The Wishing Trees

By John Shors

Book Overview

Author John Shors has won numerous awards, and his works have been translated into 25 languages. In The Wishing Trees, Ian and his 10-year-old daughter Mattie are struggling with the passing of Kate-wife and mother-after her long battle with cancer. When Ian finally opens a letter Kate handed him before her death, he is surprised at the request inside: that he and Mattie travel across Asia while opening a series of letters from Kate, one at a time. As they complete each stage of the trip, they tie paper wishes to trees, which helps them come to terms with their loss. ". a moving, emotional story ."-Booklist

• Format: Audio CD
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1664401091
• ISBN13: 9781664401099
• Release Date: September 2010
• Publisher: Recorded Books, Inc.

Customer Reviews

A beautiful and unusual novel

A rare, touching novel centered on a father's relationship with his daughter, and the love and enduring affection they have for a family member who is no longer with them. The world, which they travel together, comes alive in this novel. Highly recommended.

Loved It!

I found this story to be incredibly touching and wonderful. What a journey this father and daughter take. It's a spiritual and emotional trek that takes them around the world. I love how their relationship evolves, the people they meet, the experiences they have. This is a remarkable novel of transformation. A winner.

Beautiful Story

John Shors is magnificent. This may be the most beautiful, most touching, and most hopeful book that I have ever read. I couldn't put it down and while some of it was read through tears, I enjoyed every second.

'She couldn't soar if she didn't have faith.'

John Shors is a Romanticist - and thank goodness there are still writers like John who are able to continually spin tales that revive the simplicity and beauty of that aspect of living that matters most: Love. Some authors can write romance novels that hold the concentration for the duration of the book. John Shors writes novels of romance that become embedded in the psyche and find a home there where they grow and influence the lives of those fortunate enough to have joined him on his journey. THE WISHING TREES is his fourth novel (Beneath a Marble Sky, Dragon Sky, Beside a Burning Sea) and this time the love story is one of a continued life after death that nourishes those left behind. Ian is an Australian businessman who has lost his wife Kate to an unnamed but cruel disease leaving him alone with his ten year old daughter Mattie. A year after Kate's death he discovers Kate left both Ian and Mattie with a collection of film canisters and a letter pleading with Ian to retrace the walkabout the two of them had shared fifteen years ago - this time taking Mattie along to help her understand the depth of love Ian and Kate had experienced and the joys they discovered. Mattie misses her mother desperately, yearning to forget the end of Kate's life as a series of tubes and paraphernalia of dying. The two decide they will fulfill Kate's plea and set out on a journey to replicate that taken long ago. They travel through Japan, Nepal, Thailand, India, Hong Kong, Vietnam, and Egypt, and obeying Kate's wishes they open a canister as they reach each destination. Inside each canister is a letter and poem that blossoms the beauty of each place. And in each place they tie a message (Mattie's drawings, notes, etc) to a tree - a wishing tree - so that Kate can experience the joys of the journey they have shared as she sees from beyond. That is simply the outline of the story. What lies within this book are the incidents, the joys, the little miracles, the people met, the engendered love that the journey provides, binding them together because of the healing of their loss through the guidance of Kate's spirit. Shors is able to describe in breathlessly beautiful prose the atmospheres and climes of each visited country because he has actually traveled to these places. His history of observations, visually and spiritually, enhance the quality of this story immeasurably. So once again John Shors has created a little miracle. Savour it! Grady Harp, September 10

Lovely

This is a heartwarming and profound novel about a father and daughter as they travel around the world together after the death of their wife/mother. This unusual novel is full of interesting characters, poems, and scenes that occur during this remarkable journey.