The Child Finder: A Novel by Rene Denfeld

I had an extremely difficult childhood and every day after school I’d go to the public library, which was my sanctuary. I learned early about the power of story and imagination to save lives—the poetry of the books became the poetry of my life, the ability to find hope even in despair. In writing fiction I feel I can capture that poetry of life and the lessons I’ve learned. Rene Denfeld from Goodreads Ask the Author

I cannot review The Child Finder without first sharing Rene Denfeld’s personal story. Not only has she won numerous awards for her novels, but she has also received a New York Times Hero of the Year award for her justice work and a National Break the Silence Award. Rene Denfeld was the Chief Investigator at a public defender’s office and is now a private investigator. She has worked hundreds of cases, with particular focus on helping death row inmates who may be innocent and providing aid and support to sex trafficking victims. You can find an essay on her death row work on her website. In addition to her advocacy work, the author has been a foster adoptive parent for over twenty-five years.

In an interview for the Michigan Quarterly Review, she states, “For my job as well as being a foster parent, I’ve had a ton of training on childhood abuse, molestation, trauma, neglect, and other issues. I have fancy certifications and all that. But in truth life experience has taught me far more than any class or conference. The man I considered my father is a registered predatory sex offender. It’s one reason I feel so comfortable working with traumatized children and adults. I’ve been there. The way I survived as a child was to escape into my imagination. I built entire worlds I lived inside during the abuse. The scenes in The Child Finder dealing with surviving such abuse were based on my own experiences, and those of my children. It was actually very healing to write. The prose seemed to flow and felt poetic. I think those scenes are some of the best writing of my life.” On The Child Finder: An Interview with Rene Denfeld

The power of story and use of the imagination to save lives is very much a theme in The Child Finder. When a child is abducted and hidden within the fictional Skookum National Forest in Oregon, she uses her imagination as a tool for psychological survival, transforming herself into ‘the snow girl’ based on ‘The Snow Child,’ a character from a Russian fairytale her mother used to read to her. Throughout the novel, the author provides viewpoints from both Madison, the captured child and her alter ego, the snow girl. The following selection is an example.

The snow girl could remember the day she was born.

In brilliant snow she had been created —- two tired arms out, like an angel —- and her creator was there. His face was a halo of light.

He had lifted her, easily, over his shoulder. He had an intense, warm, comforting smell, like the inside of the earth. She could see her hands, curiously blue at the tips, as immobile as stone. Her hair swung around her face, the ends tipped in ice.

From the man’s belt slapped long fur creatures. She watched their tiny claws clutch at the empty air above the swinging white snow.

Her eyes closed as she drifted back to sleep. [p. 13]

Naomi is the self-reliant, physically fit investigator Madison’s parents call on when the search for their missing daughter grows cold after three years. Having been a lost child herself, Naomi has dedicated her life to finding children who have disappeared, and she possesses a gift for finding them, although not always alive. As the author writes:

Hope was a beautiful thing, Naomi thought, looking up through the silent trees, the clean cold air filling her lungs. It was the most beautiful part of her work when it was rewarded with life. The worst when it only brought sorrow. [p. 6]

The setting is every bit as much of a commanding character as are Naomi, Madison, and her captor. The Skookum National Forest (which the author has said is based on Mount Hood National Forest and Chemult, Oregon) is described in the novel as “tough, brutal, a wild land full of crevasses and glacier faces.” One of the reasons Madison was not immediately found was that a blizzard shut down the search party. Every time Naomi enters the forest to search the area, we fear for her. The forest adds as much suspense as the plot. Here is an example:

She started in the exact place where Madison was lost, absorbing the area. She didn’t start a formal search. Instead she treated the area like an animal she was getting to know: feeling its body, understanding its form. This was a cold animal, an unpredictable animal, with jutting, mysterious, dangerous parts.

Just a few feet into the trees the road disappeared behind her, and if not for the compass in her pocket and the tracks behind her, Naomi might have lost all sense of direction. The tall firs wove a canopy above her, almost obliterating the sky. Here and there the sun slanted through the trees, sending shafts of light to the ground. She could see how easily it would be to get turned around, lost. She had read of people dying in this wilderness less than half a mile from a trail.

These were old-growth trees, and the snow-covered ground was surprisingly bare of brush. The snow was sculpted into patterns against the reddish tree trunks. The ground rose and fell around her —- the child could have gone in practically endless directions, her form certain to disappear in mere moments. [p. 6]

I actually read Rene Denfeld’s The Butterfly Girl before The Child Finder. I recommend doing the opposite as The Butterfly Girl is a continuation of several plots introduced in The Child Finder. I plan to read The Enchanted next. It is her first novel and received rave reviews.

For more information about The Snow Child, I recommend the beautifully illustrated picture book The Snow Child: A Russian Folktale by Freya Littledale and the adult fantasy/historical fiction novel The Snow Child by Eowyn Ivey.

Check Amazon for more on this book I love.