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Year of Wonders A Novel of the Plague Geraldine Brooks 9780007743032 Books

Download As PDF : Year of Wonders A Novel of the Plague Geraldine Brooks 9780007743032 Books

Year of Wonders A Novel of the Plague Geraldine Brooks 9780007743032 Books

Like several reviewers, I would also suggest you stop reading the book at the point the Bradfords return and it is 'apple-picking time' again .
From that point you have my permission to imagine your own ending to the story , hopefully consistent with the main plot and time period. In my opinion a very good story went haywire for reasons unknown and tumbled into odd 'regency-like romance' territory. To be honest, I would have flung a 'book' against the wall, but since I was reading on my Kindle I quickly ruled that out. I do appreciate this author, and have read two other books by her. But I am sorely tempted to ask her "Why?"


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Year of Wonders A Novel of the Plague Geraldine Brooks 9780007743032 Books Reviews

Presently on holidays on England, and about to visit the Peak District, setting for this novel, I decided to read this as background. I've read many of Brook's novels, but had missed this, first, one. And it is a great beginning to an illustrious writing career. Based on fact, she has woven an engaging tale of human reaction to adversity. It's instructive to think what our own reaction would have been to such a challenge.
Predictable today, and preventable today, the plague a few years following the Restoration of Charles II was a vicious killer, striking one person after another, with – to these people – no discernible cause nor connection. So most believed that the plague’s affliction was punishment for their own or their neighbor’s sins. The exhaustion, depression, and even madness that resulted from months of seeing their family members suffer and die, their neighbors lose heart and minds to the affliction, innocents put to death as witches, the villagers discover their unsuspected weaknesses, some finding strengths they had never thought to have. Anna loses much herself, but discovers a great gift for healing and caring for others that is valued by many, then betrayed by those she admires.
The ending of this book is so bizarre and out of touch with the rest of the book that it ruined it for me! There is a twist at the end that is just ridiculous and impossible to believe. Not only that, but the edition has so many,, distracting.errors. There will. be a. comma or.,, a period in the most random,,, places! I actually wish I could get my money back on this one. Yuck.
This was an interesting story about an episode in history I wasn’t familiar with—an outbreak of plague in a Derbyshire village in 1665. A young serving woman, Anna Frith, takes in a lodger—a tailor from London—who soon dies of plague, and before long villagers are dying right and left. The village rector and a nearby nobleman decide that the village must be cut off from the wider neighborhood, with the nobleman delivering food and supplies to the sufferers so that they will not leave and risk spreading the contagion to the countryside. A flash-forward at the beginning tells us more than we perhaps needed to know of the outcome; not sure it was wise to frame the story in this fashion. As the disease works its way through the villagers, the vagaries of human nature drive the action, making the experience of the characters both more and less traumatic.

I liked the writing style very much, apart from a bit of awkwardness at the beginning. The author did not make a huge attempt at sounding “period,” which was a good choice; the point of view was demarcated by what the first-person narrator was in a position to know and understand about her world, which set us sufficiently in context without the use of self-consciously obsolete phrasings. There was some lovely new vocabulary to learn—always a plus for me! And the descriptions were vivid and lyrical—and occasionally visceral, especially a scene in a mine.

For the most part, I felt the characters were well drawn and their actions made sense in context, though a few seemed to dance too much to the piping of the plot requirements. There were also a few more characters than could be followed with ease, though the number made sense because in a small village setting the heroine would naturally know everybody. The heroine’s religious skepticism seemed a little forced to me (and maybe too modern), but the idea that her faith was mostly a facet of her emotional attachments is psychologically plausible. As for the ending, which many reviewers have commented on, the first surprise made sense to me, but the final surprise seemed unnecessary and out of left field.

*Year of Wonders* took me deep into its world and held me there. But someone needs to solve the conundrum of how to create a heroine who is true to her age but still relatable to modern readers! The independent-spirited young woman has become cliché and no longer holds any mystery for the reader. Perhaps writers need to look for inspiration to the strengths of a Fanny Price or an Anne Elliot.
Our book club chose this to read. When we did, I thought at least there's a female central character, but I expected it to be a major depression inducing read. I was not certain that I would be able to finish it. But as I opened it, dutifully to at least attempt to "slog" through asap that I could tolerate, I was mesmerized by Anna's mind, observations, and life experiences. Even in her deepest moments of grief, there was something else that she needed to resolve and I wanted to know and share that with her. I literally could NOT put the story away and read the entire novel in one sitting. And it was not just Anna's life that snared my interest,...it was the entire village and the variety of human characters and their struggles facing death and life , painted with such truth, strengths and weaknesses and rationales and unreasonable reactions. It was indeed a transformative Year of Wonders! If you live long enough, you are guaranteed to live through some extended periods of time that shake your view of yourself and the role that you must play on this Earth and remake yourself or break. There were examples of the entire spectrum with these villagers. BRAVO Geraldine Brooks !!!
Like several reviewers, I would also suggest you stop reading the book at the point the Bradfords return and it is 'apple-picking time' again .
From that point you have my permission to imagine your own ending to the story , hopefully consistent with the main plot and time period. In my opinion a very good story went haywire for reasons unknown and tumbled into odd 'regency-like romance' territory. To be honest, I would have flung a 'book' against the wall, but since I was reading on my I quickly ruled that out. I do appreciate this author, and have read two other books by her. But I am sorely tempted to ask her "Why?"