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“With vivid and richly textured prose, Brett Ann Stanciu offers unsparing portraits of northern New England life well beyond sight of the ski lodges and postcard views. The work the land demands, the blood ties of family to the land, and to each other, the profound solitude that such hard-bitten lives thrusts upon the people, are here in true measure. A moving and evocative tale that will stay with you, Hidden View also provides one of the most compelling and honest rural woman's viewpoint to come along in years. A novel of singular accomplishment.”
– Jeffrey Lent“Early in the book, I was swept by a certainty of truths in Hidden View: that Stanciu knew the bizarre and fragile construction that people's self-deceptions can frame. And that she was telling, out in public, against all the rules, the heartbreaking story of far too many women I've known, at one time or another, who struggled to make their dreams come to reality in situations….
…(In Hidden View) the questions of loyalty to person, commitment to dreams, and betrayal of the helpless are as vivid as the flames in the sugarhouse, as sweet and dangerous as the hot boiling maple sap on its way to becoming valuable syrup.
There's so much truth in this book that at some point, it stops being "fiction" and stands instead as a portrait, layered, complex, and wise. The Vermont that we love, the farms that we treasure, the children we nurture are fully present.”
– Kingdom Books, Beth Kanell"Stanciu is a Vermonter's writer. Anyone who loves the landscape and language of Vermont will be drawn into this story, but her writing holds a universal appeal, too, and rings true with the language and landscape of the human heart and mind as well. The characters in Hidden View are people you're going to think about, and care about, long after the book is read."
– Natalie Kinsey-Warnock, AS LONG AS THERE ARE MOUNTAINS
Tag Archives: gardening
To water or not to water? The Vermont gardener question. With my sandy soil, I’m watering — a showery hymn to growth. One of the hottest and driest places I’ve ever been is Utah’s Hovenweep. A few years ago, my … Continue reading
Lady Lupine
Here’s a line from a children’s picture book — my younger daughter’s favorite — You must do something to make the world more beautiful. Last evening, I overhead the girls planning to spread lupine seeds gleaned from the flowers blooming before … Continue reading
Pre-Thanksgiving
When my daughter was four, she went through a period when she wanted the same handful of books read aloud each night. One of these books was Peter Spier’s ornately drawn picture book without words about Noah’s ark. The book … Continue reading
Flowers of All Sizes
My daughter picked a piece of a dill flower in the garden today, then noticed her sprig was a miniature version of the whole. Curiously inspecting, she saw the symmetry reflected again in a smaller blossom-within-a-blossom. For the longest time, … Continue reading
Ah…. Water
Now deep in the muggy green of summer, the woods are splendid with fern, but the garden is parched, thirsty for rain. Fearful of my well, I’m reluctant to water, and what’s the point of watering if it’s not done … Continue reading
The Making of Things
If you write about Vermont, you’ll write about rain. There’s a myriad ways to know rain: lying in bed on a summer evening with the windows open, relishing the needed watering of thirsty garden greens, or the unwelcome tear of November … Continue reading
The Garden’s Geometry
As a new mother, I was surprised by the weight of children; even babies, carried all day long, are heavy, and nursing in the nighttime, my arms often drooped with exhaustion. While my daughters are long since beyond the babes-in-arms stage, … Continue reading
