What readers think of All the Little Hopes, plus links to write your own review.

I found this book to engaging and although slow to start the story became rich with detailed description of the people, their ways and the community they lived in, The smoothness in which the story is told, including difficult parts such as the Prisoner of War camp reward the reader who hangs in there and enjoys the story for the rich message. Many people will enjoy this book, and as the bees go about making their honey, we too keep busy with our tasks and enjoy the rhythm of the walk we engage in.

My two favorite genres are historical fiction and southern fiction. So this book set in North Carolina in the early 1940s was a perfect book for me. It's one of few books that after I read the last page, I wanted to go back and read it for the first time again. I am probably one of the few people who hasn't read this author's first book but as soon as I finished this book down, I ordered If the Creek Don't Rise from Amazon.

The story is told from the POV of two thirteen year old girls. Lucy lives in the eastern part of NC with her family. She is a reader and a lover of Nancy Drew mysteries. She loves to learn and is always using difficult words. Allie Bert Tucker , known as Bert, is from the mountains of NC. After her mother died in childbirth, she was sent to the eastern part of the state to help an aunt she'd never met. She felt like she was the reason that her mother died and looked at this trip as a banishment from her family. "My punishment is exile from my homeland." (p 22) When Lucy and Bert meet for the first time, they decide to be friends. Eventually, the living arrangements with her aunt changes and Bert goes to live with Lucy's family. All sorts of strange happenings in the town - a man goes missing, a woman stops speaking - Lucy decides that she and Bert can be Nancy Drew and solve the mysteries. Bert isn't so sure of this but agrees because they are friends. The two girls spend their days working with bee hives because their father has a contract from the government for beeswax and in their free time, they work to solve the mysteries in town. The more they try to learn about what's going on, the more the mysteries continue to happen.

This book is a picture of a small southern town in the 40s. Along with the two main characters, there are lots of other characters - from Lucy's nurturing mom to the quirky Trula Freed who can tell the future. The main lesson that Lucy and Bert learn is that family is made up not just through blood but also through the people who love and care about you.

Fantastic southern fiction!

Thanks to BookBrowse for a copy of this book to read and review. All opinions are my own.

I really enjoyed this book. The time period of WWII can often seem overdone but the topics in this story were new and fresh. POW camps in North Carolina, the role of American apiaries to name a few. The female characters are strong and resilient. I especially enjoyed the themes of friendship, community and what family and home really mean. Lu and Bert seem to have qualities that every girlfriend I have also possess in some degree. Lu’s love of vocabulary and some of the quips she came up with had me laughing. When I finished the book I thought how great it would be to live in a place where people really cared about each other regardless of race or class. If

In All The Little Hopes Leah Weiss uses historical fiction as the vehicle for an engaging coming of age story. She deftly weaves the themes of friendship, home, family, acceptance, forgiveness, belonging, and justice in a story set in rural North Carolina during WWII. From a tobacco farm to the forests near Mount Mitchell this story is rich and compelling and filled with characters from whom it is impossible to remain detached.
WWII, a local POW camp filled with Germans, a mystery of missing men, the tragedy of sacrifice and loss, the power of words, both spoken and left unsaid, and an undercurrent of spiritualism fill the story with sumptuous layers to explore and enjoy.

All the Little Hopes by Leah Weiss is a coming of age story set during the last years of World War II
The chapters alternate between the perspectives of two North Carolina girls that, through fate, become best friends. The girls are raised in the same state, yet have very different climate, dialect and customs which Ms. Weiss brilliantly captures
This is also a story of family, friendship and community and how each effect the another. The characters are well developed and the reader is drawn in with the families and their fear of receiving bad news about a loved one at the front
The characters are well developed and the story has constant action, mystery, heartbreak and love.
I highly recommend it.

All the Little Hopes by Leah Weiss is a wonderful story of two young girls in North Carolina but from very different geography, backgrounds, viewpoints. Fate throws them together. The novel is told by the two girls in alternating chapters. You see the world from each of their views. There is mystery, friendship, judgement, forgiveness, charity, and suspense. It reminds me just a little of Where the Crawdads Sing in that they are surrounded by loving adults that add wonder, generosity, and magic to their lives. I would have finished it in one sitting but life kept getting in the way - it's a hard book to put down.
I definitely recommend it.