ABOUT
THE BOOK

Latitudes of Melt opens with the discovery by two fishermen of a baby floating on an ice pan in the North Atlantic off the coast of Newfoundland in 1912, and becomes a breathtaking family saga that spans almost a century. To the small fishing community of the Drook into which the foundling is adopted, Aurora, as they name her, with her shock of white hair, one blue eye and one brown, is clearly enchanted. Throughout her early years, she displays behaviour the locals find odd. Spending most of her time outside, alone on the beautiful barren landscape, the girl seems closer to nature than to the world of people. Filled with the lore of shipwrecks, icebergs, whales, gardens, food, fabric, folk art and colour, Latitudes of Melt is also an unforgettable love story as Aurora grows to adulthood and meets the son of the lighthouse keeper who shares her passion for reading. But it is only when Aurora is herself an old woman, having raised children and grandchildren, that we learn the wrenching story behind the baby’s miraculous survival on the ice.