Winter Garden
by Kristin Hannah
Book Overview
Estranged sisters Meredith and Nina obey their dying father’s demand: hear their icy mother, Anya, finally finish the fairy tale she has withheld since their childhood. As Anya speaks, a peasant girl’s ordeal in besieged Leningrad surfaces—love tested, starvation endured, choices that scar—and the sisters unearth the origin of their mother’s distance; the truth forces them to reckon with their fractured loyalty, the price of silence, and the chance to remake their family’s future.
This guide maps every chapter, profiles the cast, traces themes and historical context, and curates the novel’s most striking quotes. It equips you to follow each plot turn, analyze character arcs, and engage with the book’s questions about memory, resilience, and love.