Modern Lit: The Year of Fog, by Michelle Richmond

It only takes a moment

There are many times in life when it all changes, irrevocably, in a sudden, single moment. One of those timesthat most of us will never have to experience is the abduction of a child. One can only imagine….. If you read The Year of Fog, you won’t have to imagine. This book opens with a walk on the beach, which, in the course of 30 seconds, turns into one of life’s worst nightmares. This novel is about what happens to the missing child’s caretakers – what they feel, fear, do, and do not do. What happens to their thoughts, their relationships, the substance of their very lives, their selves. Parts of the narrative are incredibly painful, which is to be expected, but what I found surprising were the passages of almost unbearable suspense. Part psychology, part philosophy, and in a large part, mystery, this is a beautifully expressed, detailed work of fiction that suffers from a single fault, and that is its repetitiveness. But its strength far outweighs it weakness.