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| Categories | Genre Fiction |
| Author | Kristin Hannah |
| Publisher | Ballantine Books; Reprint edition (September 27, 2005) |
| Language | English |
| Paperback | 432 pages |
| Item Weight | 11.2 ounces |
| Dimensions |
5.16 x 0.92 x 8 inches |
I. Book introduction
Angel Falls is a captivating and heart-wrenching novel written by bestselling author Kristin Hannah. Set against the stunning backdrop of the Pacific Northwest, the story follows the lives of two women whose paths converge in the small town of Angel Falls.
When Mikaela Campbell, beloved wife and mother, falls into a coma, it is up to her husband, Liam, to hold the family together and care for their grieving, frightened children. Doctors tell Liam not to expect a recovery, but he believes that love can accomplish what medical science cannot. Daily he sits at Mikaela’s bedside, telling her stories of the precious life they have built together, hoping against hope that she will wake up. But then he discovers evidence of his wife’s secret past: a first marriage to movie star Julian True.
Desperate to bring Mikaela back at any cost, Liam knows that he must turn to Julian for help. But will that choice cost Liam his wife, his family, and everything he holds dear? One of Kristin Hannah’s most moving novels, Angel Falls is a poignant and unforgettable portrait of marriage and commitment, of an ordinary man who dares to risk everything in the name of love.
Editorial Reviews
- “A tearjerker . . . about the triumphs of family.”—Detroit Free Press
- “An all-night reading affair—you won’t be able to put it down. . . . [Angel Falls will] make you laugh and cry.”—New York Post
- “A jewel . . . Hannah has executed her premise perfectly and plumbed its implications for every ounce of feeling.”—San Jose Mercury News
- “Hannah writes of love with compassion and conviction.”—Luanne Rice
- “An all-night reading affair—you won’t be able to put it down. . . . [Angel Falls will] make you laugh and cry.”—New York Post
- “A jewel . . . Hannah has executed her premise perfectly and plumbed its implications for every ounce of feeling.”—San Jose Mercury News
- “Hannah writes of love with compassion and conviction.”—Luanne Rice
About Kristin Hannah
Kristin Hannah (born September 25, 1960) is an American writer. Her most notable works include Winter Garden, The Nightingale, Firefly Lane, The Great Alone, and The Four Winds. In 2024, St. Martin’s Publishing Group published her novel, The Women, which is set in America in the 1960s.
Kristin Hannah was born in California. After graduating with a degree in communication from the University of Washington, Hannah worked at an advertising agency in Seattle. She graduated from the University of Puget Sound law school and practiced law in Seattle before becoming a full-time writer. Hannah wrote her first novel with her mother, who was dying of cancer at the time, but the book was never published.
Hannah’s best-selling work, The Nightingale, has sold over 4.5 million copies worldwide and has been published in 45 languages.
Hannah lives on Bainbridge Island, Washington, with her husband and their son.
II. Reviewer: Angel Falls by Kristin Hannah
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1. MARGITTE reviews for Angel Falls
This is one of the soft-reads I have chosen as in-betweener, to escape a little from the heavy-handed, often depressing, other books I love to indulge in. It is a well-constructed, intriguing story that kept me going forward despite the obvious clues of the outcome. There even might have been quite an impressive number of other books with a similar theme. Mother or father lands in a coma, secrets are revealed, town and family gets involved, the ambiance around the saga is romantic, sentimental, Hallmark-ish. But sometimes I just need this kind of book to balance my reading-psyche out. And this one worked splendidly.
Official blurb:
When Mikaela Campbell, beloved wife and mother, falls into a coma, it is up to her husband, Liam, to hold the family together and care for their grieving, frightened children. Doctors tell him not to expect a recovery, but he believes that love can accomplish what medical science cannot. Daily he sits at her bedside, telling her stories of the precious life they have built together, hoping against hope that she will wake up. But then he discovers evidence of his wife’s secret past: a hidden first marriage to movie star Julian True.
Desperate to bring Mikaela back at any cost, Liam knows he must turn to Julian for help. But will that choice cost Liam his wife, his family, and everything he holds dear? One of Kristin Hannah’s most moving novels, Angel Falls is a poignant and unforgettable portrait of marriage and commitment, of an ordinary man who dares to risk everything in the name of love.
There you have it. Quite a heavy load of clichés are thrown in to establish the all-american entertainment family feeling – those television and movie families, the do-gooders, the divine carriers of the American feel-good genes.
Living and working in a harsh environment, I often indulge in this kind of reads because deep down inside I want to believe that the good people in the world is still winning; and the good people set the standards of the good things in life, such as happy family Christmastimes, and happy family birthday celebrations, etc. In real life it does not always exist, as we all know. In fact, there are more movies (and statistics) depicting the opposite, and in my heart I want them to go away and let the good guys storm in and take over the running of the world. Intellectually this kind of story does not make it to the finishing line, because the world is way too cruel and uncompromising for it. But emotionally I allow this kind of story to win and I bet my bottom dollar on these characters to not only be part of the saga, but also part of real life as well. In fact, I want to, and do believe(or at least hope) they are based on real people! It’s part of my head-in-the-sand-stand!
So, as a soft-read with a few realistic and unrealistic elements combined, this is a good book to read in its genre. The moral of the story is interesting to explore. I am not giving away any clues whatsoever. I am happy with the ending. It fits this story, and that’s where I get out of it. You can indulge and enjoy if you want to know more :-))
This was my introduction to Kristin Hannah. I hope to come back to more of her books as time permits. But for now she has made me feel better about the world.
2. SUSAN reviews for Angel Falls
Oh how I loved ANGEL FALLS! For a debut, this story was intense! I can’t believe I waited so long to read it as it was published in 2000 and I have been a fan of Kristin Hannah for many many years! Another heart tugging, tearful book by one of my favorite authors and I loved every minute of it! I loved the characters and at times even felt sorry for Julian. Liam was my best character – he was greater than life itself – when the life of his wife Mikaela was at stake. This is not a gushy romance story, rather it is a moving tale of a family struggling to get through the most challenging time of their lives.
ANGEL FALLS is the story of Mikaela Campbell. She’s a wife and mother and ends up in a coma after an accident. While she’s in the coma, her family does everything to try to wake her up, but nothing works until her husband Liam discovers the identity of her first husband, a famous Hollywood actor, Julian True. It’s his name that Mikaela responds too and as a result, Liam contacts Julian in the hopes that he can bring her out of the coma. And he does, but with heartbreaking consequences. I was completely invested in certain characters – I just had to know what happened. Let me tell you, my heart hurt for them.
ANGEL FALLS by Kristin Hannah pulled me right in as all of Kristin’s books do. The mystery through out had me flipping the pages like a mad woman at some points. Once I started reading ANGEL FALLS it was very hard to stop. The twists and turns kept me reading late into the night. I love when an author can do that to me! Kristin Hannah does a super job of making you feel the emotions the characters are experiencing, at familiarizing you to the settings and the motivations of the story and just simply making you FEEL. Whether it be sadness, anger, love or disgust you get to crawl into some of the characters lives and see the story through their perspective.
3. SYNDI reviews for Angel Falls
Angel Falls is a sweet tender love story between Mikeala and Liam. I enlist Liam as my book husband. He is such perfect man. His heart knows no boundry when it comes to Mikeala. Love him.
Miss Hannah proven herself even in her early books, she is a master on putting a powerful narative. I simply in awe with this book.
4. NS reviews for Angel Falls
Forgoing high drama and dysfunctional elements, Angel Falls takes a conservative approach and focuses on a simple, yet profound issue that is still deeply moving and emotional. Thus, begins the story of a couple who learn what love truly means, and deciding whether it is enough.
Set in Angel Falls, a geographically appealing, small anonymous town where the people are the heart of the community. It is a place where everyone knows everyone and where families are raised. It is also a place for escape and where Mikaela Luna find refuge from a painful past. Here she meets Liam Campbell, a quiet man who loves her fully. Here Mikaela nurtures a broken heart, raises a family, and settle into life. It is a life so unlike the former one she has known: a fast, disillusioned world with a man who appears larger than life and has a hold on her heart, despite being the one to break it.
All this changes when an accident puts Mikaela in a coma and her past re-emerges. Suddenly the love Liam and Mikaela share come under scrutiny. Is it enough? Was it ever enough? For Liam, it is a realization that he is unsure he can still settle for a part of his wife’s love if she loves another. For Mikaela, it is a realization of taking her husband’s love for granted, and her inability to fully love him back because of another man.
In the wake of Mikaela’s recovery comes clarity, renewed questions posed through a different perspective, where what was is not what seems and is. The re-appearance of Julian True into her life allows Mikaela to finally come to terms with her past and discover things about herself she has never realized.
The characters are what support and makes the story. Central to the story is Mikaela’s family who represent solidity and security in her life. Her husband, Liam loves her, but who has settled for her love with the belief that it is enough. Her children, Jacey and Bret represent her success in motherhood. Her mother Rosa also has a strong presence; her mistakes mirror those of her daughter’s except she is in a position to provide wisdom and guidance to her daughter.
The setting and beauty of Angel Falls do more than appeal; they represent a contrast to Mikaela’s former life and now. Though small, the town provides peace, serenity and home, a place of acceptance. This in contrast to the big city, where faces are anonymous and lacks the feel of home.
The story itself is simple; there is no family drama concerning infidelity, teenage rebellion and angst or complex issues. But even without these elements, the story remain moving and insightful. Instead, the betrayals are those that are hidden or quietly yearned for. They reside in words unspoken, and feelings withheld. It is the accident that provide Liam and Mikaela the chance to find significance in their love, re-affirm their love, and strengthen the bonds of their family.
5. JJSPINA reviews for Angel Falls
A beautiful story of love and commitment!
Angel Falls is an emotional story of love and family, a tearjerker that you will not forget. The characters are well defined and bring the story full circle evidencing the love and commitment of a family who is grieving and struggling to survive in spite of what life has thrown at them.
This story will make one think about one’s own life and what one would do in the circumstances laid out in this tale. It’s a courageous and unselfish story of a man’s love and commitment to his family above all odds, putting their interests above his own.
This author has created another beautiful story that is an unforgettable read. I highly recommend this book!
6. MINDY E reviews for Angel Falls
Emotional and insightful “feel good” read
Kristin Hannah is a great author, and this time she is masterful in helping us see and grasp the essence of love in this touching novel. She’s done a remarkable job of gifting her readers with a believable narration that captures the most powerful and elusive force in the world– almost impossible to explain except through experience and feeling.
“Angel Falls” lays open a family’s struggle to trust and recognize the strength of their bonds when unexpected tragedy abruptly interrupts a seemingly ordinary day. Thus begins a marathon of what it means to love and be loved in a battle where the overwhelming power of obsession and past love come face to face with reality and secrets long held.
There are no real “bad guys” here, but as the characters pick their fragile (yet unbreakable) way through this touching and insightful story, you’ll feel sympathy for those who realize too late the cost of failing to embrace love when it’s offered purely and selflessly. The pain, regrets tenderness and triumphs felt honest, even if a little smoother than real life might dish out, and the good guy wins in the end– and a family comes together. Make sure you have a little reading time set aside when you begin this book– you won’t want to put it down. I’m not a big romance reader, but I read this one straight through.
7. JOANN PERSICHETTI reviews for Angel Falls
Faith is the assurance of things hoped for the conviction of things not seen
The family’s faith in one another was unshakable in spite of the hopelessness they felt when Mikaela suffered a head injury which resulted in a coma. What a gentle husband/doctor/father Liam was throughout the coma and even after he found out that his beloved wife had been married to a famous movie star. The support of Mikaela’s mother was the glue that kept the hope of the family together.
Once again, Kristen Hannah captures the essence of love and forgiveness that I never get tired of reading. All the characters in this story is shown in depth by giving the reader a taste of their thoughts and a window to their personalities.
I would recommend this book to anyone who needs a heartwarming feeling. This book is a perfect introduction to Kristen Hannah!
8. JENNIFER A GRUNBECK reviews for Angel Falls
Angel falls takes on medical and faith and love
When you begin all seems like a perfect family. Then an accident brings them to the brink. The past and the present collide and the future becomes uncertain. Will Mike find her True love or will her memories stay hidden from her. Will her family hold together long enough for the healing to happen.
Another great read from Kristin.
9. MELISSA reviews for Angel Falls
Angel Falls was a challenging book to write at the time. In it, the heroine is in a coma for most of the story, and while she in unconscious, she remains central to the plot. This book was, in simplest terms, a love triangle. That was the surface story, at least. But what I really loved about it, was that it examined two completely different kinds of love, and reminded the reader that a woman can be in love with two different men in her life…and that ultimately, a choice has to be made. For Michaela, the heroine of this book, the choice was between her first and second husbands—one who had swept her away with his passion and broken her heart, and the other, who had grounded her with the constancy of his love and healed her soul. And all of this story—her choice—was carried out between the men while she lay sleeping. As a novelist, the challenge was to create two men worthy of her love so that the reader could reasonably believe either choice; as a writer, the challenge was to write a triangle love story primarily through the two men’s viewpoints. In the years since its publication, Angel Falls has proven to be a real “love it or hate it” book.
10. ALAINE reviews for Angel Falls
What a wonderful book! I was completely lost in this story that was mainly told through the eyes of the Liam, Mikaela’s husband. It gave a unique insight into a man’s perspective of love and family. This is not a gushy romance story, rather it is a moving tale of a family struggling to get through the most challenging time of their lives. It is about self discovery and realisations of what is truly important in life. The characters where easy to relate to and I found a little of my own life story in the pages of this book, having been raised by a man who was not my biological father but loving just the same.
I came across this book on audio and will definiately read more books by Kristin Hannah as I loved her style and the way in which she told this story. It is beautifully written!
III. Angel Falls Quotes by Kristin Hannah
The best book quotes from Angel Falls by Kristin Hannah
“The measure of a man comes down to moments, spread out like dots of paint on the canvas of a life. Everything you were, everything you’ll someday be, resides in the small, seemingly ordinary choices of everyday life. It starts early, this random procession of decisions. Should I try out for Little League, should I study for this test, should I wear this seat belt, should I take this drink? Each decision seems as insignificant as a left turn on an unfamiliar road when you have no destination in mind. But the decisions accumulate until you realize one day that they’ve made you the man that you are.”
“That was the one thing she knew now. Some chances came and went, and if you missed them, you could spend the rest of your life standing alone, waiting for an opportunity that had already passed you by.”
“At one point, she’d wanted to hurl the whole breakfast at the wall. And then she’d remember why it was that men had temper tantrums and women didn’t: cleanup.”
“How did you tell a man that you’d grown up, that you’d learned true love wasn’t a night of passionate sex under a sky lit up by fireworks, but an ordinary Sunday morning when your husband brought you a glass of water, two aspirins, and a heating pad for your cramps?”
“The measure of a man comes down to moments, spread out like dots of pain on the canvas on life. Everything you were, everything you’ll someday be, resides in the small, seemingly ordinary choices of everyday life…..Each decision seems as insignificant as a left turn on an unfamiliar road when you have no destination in mind. But the decisions accumulate until you realize one day that they’ve made you the man that you are.”
“A dark purple sky filled with the first few evening stars made her feel small. She smiled; that was what she expected from the sky. All her life, she’d gone out at night and stood beneath that blue velvet darkness. It was her temple, the true house of God, and it never failed to remind her of her place.”
“Tragedy was like that, a razor that sliced through time, severing the now from the before, incising the what-might-have-been from reality as cleanly as any surgeon’s blade.”
“He was afraid that the secrets she’d kept would always be here, inside him, an ugly malignant thing lodged near enough to his heart to upset its rhythm, and though it could be removed, cut out, there would always be scars; bits and pieces of it would remain in his blood, making it wrong somehow, so that if he accidentally sliced his skin open, his blood would–for one heartbeat–flow as black as India ink before it remembered that it should be red.”
“He wanted to be angry, to scream and rail and feel honest-to-God outrage. But he wasn’t that kind of man. His love for Mikaela was more than just an emotion; it was the sum total of who he was. This one thing he knew above everything else. He loved Mikaela too much. Which in its way was as bad as loving someone not enough.”
“Liam learned that it was possible to appear to move forward when you were really standing still.”
“The falling apart of a man’s life should make more noise. It should startle passesrby with its Sturm and Drang. It ought to sound like the Parthenon crashing down. Not this ordinary, everyday kind of quiet…He closed his eyes…And still it was quiet, this falling apart of his life, as silent as the last beat of an old man’s heart. A quiet, echoing thud, and then…nothing.”
“Love wasn’t a great, burning brushfire that swept across your soul and charred you beyond recognition. It was being there, simply that. It was a few people, standing together in a living room, trimming a Christmas tree with the decorations that represented the sum total of who they were, where they’d been, what they believed in. It was simple, everyday moments that laid like bricks, one atop another, until they formed a foundation so solid that nothing could make them fall. Not wind, not rain … not even the faded, watercolor memories of a once-brushfire passion. Nothing.”
“I think maybe ‘in love’ has the shelf life of whipping cream. No matter how you handle it, it goes sour. But if you’re lucky, you get past ‘in love’ and end up just loving someone.”
“How was it that the profound simplicity of those words had the power to rock her world? Never again would she lose sight of what mattered, not for a day or an hour or even a minute. She would treasure every instant of her life from now on, for she knew something now, a deep truth that had eluded her all of her life. Love wasn’t a great, burning brushfire that swept across your soul and charred you beyond recognition. It was being there, simply that. It was a few people, standing together in a living room, trimming a Christmas tree with the decorations that represented the sum total of who they were, where they’d been, what they believed in. It was simple, everyday moments that laid like bricks, one atop another, until they formed a foundation so solid that nothing could make them fall. Not wind, not rain … not even the faded, watercolor memories of a once-brushfire passion.”
“Courage, Liam thought to himself, wasn’t a hot, blistering emotion held only in the hands of men who joined the special forces and jumped out of airplanes and scaled unnamed mountains. It was a quiet thing, ice-cold more often than not; the last tiny piece you found when you thought that everything was gone. It was facing your children at a time like this, holding their hands and brushing their tears away when you were certain you hadn’t the strength to do it. It was swallowing your own grief and going on, one shallow, bitter breath at a time.”
“she’d always believed that she didn’t belong. It was, she realized, an ugly bit of baggage that she’d carried here from her youth, and she’d been so damned busy hanging on to it that she’d failed to notice that the bags were empty.”
“Let me tell you something else I know. When you hide things away, and keep them secret, they have a … power.”
“He’d never thought much about silence, but now he knew its every shape and contour. It was a cheap glass jar that trapped old voices and kept them fresh.”
“Love wasn’t a great, burning brushfire that swept across your soul and charred you beyond recognition. It was being there, simply that.”
“Liam tried to imagine what it must be like to have a mother like this. What a power it must grant a person in life to have a place where you could always land softly, even after the hardest hit.”
“an ordinary man whose only claim to the extraordinary was the depth of his love for a woman.”
“They’d blithely thrown their line of dreams out again and again, reeling in nothing but lost chances and missed opportunities. Why hadn’t they realized how precious every moment was?”
Excerpted from Angel Falls by Kristin Hannah
Angel Falls – Chapter One
In northwest Washington state, jagged granite mountains reach for the misty sky, their peaks inaccessible even in this age of helicopters and high-tech adventurers. The trees in this part of the country grow thick as an old man’s beard and block out all but the hardiest rays of the sun. Only in the brightest months of summer can hikers find their way back to the cars they park along the sides of the road.
Deep in the black-and-green darkness of this old-growth forest lies the tiny town of Last Bend. To visitors — there are no strangers here — it is the kind of place they’d thought to encounter only in the winding tracks of their own imaginations. When they first walk down the streets, folks swear they hear a noise that can only be described as laughter. Then come the memories, some real, some manufactured images from old movies and Life magazine. They recall how their grandmother’s lemonade tasted . . . or the creaky sound of a porch swing gliding quietly back and forth, back and forth, on the tail end of a muggy summer’s night.
Last Bend was founded fifty years ago, when a big, broad-shouldered Scotsman named Ian Campbell gave up his crumbling ancestral home in Edinburgh and set off in search of adventure. Somewhere along the way — family legend attributed it to Wyoming — he took up rock climbing, and spent the next ten years wandering from mountain to mountain, looking for two things: the ultimate climb and a place to leave his mark.
He found what he was looking for in Washington’s North Cascade mountain range. In this place where Sasquatches were more than a campfire myth and glaciers flowed year round in ice-blue rivers, he staked his claim. He drove as close to the mighty Mt. Baker as he could and bought a hundred acres of prime pastureland, then he bought a corner lot on a gravel road that would someday mature into the Mount Baker Highway. He built his town along the pebbly, pristine shores of Angel Lake and christened it Last Bend, because he thought the only home worth having was worth searching for, and he’d found his at the last turn in the road.
It took him some time to find a woman willing to live in a moss-chinked log cabin without electricity or running water, but find her he did — a fiery Irish lass with dreams that matched his own. Together they fashioned the town of their combined imagination; she planted Japanese maple saplings along Main Street and started a dozen traditions-Glacier Days, the Sasquatch race, and the Halloween haunted house on the corner of Cascade and Main.
In the same year the Righteous Brothers lost that lovin’ feeling, Ian and Fiona began to build their dream home, a huge, semicircular log house that sat on a small rise in the middle of their property. On some days, when the sky was steel blue, the glaciered mountain peaks seemed close enough to touch. Towering Douglas firs and cedars rimmed the carefully mowed lawn, protected the orchard from winter’s frozen breath. Bordering the west end of their land was Angel Creek, a torrent in the still gloaming of the year, a quiet gurgling creek when the sun shone high and hot in the summer months. In the wintertime, they could step onto their front porch and hear the echo of Angel Falls, only a few miles away.
Now the third generation of Campbells lived in that house. Tucked tightly under the sharply sloped roofline was a young boy’s bedroom.
It was not unlike other little boys’ rooms in this media-driven age — Corvette bed, Batman posters tacked to the uneven log walls, Goosebumps books strewn across the shag-carpeted floor, piles of plastic dinosaurs and fake snakes and Star Wars action figures.
Nine-year-old Bret Campbell lay quietly in his bed, watching the digital clock by his bed flick red numbers into the darkness. Five-thirty. Five thirty-one. Five thirty-two.
Halloween morning.
He had wanted to set the alarm for this special Saturday morning, but he didn’t know how, and if he’d asked for help, his surprise would have been ruined. And so he snuggled under the Mr. Freeze comforter, waiting.
At precisely 5:45, he flipped the covers back and climbed out of bed. Careful not to make any noise, he pulled the grocery sack from underneath his bed and unpacked it.
There was no light on, but he didn’t need one. He’d stared at these clothes every night for a week. His Halloween costume. A sparkly pair of hand-me-down cowboy boots that they’d picked up at the Emperor’s New Clothes used-clothing shop, a fake leather vest from the Dollar-Saver thrift shop, a pair of felt chaps his mom had made, a plaid flannel shirt and brand-new Wrangler jeans from Zeke’s Feed and Seed, and best of all, a shiny sheriff’s star and gun belt from the toy store. His daddy had even made him a kid-sized lariat that could be strapped to the gun belt.
He stripped off his pj’s and slipped into the outfit, leaving behind the gun belt, guns, chaps, lariat, and ten-gallon hat. Those he wouldn’t need now.
He felt like a real cowboy. He grabbed the index card with the instructions on it — just in case — and went to his bedroom door, peeking out into the shadowy hallway.
He peered down at the other two bedrooms. Both doors were closed and no light slid out from underneath. Of course his sixteen-year-old sister, Jacey, was asleep. It was Saturday, and on the day after a high-school football game, she always slept until noon. Dad had been at the hospital all night with a patient, so he’d be tired this morning, too. Only Mom would be getting up early-and she’d be in the barn, ready to go, at six o’clock.
….
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