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3.89 AVERAGE
3.89 AVERAGE
challenging
dark
emotional
funny
reflective
sad
tense
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
I really enjoyed the book - full of imagery, almost poetic at times
adventurous
dark
emotional
mysterious
reflective
sad
tense
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
4.75 What an exquisite earthy treasure, I found in Helen Humpreys' voice! This contemporary folkloric style/mythic/pagan tale of hers captivated me with its comparison and contrast of wildness and being tamed. It was a love rhythmic hymn to nature and a person's connection with it.
She speaks my love-language, and my language is of Canada's north. Typically, I am not a fan of first-person point of view, but she uses this perspective to offer superb multiple first-person narrative pieces that create strong, vivid character portrayals and enriches, weaves in layers of meaning to her story. In doing so, she paints a vivid portrait of her primary character Alice and breathes to life all her secondary characters, as well.
Her style was briefer sentence structures with a sprinkling of simple metaphors and basic similies, and enough variation in the structure that my attention never slipped. I wanted to be there. I wanted to be one of her characters.
Central to this contemporary folklore tale are fantastic phenomenological descriptors of the lived experience with the land and one's surroundings. Some of these are present in Humphreys' stunning words that caught and held my attention as quoted below.
"If there's no apparent reason for something to change, then why does it change? Is it a dog's nature to vary behaviour when life becomes too comfortable?" pg 10
"Like many North American cities, ours has water at the bottom and woods at the top. We have built our houses between what is fluid and what is fixed." pg 23
"I can feel the heat blossoms on your skin." pg 34 and "Why are you always sad?" pg 34
"Kindness spooked you --- you were always looking for the trap in it." pg 35
"...the different shades of green glow with a deep resonance, as though the light sounds from somewhere inside them." pg 44
"the stars wire the sky together and the crickets fill the shadows of the earth with their breath." pg 45
"... we catch a glimpse of white fur flashing by inside the bars of the woods." pg 47 (beautiful simple metaphor; woods as a prison)
"Hunger is a beginning I can understand. It is most beginnings. But it is in endings that we prove our aloneness, and our individuality. To give up on, in an instant, what we worked so hard to get is what we fear from one another." pg 68
"I refuse to carry the burden of your disappointment."pg 69 (wow a strong feminist voice here!)
"I didn't hear _____ , or if I did, I stuffed it into the container of my dream." pg 102
"I thought about the dogs in their den, curled around the last little scrap of the night." pg 131
"It is very easy to choose the wrong word." pg 132
"I have never been wild. I never wanted to be, and yet my life has grown wild around me. I suppose there might have always have to be that balance, and if wildness is not happening within you, then it's happening outside of you. Is it always to be feared as I fear it? Is the only choice either to be the wild thing or to shoot at the wild thing? I think so. There is no living safely with wildness. If you let a wild thing into your house, it tears everything to pieces." pg 136 ( a preternatural understanding of nature)
"Years of not painting drove me crazy." pg 139
(the brutal honesty of--->) I was so used to my father's depressive inertia that it was a shock to hear that he'd done something about it." and "My father's depression found me, after his death." pg 140
"(They) were just attempts to break out of from the slow tomb of my days." pg 147
"Maybe that's what I'm trying to do here, clear a space in all the debris, through all the anxieties and worries where I can just exist, easily and simply..." pg 157
"He sleeps a lot now, .... winter arching its back against the windows."
"We couldn't respond to anything outside the vortex of our attraction to each other..." AND
"Never trust anyone who has been betrayed. Betrayal never loses its edge, never really goes away." AND
"She should have been (made) stronger than loving me made her." pg 167
"Is it not that we are afraid of what is wild within ourselves? Isn't the whole structure of society about trying to fit ourselves into smaller and smaller cages? The more confined we are by duty and love, the more our wilderness will be tamed and the more secure we can expect to feel. But of course, that's not true. We don't feel safe at all." pg 173
"It seemed these unexpected glimpses of the natural world were a kind of hope." pg 181
"The smell is sulfur cold. The smell is winter coming on." pg 183
"Everything is movement or monument." pg 185
This would have been 5 stars but for the overuse of the word,"the." "The" necessarily creates distance and formality. I understood how Humphreys uses "the" to give her next word a reverent tone; however it was a tad overplayed.
Thank you Helen Humpreys for affirming a strong female voice for the north. You invited me to spend time with you in your story and I relished every moment spent immersed in your lore.
She speaks my love-language, and my language is of Canada's north. Typically, I am not a fan of first-person point of view, but she uses this perspective to offer superb multiple first-person narrative pieces that create strong, vivid character portrayals and enriches, weaves in layers of meaning to her story. In doing so, she paints a vivid portrait of her primary character Alice and breathes to life all her secondary characters, as well.
Her style was briefer sentence structures with a sprinkling of simple metaphors and basic similies, and enough variation in the structure that my attention never slipped. I wanted to be there. I wanted to be one of her characters.
Central to this contemporary folklore tale are fantastic phenomenological descriptors of the lived experience with the land and one's surroundings. Some of these are present in Humphreys' stunning words that caught and held my attention as quoted below.
"If there's no apparent reason for something to change, then why does it change? Is it a dog's nature to vary behaviour when life becomes too comfortable?" pg 10
"Like many North American cities, ours has water at the bottom and woods at the top. We have built our houses between what is fluid and what is fixed." pg 23
"I can feel the heat blossoms on your skin." pg 34 and "Why are you always sad?" pg 34
"Kindness spooked you --- you were always looking for the trap in it." pg 35
"...the different shades of green glow with a deep resonance, as though the light sounds from somewhere inside them." pg 44
"the stars wire the sky together and the crickets fill the shadows of the earth with their breath." pg 45
"... we catch a glimpse of white fur flashing by inside the bars of the woods." pg 47 (beautiful simple metaphor; woods as a prison)
"Hunger is a beginning I can understand. It is most beginnings. But it is in endings that we prove our aloneness, and our individuality. To give up on, in an instant, what we worked so hard to get is what we fear from one another." pg 68
"I refuse to carry the burden of your disappointment."pg 69 (wow a strong feminist voice here!)
"I didn't hear _____ , or if I did, I stuffed it into the container of my dream." pg 102
"I thought about the dogs in their den, curled around the last little scrap of the night." pg 131
"It is very easy to choose the wrong word." pg 132
"I have never been wild. I never wanted to be, and yet my life has grown wild around me. I suppose there might have always have to be that balance, and if wildness is not happening within you, then it's happening outside of you. Is it always to be feared as I fear it? Is the only choice either to be the wild thing or to shoot at the wild thing? I think so. There is no living safely with wildness. If you let a wild thing into your house, it tears everything to pieces." pg 136 ( a preternatural understanding of nature)
"Years of not painting drove me crazy." pg 139
(the brutal honesty of--->) I was so used to my father's depressive inertia that it was a shock to hear that he'd done something about it." and "My father's depression found me, after his death." pg 140
"(They) were just attempts to break out of from the slow tomb of my days." pg 147
"Maybe that's what I'm trying to do here, clear a space in all the debris, through all the anxieties and worries where I can just exist, easily and simply..." pg 157
"He sleeps a lot now, .... winter arching its back against the windows."
"We couldn't respond to anything outside the vortex of our attraction to each other..." AND
"Never trust anyone who has been betrayed. Betrayal never loses its edge, never really goes away." AND
"She should have been (made) stronger than loving me made her." pg 167
"Is it not that we are afraid of what is wild within ourselves? Isn't the whole structure of society about trying to fit ourselves into smaller and smaller cages? The more confined we are by duty and love, the more our wilderness will be tamed and the more secure we can expect to feel. But of course, that's not true. We don't feel safe at all." pg 173
"It seemed these unexpected glimpses of the natural world were a kind of hope." pg 181
"The smell is sulfur cold. The smell is winter coming on." pg 183
"Everything is movement or monument." pg 185
This would have been 5 stars but for the overuse of the word,"the." "The" necessarily creates distance and formality. I understood how Humphreys uses "the" to give her next word a reverent tone; however it was a tad overplayed.
Thank you Helen Humpreys for affirming a strong female voice for the north. You invited me to spend time with you in your story and I relished every moment spent immersed in your lore.
challenging
emotional
inspiring
reflective
sad
fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
No
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Complicated
adventurous
dark
emotional
mysterious
reflective
fast-paced
An emotional and reflective medium-paced fiction book about a woman who loses her dog to a pack of wild dogs. Really, it’s a book about love in all its myriad forms.
A haunting, sad, yet emotionally satisfying novel. The basic idea is that there are a group of people who gather on the edge of the woods outside a small Midwestern town, calling out to their dogs who have joined a wild dog pack. Most of them lost their dogs through another's ill will or by accident. Alice, the main character, lost Hawk when her (now ex) boyfriend turned her loose because she was "too expensive to feed," and most of the small group have similar stories. Now they gather and call in vain for their dogs to return, and soon their lives begin to intertwine in unexpected ways.
I was prepared to cry at the end of this because any scenario in which a dog is separated from his human makes me emotional. Luckily, the ending was unexpected and I should have trusted Humphreys a little more. The writing was perfect, as always, and I actually really liked the structure. It was interesting to have insights into the minds of minor characters. And the added perspectives added to the depth the author was working to convey. There are layers here. It is so much more than a story about dogs who got away. But then, I find there is so much that dogs reveal about our own natures. Clearly Humphreys agrees.
One of my favorite lines was:
Everything is movement or its monument.
Brilliantly written!
Everything is movement or its monument.
Brilliantly written!