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| Wish You Well | 
 enlarge | Author: David Baldacci
Publisher: Grand Central Publishing
Category: Book
List Price: $12.99
Buy Used: $0.95
You Save: $12.04 (93%)
New (44) Used (62) Collectible (2) from $0.95
Avg. Customer Rating:  252 reviews
Sales Rank: 4507
Media: Paperback
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 432
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.8
Dimensions (in): 7.8 x 5.4 x 1.6
ISBN: 0446699489
Dewey Decimal Number: 813
EAN: 9780446699488
ASIN: 0446699489
Publication Date: April 3, 2007
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
Condition: Standard used condition.
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Amazon.com
David Baldacci has made a name for himself crafting big, burly legal thrillers with larger-than-life plots. However, Wish You Well, set in his native Virginia, is a tale of hope and wonder and "something of a miracle" just itching to happen. This shift from contentious urbanites to homespun hill families may come as a surprise to some of Baldacci's fans--but they can rest assured: the author's sense of pacing and exuberant prose have made the leap as well. The year is 1940. After a car accident kills 12-year-old Lou's and 7-year-old Oz's father and leaves their mother Amanda in a catatonic trance, the children find themselves sent from New York City to their great-grandmother Louisa's farm in Virginia. Louisa's hardscrabble existence comes as a profound shock to precocious Lou and her shy brother. Still struggling to absorb their abandonment, they enter gamely into a life that tests them at every turn--and offers unimaginable rewards. For Lou, who dreams of following in her father's literary footsteps, the misty, craggy Appalachians and the equally rugged individuals who make the mountains their home quickly become invested with an almost mythic significance: They took metal cups from nails on the wall and dipped them in the water, and then sat outside and drank. Louisa picked up the green leaves of a mountain spurge growing next to the springhouse, which revealed beautiful purple blossoms completely hidden underneath. "One of God's little secrets," she explained. Lou sat there, cup cradled between her dimpled knees, watching and listening to her great-grandmother in the pleasant shade... Baldacci switches deftly between lovingly detailed character description (an area in which his debt to Laura Ingalls Wilder and Harper Lee seems evident) and patient development of the novel's central plot. If that plot is a trifle transparent--no one will be surprised by Amanda's miraculous recovery or by the children's eventual battle with the nefarious forces of industry in an attempt to save their great-grandmother's farm--neither reader nor character is the worse for it. After all, nostalgia is about remembering things one already knows. --Kelly Flynn
Product Description
Precocious 12-year-old Louisa Mae Cardinal lives in
the hectic New York City of 1940 with her family.
Then tragedy strikes--and Lou and her younger brother,
Oz, must go with their invalid mother to live on their
great-grandmother's farm in the Virginia mountains.
Suddenly Lou finds herself coming of age in a new
landscape, making her first true friend, and experiencing
adventures tragic, comic, and audacious. But the forces
of greed and justice are about to clash over her new
home . . . and as their struggle is played out in a crowded
Virginia courtroom, it will determine the future of two
children, an entire town, and the mountains they love.
Download Description
In 1953, a young family has a devastating car accident which leaves twelve year old Louisa (Lou) and her seven year old brother Oscar (Oz) with their Pulitzer Prize winning father dead and their mother a bedridden, invalid who has completely withdrawn. Their only relative is their father's grandmother who is a stranger to them but who is willing to take the children in and care for their mother. So they move with their mother from their home in New York City to their great-grandmother's remote farm in rural southwest Virginia. As Lou and Oz get to know Louisa, they also get to know the harshly beautiful land that has sustained their family for generations and is the source of their father's acclaimed novels. It's a hard life for two kids from New York City, getting up at five in the morning to start working the farm, no electricity, no phones, an outhouse. But with the help of their new best friend, Diamond Skinner, and the kindliness of town lawyer, Cotton Longfellow, they thrive under their great-grandmother's care until one day a mining company makes an offer for the land that Louisa refuses to sell. To keep their farm, with the mining company and their own greedy neighbors against them, Cotton must try their case in court. Lou and Oz pray for a miracle...and their prayers are answered in undreamed of ways.
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| Customer Reviews: Read 247 more reviews...
 Wonderful story! July 23, 2008
This is my first Baldacci book. I picked it up at a local swap meet, and I'm so glad I did. I loved this story about a young girl and her brother who go to live with their great-grandmother in the Virginia mountains! It really touched my heart. It also made me hungry...I now have a real craving for some homemade bread with butter! I'm definitely keeping it in my collection of best books to read.
Wishing well.. July 19, 2008
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
Wish You Well
Our story starts out with a family, mother, father, daughter and son. They are going for the day to have a picnic before they move to California so father can pursue his writing career there. Currently they live in New York City. On the way back, mother and father are discussing moving and mother wants to go live in Virginia where father grew up -- Father doesn't want to ever go back. They end up having an accident, which kills father and hurts the mother. The children end up going to Viriginia, taking their mother whom keeps her eyes shut and doesn't speak anymore; thinking if they wouldn't have been argueing maybe the accident wouldn't have happened.
Moving to Virginia Oz and Lou meet lots of characters, the great-grandmother Louisa, Eugene, Diamond, Cotton and some not so nice. A big gas company pressures Louisa to sell her property, but she says she will never leave the mountain. She has a stroke and it leaves her stuck in the hospital, unable to communicate, just like mother. The gas company takes her to court, even though she is unable to communicate saying that she is mentally unfit and can't take care of the children either. Will she be able to save her land? Will mother (Amanda) ever walk and talk again?
This book was so enthralling I couldn't put it down. Lou is a strong young lady and one of my favorite characters. You will love this book!
Wonderful, Wonderful June 18, 2008
This is a wonderful story. It had me crying and laughing.. It was a completely departure from his other books. I truly enjoyed every page.
Best of David's Books May 31, 2008
Even though this book was published eight years ago, I decided to read it. Boy am I glad I did. This is one of the most beautifully written and heartwarming stories I've read. I just had to tell every one that if they enjoy REAL people who work hard for a living and get by using the brains God gave them then you will LOVE this book. This is about the triumph of the human spirit and decent folk helping their neighbors.
You will not be disappointed!
A different read from you, but the author is doesn't miss a beat... May 14, 2008
You have got to read this one. It's a totally different story than I was used to, but I enjoyed the emotional ride just like the other thrillers...
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