My Book
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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: language
Mooncrazed
Walking beneath the full moon last night, my younger daughter remarks how quickly the moon rises. Our conversation winds into the complexities of the moon phases, and I finally I admit I just don’t know the answer, but my father … Continue reading
Wandering, Mid-August
Three boys loop in circles on their bikes, eating popsicles and talking. Walking by, I note one boy rides an old banana-seat bike, not unlike my brother’s when he was a kid. Monday evening, the neighborhood I walk through is … Continue reading
Onamonapia
Onamonapia Continue reading
Private v. Public
This morning, after driving through a surprisingly thick snowstorm, I found myself in a tiny room in the radio studio of WDEV in Waterbury. Hester Fuller, the host, had kindly read my book and interviewed me for a bit, then … Continue reading
Sisters
This morning when my older daughter left with friends, the younger sister watched her drive away as sadly as if the sun and all its life had departed, leaving only me, a distant and chilly star. The younger child’s first word … Continue reading
Gnomon
When I was in high school, my father, sister, and I read Joyce’s short story, “The Sisters.” I was thinking of that story again today, in this kind of chilly and drab weather that intimates how I imagine Ireland. The … Continue reading
