younger brother while her mom, a talented artist, weaves beautiful tapestries. For six years, it’s been just the three of them—her mom has brought home guests at times, but none have ever stayed.

Yet when her mom brings home a six-foot tall crane with a menacing air, the girl is powerless to prevent her mom letting the intruder into her heart, and her children’s lives. Utterly enchanted and numb to his sharp edges, her mom abandons the world around her to weave the masterpiece the crane demands.

In this stunning contemporary retelling of “The Crane Wife” by the Newbery Medal-winning author of The Girl Who Drank the Moon, one fiercely pragmatic teen forced to grow up faster than was fair will do whatever it takes to protect her family—and change the story.

This little novella definitely packs a punch. I knew Barnhill as a Newbery-award winning author of The Girl Who Drank the Moon, but this book was shelved in the adult fiction section of my public library, and despite the teenage protagonist, it definitely feels more like an adult novel. It wasn't clear to me in the beginning that the narrator, who isn't named in the story, is telling the story twenty years after the actual events of the plot, but the nameless narrator and the fairy tale elements give this story a timeless quality. I sat down at a Starbucks and polished the whole thing off in an hour and a half. I heartily recommend taking the time to read this. It's a little heartbreaking, but it's well worth the time.