Amy 
historical fiction
A Piece of the World was my favorite prize from attending the ALA Midwinter Convention. It was the only Advance Readers Copy I brought home that was already on my To Read list. I loved Christina Baker Kline’s Orphan Train and had been awaiting her latest release.
The mood of this novel is mostly melancholy. Inspired and imagined from the Andrew Wyeth painting Christina’s World, the novel is Christina Olson’s life story. She is born with some sort of degenerative disease which is never diagnosed in the novel. Her symptoms worsen as she ages. However, Christina never lets her ailments stop her from doing what she wants and she is amazingly accomplished in the daily activities of farm life, not to mention her academic aptitude.
I was drawn to Christina’s character, quickly caring about her. I was very interested to know what would happen. Growing up in a fairly sheltered manner in a small town on a farm that required all family members put in a great deal of work, she was not prepared for a surprise encounter. Neither was she given many choices about how to live her life. And her medical condition further limited her freedom. She did enjoy many aspects of life and was fortunate to have some special people in her corner. But, it’s a sad tale for the most part. Not so sad that I didn’t enjoy it, though. I thought the shifting between different time frames was effective for this story.
This novel is not as great as Orphan Train but I liked it and look forward to Kline’s future novels.
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