A Far Country

Powerful . . . Haunting . . . The story revolves around Isabel, a charmingly melancholy girl who lives with her extended family in Saint Michael. . . . [She] has a brother, Isaias, who is seven years her senior. . . . Isabel adores him, and she has an uncanny ability of always finding him, no matter where he is. Then, drought and civil unrest descend upon them. . . . Isaias sneaks away one night to make his fortune as a street entertainer in the big city. Soon after, when food is gone, Isabel follows. . . . When Isabel arrives, Isaias is nowhere to be found. Isabel waits for him, day after day. Her despair grows palpable. . . . The ‘far country’ [of the title] is redolent of what C. S. Lewis in The Pilgrim’s Promise called Sehnsucht, the ‘inconsolable longing’ in the human heart for ‘we know not what’. . . . I found that Isabel’s story was my own, and her quest carried me through to the very end. Indeed, Mason has erased time and location details in the book so that it can be read as everyperson’s story, with the timeless beauty of a slow, winding parable. He’s a deft weaver of words. . . . I’m already looking forward to his third novel.