Scan barcode
rissaleighs's review against another edition
4.0
Update from a 2020 reread: the passage on the very first page about the herb garden has been immortal in my memory all these years. A summer craving. :)
sidonie's review against another edition
slow-paced
4.0
Normalize women doing nothing and talking about it!
compass_rose's review against another edition
3.0
Hoping to visit SOJ's house in June, so I want to read this before I go.
sueann's review against another edition
4.0
I'm not trying to diminish this book my calling it a sweet story. Jewett really captures the sense of a small community as well as the peace and grandeur of Maine.
ellaeunicem's review against another edition
lighthearted
reflective
relaxing
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
3.0
kristinana's review against another edition
3.0
I need to be honest in my reviews, right? For the sake of transparency?
I found this book so incredibly boring when I started it that I almost quit a number of times, often avoided reading it, and typically fell asleep while attempting to read it. It took me much longer than it should have to read for that reason. This made me feel like a bad person and worry that I had lost patience. I thought I enjoyed slow narratives.
It was quite amusing to me when, early in the book, the narrator realizes at one point that she had gotten bored with an old sea captain's stories and had stopped listening. If the narrator can't pay attention to the stories, how can I be expected to?
But then, the narrator realizes that she has been rude and refocuses her attention, so I tried to follow her lead and did grow to like the book more. I still didn't love it, but eventually I became used to its pace and lack of plot enough to enjoy certain things about it. Certain stories, such as that of "poor Joanna," are haunting, and I did enjoy the bonds between women and the regular referrals to herbal remedies. Still, I was overall disappointed by the structure, which consisted a lot of character sketches and individual monologues. It was as if people were just waiting around for someone to show up so they could tell a story. Which, I mean, might not be that unrealistic, if you are lonely and live in an isolated place. But if you contrast this with Elizabeth Gaskell's _Cranford_, which is what I thought the novel might be like (since both focus on rural areas with aging, mostly female populations that are visited by younger but not exactly youthful female narrators), you will find it has much less humor and liveliness. While Cranford's women dwell on the past, they also interact with each other and have new adventures, which certainly seems like a much preferable way to age.
While the main book is largely stagnant, I found some of the additional stories in my edition much more enjoyable. "The Foreigner" is another Dunnett's Landing story, and while it has a similar basic structure (Mrs. Todd telling our narrator a story about someone who has died), there is something richer and more beautiful about it, for my own taste, than the stories in the main part of the novel. "Martha's Lady" was, for me, the most enjoyable story; it deals with an entirely different set of characters and tells a beautiful story of romantic friendship. I am glad I had the endurance to read these additional stories, as they were my favorite parts of the edition.
I found this book so incredibly boring when I started it that I almost quit a number of times, often avoided reading it, and typically fell asleep while attempting to read it. It took me much longer than it should have to read for that reason. This made me feel like a bad person and worry that I had lost patience. I thought I enjoyed slow narratives.
It was quite amusing to me when, early in the book, the narrator realizes at one point that she had gotten bored with an old sea captain's stories and had stopped listening. If the narrator can't pay attention to the stories, how can I be expected to?
But then, the narrator realizes that she has been rude and refocuses her attention, so I tried to follow her lead and did grow to like the book more. I still didn't love it, but eventually I became used to its pace and lack of plot enough to enjoy certain things about it. Certain stories, such as that of "poor Joanna," are haunting, and I did enjoy the bonds between women and the regular referrals to herbal remedies. Still, I was overall disappointed by the structure, which consisted a lot of character sketches and individual monologues. It was as if people were just waiting around for someone to show up so they could tell a story. Which, I mean, might not be that unrealistic, if you are lonely and live in an isolated place. But if you contrast this with Elizabeth Gaskell's _Cranford_, which is what I thought the novel might be like (since both focus on rural areas with aging, mostly female populations that are visited by younger but not exactly youthful female narrators), you will find it has much less humor and liveliness. While Cranford's women dwell on the past, they also interact with each other and have new adventures, which certainly seems like a much preferable way to age.
While the main book is largely stagnant, I found some of the additional stories in my edition much more enjoyable. "The Foreigner" is another Dunnett's Landing story, and while it has a similar basic structure (Mrs. Todd telling our narrator a story about someone who has died), there is something richer and more beautiful about it, for my own taste, than the stories in the main part of the novel. "Martha's Lady" was, for me, the most enjoyable story; it deals with an entirely different set of characters and tells a beautiful story of romantic friendship. I am glad I had the endurance to read these additional stories, as they were my favorite parts of the edition.
chelseyaytch's review against another edition
Not bad at all, just not the right book at this moment.