Recommended Read: Child Wonder

Child Wonder by Roy Jacobsen awed me in so many ways.  The voice of Finn, this child narrator, is odd and beautiful.  His observations about his mother, his friends and extended family, the lodger that rents a room in their small apartment in Oslo, and the half-sister who shows up in their lives, leaves me breathless, wanting to read the words out loud to whomever may be nearby.  And I did.  Finn may be overly wise in his own ways, and yet he’s still a child, and what he thinks he understands may not be true.    The story is sad and funny, sweet and upsetting.  And the ending. . . well, let’s say that the ending will pull at your heart.