I actually saw this book the first time through the Amazon Vine program; I ended up getting it from the library instead, but the cover and book description intrigued me. I liked some parts of the book and disliked others; overall it ended up being an okay read. It was more a tale of people making bad decisions about love than a fantasy though; you should know that before you pick it up.

Most of the tale centers around a young girl Ida and a photographer Midas. Midas is very introverted and grew up on the island; while Ida is very monochromatic and extroverted, although at one time she was vibrant. Ida has a disease that she seems to have picked up when she visited the island, she is slowly turning to glass from the feet up. Midas is at first fascinated by the image her glass feet portray and then fascinated by Ida herself. Ida is dealing with the uncertainty of her illness, while Midas is dealing with his fright of people. The lives of numerous people weave in and out of their story. The book is full of people who regret choices they have made in their lives and full of people who have lost the loves of their life.

As you might guess from the description this is not a heartwarming book or a happy book. The majority of characters are incredibly depressed; the whole story is a bit monochromatic as all the characters are bleached of any positive emotion. Ida, despite her horrible affliction, is the greatest point of light in the whole novel. While the description of the book makes it seem like a fantasy, it really is not that at all. The book deals more with people's past decisions and how those decisions affected their families; it also deals with how a life-threatening illness affects the people around you. There are mysterious happenings on the island but they are never explored, only briefly discussed, and are just accepted as part of the island.

The writing style is both good and bad. At times the descriptions are so beautiful as to be inspiring, at others the plot wanders a bit too much. Shaw bounces between present and past without much warning. The storyline is told from a number of characters' viewpoints; which can get a bit confusing at times. When I got to the end of the book, I also thought that some of the characters could have been left out of the story without much impact...then we could have spent more time with Midas and Ida.

The most beautiful parts of the book were when Henry is exploring the insects of the regions, followed by the parts with Midas and Ida. This book is not really a fantasy and definitely not something to read to lift your mood. The mood of the book feels like winter; cold, unforgiving, and hopefully giving way to something better. To be honest the story left me feeling chilled.

Overall, there is some excellent imagery in the book and some creative ideas. I thought the execution left something to be desired; the plot meanders a lot and the book dealt more with bitter people than fantasy. In general an okay read; but not something to brighten your day. It didn't make me eager to read any more of Shaw's work. ( )

I won this book from Library Thing's Early Reviewer Program. While reading this book I was fascinated by the main characters struggle. Through each other they both learn to love again. Even though I never did connect with the characters this is a good book to read on a rainy day. ( )

Full Review: http://bookviews.wordpress.com/2010/0...

Ida Maclaird is a woman turning to glass. A transformation, which begins with no hint, no warning, and has no known cause. She has nothing to go by except a long ago mention of glass bodies in the bog of the islands. It is all that Ida has, this mention of glass bodies, and keeping that mention as a hope Ida travels to the strange St. Hauda’s Land where she seeks a cure but finds instead Midas Cook, who stumbles upon her himself while trying to capture light.

A recluse, Midas knows the whole of the islands but speaks willing and regularly to only two people. Other than that, Midas hides away in his home venturing out only to capture the light with his camera. His meeting with Ida, however, jars him. He remembers their first meeting continuously afterwards – his awkwardness, and her thin frame paired with odd large, bulky boots, that he feels he knows she is hiding. But Midas too is hiding, and it is not until Ida, until his learns her condition, until they accompany each other in finding a cure, through which his past is slowly revealed, that Midas realizes what Ida is, what she becomes to him, and that even he was hiding.

We learn of Midas sometimes through his childhood memories and sometimes through his deceased father’s memories. And this way, through memories, does the book reveal the pasts that have shaped all the odd-ball characters it presents: Henry Fawa, Midas’s mother, Evaline, Midas’s father,Carl Maulsen,and Enghem Stead. Each is odd, having lived as they have within themselves so long, but through Ida’s unlikely draw towards Midas, each one of their lives are reveled and they draw us, the readers, eerily to them. We begin to understand them, for they are very human, these characters, with lives lived and regretful pasts that haunt them. The description of these lives, the manner in which they intertwine is the art that Shaw seems to have captured brilliantly.

Reading The Girl with Glass Feet was an externally clam, serene experience, but internally it incites within you a slightly shimming feeling of chocked up panic that is carried all throughout the book. But once done, it calms you again.

The Girl with Glass Feet is a mesmerizing and aching tale. I wanted to lap up its imagery and envelop myself in Shaw’s emotion. It’s both a fairy tale and a stark reality on how desperate we can be as humans. It mirrors hopes, dreams, fears, and delusions that form the foundation and structure of humanity.

This is a soft story that shouts emotions. I know that I used the adjective “aching” and I cannot stress how vivid that emotion is still felt, even though it has been nearly a month since I’ve finished this book. As soon as I turned over the last page, I wanted to take a sharp breath inward in the hopes that the cold air would fill that huge hole in my gut that the novel left behind.

Read more here:

http://annotatedreading.blogspot.com/... ( )

This wasn't at all what I expected from the beginning. I had a hard time getting into it at first - I think it just takes a little time to adjust to the style of magic realism of the story.

I like magic realism, and the idea that a writer can just give the reader a world where the unexpected can happen but everything is accepted by the characters. Some sort of explanation of how things work in the world that's been created can be helpful, though. It wasn't clear at all if the inhabitants of St. Hauda's Land were living in some sort of magical area different from the mainland, or if the whole of the world was different. I was left wishing for more resolution of a lot of those aspects of the set-up, and unfortunately didn't get it.

However, the writing is very beautiful, and most of the characters well-imagined. Oddly, the title character, Ida, was more loosely drawn than that of Midas Crook, the man who tries to help her find a cure for her affliction. Luckily, I found myself drawn into Midas' world so that was enough for me. ( )