Crow Lake (Today Show Book Club #7)
by Mary Lawson
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Book Summary Information
Author: Mary LawsonEdition: Paperback
Audio: English (Unknown); English (Original Language); English (Published)
Published: 2003-01-13
ISBN: 0385337639
Number of pages: 304
Publisher: Dial Press Trade Paperback
Book Reviews of Crow Lake (Today Show Book Club #7)
Book Review: Charming until the end (literally). . .
Summary: 4 Stars
Crow Lake was yet another one of those books that I had bought years ago, only to have it sit on my shelf, constantly getting passed over in favor of other choices. I have to say that if I'd known how involved I'd become in reading it, I probably would have picked it up much sooner.
Upon finishing Crow Lake a couple days ago, I admittedly have some mixed emotions. I read this book in just over a week and constantly felt excited to get back on the train for the chance to read further. However, I must say that while I liked this book a lot, I did not love it. And I'm afraid that comes down to my disappointment with the way the book ended. If you asked me during the first four parts of the book what I thought of it, I would have said it was an incredibly story. But the last two parts did not sit well with me. I was bored, almost disinterested, which seemed nearly impossible for me to understand because just a day or two before I was literally excited with longing to get back to this book. Without question, there was definitely a distinct point in my reading where I crossed a line and couldn't get back the enthusiasm I had once had.
What makes me perplexed is that I'm not really sure what exactly threw me off about the last parts of the book. I know that adult Kate was not my favorite character; I certainly liked her much more as a little kid and a growing girl. Perhaps the late domination in the book of her as a grown-up, with her questioning her teaching at the university and her relationship with Daniel, was too much for me. I liked her better in the context of her family and on the ponds of Crow Lake. I just didn't feel invested in that part of her life which might explain my eventual lack of emotion when the ending did occur. Although the story seemed somewhat lacking in an ending, to be honest. And it wasn't that the ending was forced. You could see that the details of the secret family tragedy were something the author was aiming at from the beginning and throughout. But still, it didn't feel like the proper ending. And I wish I could say what would have made it better, but I am afraid I'm just not sure.
Overall, I give Mary Lawson a good deal of credit for writing a book on a topic that I, quite truthfully, couldn't care less about, and still make it seem interesting and, dare I say, even slightly romanticized. The trips to the pond that Matt and Kate took while growing up were incredibly sweet and their shared interest in studying pond life was equally touching. Personally, I am not a fan of the outdoors and certainly blanked out many times during my environmental science class in college, but she created a world that even I seemed to want to be a part of, horrible tragedy aside, at least through the first hundred plus pages of the novel. For that credit is definitely due. I love Canada, but my visits have only consisted of the city of Toronto, and therefore the utter wilderness of Crow Lake holds a great deal of mystery for me and I felt it was a perfect setting for this book.
Lastly I must mention that in the early parts of the book, besides the relationships among the siblings in the family, their responses to the family tragedy, and their trips to the pond, that my favorite parts of the book were those that involved the character of young Bo. Bo was an incredibly realistic character as a baby - full of honesty and full of life. Those scenes with Bo by the water or dialogues as she learned nursery rhymes were adorable. When Bo grew up, she lost some of her charm, but that's not entirely unexpected. As it turns out, the novel itself sort of did the same thing.
Summary of Crow Lake (Today Show Book Club #7)
Crow Lake is that rare find, a first novel so quietly assured, so emotionally pitch perfect, you know from the opening page that this is the real thing?a literary experience in which to lose yourself, by an author of immense talent.Here is a gorgeous, slow-burning story set in the rural ?badlands? of northern Ontario, where heartbreak and hardship are mirrored in the landscape. For the farming Pye family, life is a Greek tragedy where the sins of the fathers are visited on the sons, and terrible events occur?offstage.
Centerstage are the Morrisons, whose tragedy looks more immediate if less brutal, but is, in reality, insidious and divisive. Orphaned young, Kate Morrison was her older brother Matt?s protegee, her fascination for pond life fed by his passionate interest in the natural world. Now a zoologist, she can identify organisms under a microscope but seems blind to the state of her own emotional life. And she thinks she?s outgrown her siblings?Luke, Matt, and Bo?who were once her entire world.
In this universal drama of family love and misunderstandings, of resentments harbored and driven underground, Lawson ratchets up the tension with heartbreaking humor and consummate control, continually overturning one?s expectations right to the very end. Tragic, funny, unforgettable, Crow Lake is a quiet tour de force that will catapult Mary Lawson to the forefront of fiction writers today.
Canadian writer Mary Lawson's debut novel is a beautifully crafted and shimmering tale of love, death, and redemption. The story, narrated by 26-year-old Kate Morrison, is set in the eponymous Crow Lake, an isolated rural community where time has stood still. The reader dives in and out of a year's worth of Kate's childhood memories--when she was 7 and her parents were killed in an automobile accident that left Kate, her younger sister Bo, and two older brothers, Matt and Luke, orphaned. When Kate, the successful zoologist and professor who is accustomed to dissecting everything through a microscope, receives an invitation to Matt's son's 18th birthday party, she must suddenly analyze her own relationship and come to terms with her past before she forsakes a future with the man she loves. Kate is still in turmoil over the events of that fateful summer and winter 20 years ago when the tragedy of another local family, the Pyes, spilled over into their lives with earth-shattering consequences. But does the tragedy really lie in the past or the present? Lawson's narrative flows effortlessly in ever-increasing circles, swirling impressions in the reader's mind until form takes shape and the reader is left to reflect on the whole. Crow Lake is a wonderful achievement that will ripple in and out of the reader's consciousness long after the last page is turned. --Nicola Perry, Amazon.co.uk
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