To return to the questions provoked by the old folk tale riddle that underlies Høeg's text—is there a heart and does Høeg break it or not?—my answer is only too obvious. In my reading, Frøken Smillas fornemmelse for sne is a sentimental narrative about the mourning of the child, a narrative told with a broken heart that the writer attempts to heal. "Min mors forfaedre ville have undret sig over, at universets nøgler for en af deres efterkommere skulle vise sig at vaere skriftlig" ("My mother's forefathers would have been astounded that the key to the universe for one of their descendants would turn out to be in written form"), Smilla/Høeg says. S/he does not seem, to borrow Leithauser's word, to be being "coy." Yet the narrative fact remains that that...