Do I have any fellow HSP friends out there?  If so, you guys may understand when I say it took me a while to work up the courage to read The Great Alone. Sad books and  hard topics usually weigh heavily upon me and can leave me in a slump. I finally did it, though, and am I ever glad I did!  I was slower in my reading of this book, occasionally having to lay it aside after reading a particularly hard passage, but I also found myself completely swept away in the Alaskan setting. I loved the symbolism in the turbulent weather interwoven and coinciding with Ernt's turbulent moods (trigger warnings for domestic violence and PTSD) - as gut-wrenching as it could be to read, I found that so cleverly and beautifully done.  The slow unraveling of the Allbright family felt like a building crescendo, dramatic and haunting.  The characters, too, I found to have depth and such realness to them that I sometimes forgot I was reading fiction. I especially loved the mother-daughter relationship in this story and had tears streaming down my face by the end because I could relate to that relationship. Even though I finished this book almost two weeks ago, I find that I'm still living in the story.  I think I will be for quite some time. This was a ⭐⭐⭐⭐