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categj's review against another edition
5.0
During a violent storm out in the North Atlantic, on Valentine’s Day in 1982, the Ocean Ranger, a self-propelled, semi-submersible oil rig, was hit with a huge wave and damaging the deck. The rig sank the next day, and all 84 men aboard perished.
Lisa Moore’s novel, February, has at its centre this real-life tragedy — how this event impacts the families and the community of the small town in Newfoundland.
This novel is a beautifully written story of death, loss, love, memory and grief. The story weaves back and forth between past and present, with all threads either coming from or leading towards the tragic event of 1982, when Helen lost her husband, Cal, to the depths of the Atlantic Ocean.
Even though grief is a highly unique and individualistic emotion, Ms. Moore expresses Helen’s grieving process in a way that we can all relate to in poignant and personal ways. Helen’s feelings and state of mind ring true. The winding and meandering narration, flowing from Helen’s present (in 2008) to the time of the tragedy (in 1982) and the time before and after the event, feel familiar, the way our thoughts travel back and forth remembering times and places in our own past and present.
Through Helen’s eyes and her feelings, we feel the impact of Cal’s death on the family — their three daughters and, particularly, their son, John, who grows up wary of relationships and terrified of water.
Water, of course, plays an important part in this novel and Moore uses water in various descriptive ways in the book. Boiling kettles, an overflowing bathtub, rain, a mirror breaks in the honeymoon suite — it "buckled, or bucked, or curled like a wave and splashed onto the carpet and froze there into hard, jagged pieces", an orgasm "like a spill of icy water" subtly remind us of that fateful night in 1982.
Lisa Moore’s novel February is passionate, beautiful, sad but at the same time, uplifting. A story about love and loss, and the strength that we find within to carry on, to remember and to live.
I loved this book and can’t wait to read some of Ms. Moore’s other work.
Lisa Moore’s novel, February, has at its centre this real-life tragedy — how this event impacts the families and the community of the small town in Newfoundland.
This novel is a beautifully written story of death, loss, love, memory and grief. The story weaves back and forth between past and present, with all threads either coming from or leading towards the tragic event of 1982, when Helen lost her husband, Cal, to the depths of the Atlantic Ocean.
Even though grief is a highly unique and individualistic emotion, Ms. Moore expresses Helen’s grieving process in a way that we can all relate to in poignant and personal ways. Helen’s feelings and state of mind ring true. The winding and meandering narration, flowing from Helen’s present (in 2008) to the time of the tragedy (in 1982) and the time before and after the event, feel familiar, the way our thoughts travel back and forth remembering times and places in our own past and present.
Through Helen’s eyes and her feelings, we feel the impact of Cal’s death on the family — their three daughters and, particularly, their son, John, who grows up wary of relationships and terrified of water.
Water, of course, plays an important part in this novel and Moore uses water in various descriptive ways in the book. Boiling kettles, an overflowing bathtub, rain, a mirror breaks in the honeymoon suite — it "buckled, or bucked, or curled like a wave and splashed onto the carpet and froze there into hard, jagged pieces", an orgasm "like a spill of icy water" subtly remind us of that fateful night in 1982.
Lisa Moore’s novel February is passionate, beautiful, sad but at the same time, uplifting. A story about love and loss, and the strength that we find within to carry on, to remember and to live.
I loved this book and can’t wait to read some of Ms. Moore’s other work.
christie_esau's review against another edition
5.0
I am actually shocked (but probably shouldn't be) at how beautiful this book is. Harrowing and incredibly sad a lot of the time, but also a startlingly accurate portrait of grief and family and growing older. Highly recommend.
emilyjessica's review against another edition
1.0
Take me so long - nothing super interesting. I actually really enjoyed the writing style and descriptions of what she was thinking - but that was surrounded by a story built of the most cliched and stereotyped gendered characters and relations between them that it just turned me off large chunks of it.
vanessab78's review against another edition
dark
emotional
hopeful
sad
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
4.0
a_hoopyfrood's review against another edition
dark
emotional
reflective
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.0
msmagoo502's review against another edition
challenging
dark
emotional
funny
hopeful
lighthearted
reflective
sad
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
5.0
ridgewaygirl's review against another edition
4.0
And at first you think you will not be alone forever. You think the future is infinite. Childhood seems to have been infinite. Downstairs the saw revs and Helen hears a stick of wood fall to the floor. And so will the future be infinite, and it cannot be spent alone.
But, she has learned, it is possible: not to meet someone. The past yields, it gives way, it goes on forever. The future is unyielding. It is possible that the past has cracked off, the past has clattered to the floor, and what remains is the future and there is not very much of that. The future is the short end of the stick.
February, by Lisa Moore is about grief. Helen is a mother of three, pregnant with the fourth, when the Ocean Ranger, the oil rig her husband is working on, goes under off the coast of Newfoundland in 1982. [February] chronicles Helen's story, from meeting her husband to the life she manages to carve for herself from the wreckage of her earlier plans and expectations. Grief is ever present, and something that can't be shed after a suitable length of time, like an unfashionable coat. Her husband Cal is always somewhere in her mind and she is haunted by her imaginings of his final moments. But life goes on and she has four children, also marked by the loss of Cal, to care for. She doesn't get to give up or give in. The book jumps forwards and back in time to different parts of Helen's life; a good thing, because focusing too long on the intense period of sadness just after the rig went down would be unreadable.
But, she has learned, it is possible: not to meet someone. The past yields, it gives way, it goes on forever. The future is unyielding. It is possible that the past has cracked off, the past has clattered to the floor, and what remains is the future and there is not very much of that. The future is the short end of the stick.
February, by Lisa Moore is about grief. Helen is a mother of three, pregnant with the fourth, when the Ocean Ranger, the oil rig her husband is working on, goes under off the coast of Newfoundland in 1982. [February] chronicles Helen's story, from meeting her husband to the life she manages to carve for herself from the wreckage of her earlier plans and expectations. Grief is ever present, and something that can't be shed after a suitable length of time, like an unfashionable coat. Her husband Cal is always somewhere in her mind and she is haunted by her imaginings of his final moments. But life goes on and she has four children, also marked by the loss of Cal, to care for. She doesn't get to give up or give in. The book jumps forwards and back in time to different parts of Helen's life; a good thing, because focusing too long on the intense period of sadness just after the rig went down would be unreadable.
selinayoung's review against another edition
3.0
Interesting writing style. Interesting story/premise. Sadly couldn't quite get into it, but this book had a hard act to follow (Indian Horse would not get out of my brain).