Eve LaSalle Caram's voice is very strong; with the first line, you're swept to another place and time. I love this novel.

Rena is one character you will never forget. Despite all the adversities in her life, she remains happy. She is absolutely loveable!

Wintershine is set lovingly in the Ozark foothills and the Gulf Coast of Texas in the 1930s and 40s. The evocative novella tells of the trials and travels of Merrill, a young girl who stays with her grandparents in Arkansas when her mother moves to Texas to teach piano.

This is a magical time for the child, spent playing in the foundation of a burned-down house or walking up Dread Hill, absorbed in making up stories. When she moves to Ingleside, Texas, at the start of World War II, she lives with her mother and her uncle in back of his store. She makes friends, basks in her mother's presence and loud piano pieces, and stays up one night as the apartment is threatened by Hurrican Annabel. Returning for a Christmas visit to Arkansas, she walks in the forest through the "wintershine," or eerie light at that time of the year.

This is a delicate tale of childhood amazement, frustration, friendship and love that will bring tears of recognition to anyone who grew up in the Deep South. - by Douglas Junge, LA Times Reader Reviews