Wish you well

David Baldacci has made a name for himself crafting big, burly legal thrillers withlarger-than-life plots. However, Wish You Well, set in his native Virginia, is a tale of hopeand wonder and "something of a miracle" just itching to happen. This shift from contentiousurbanites to homespun hill families may come as a surprise to some of Baldacci's fans--but they canrest 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 leavestheir mother Amanda in a catatonic trance, the children find themselves sent from New York Cityto their great-grandmother Louisa's farm in Virginia. Louisa's hardscrabble existence comes as aprofound shock to precocious Lou and her shy brother. Still struggling to absorb theirabandonment, they enter gamely into a life that tests them at every turn--and offers unimaginablerewards. For Lou, who dreams of following in her father's literary footsteps, the misty, craggyAppalachians and the equally rugged individuals who make the mountains their home quicklybecome 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 anddrank. 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 littlesecrets," she explained. Lou sat there, cup cradled between her dimpled knees, watching andlistening to her great-grandmother in the pleasant shade...Baldacci switches deftly between lovingly detailed character description (an area in which his debtto Laura Ingalls Wilder and Harper Lee seems evident) and patient development of the novel'scentral plot. If that plot is a trifle transparent--no one will be surprised by Amanda's miraculousrecovery or by the children's eventual battle with the nefarious forces of industry in an attempt tosave 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