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: reading
More Summer
Every month might as well be a whole entire season in Vermont. August is the month of the best things — wood stacking and pickle canning, tart made from the first fruit from our tree, whipped cream, purring cats, and all … Continue reading
Spiritual Crisis
Tanned and wearing overalls, a woman comes into my library and gathers a stack of library books for her children. For this moment, it’s just the two of us. She’s a woman who doesn’t usually check out books for herself, … Continue reading
This Offering
After a day of high school kids reciting poetry, I hold up in the Barre public library. Not far from me, a man unscrews a plastic bottle of sweet tea and mutters to himself. Abruptly, I pause my frantic emailing … Continue reading
Vermont Commune Story
Writing about summer camp — in February — makes me pause over photographs. How green and gorgeous is Vermont’s summer. The profusion of hydrangeas. The luxury of lying in green grass. I spent a few hours last week speaking with … Continue reading
My Daughter, My (Former) Younger Self
My daughters dropped me off for a dentist appointment — worse, an oral surgeon — appointment and disappeared to check out a mural in town. I wait. I wait a little more. The appointment’s at the end of the day, and, … Continue reading
Armistice Day
This is the gray time in New England, when even the daylight is dull. Gone are the spring days of blue squill, the early morning birdsong. After dinner, we walk in the dark. My daughter and I read for hours. … Continue reading
Neither Wolf Nor Dog
My daughter looked up from her geometry homework and asked why I was laughing. I shared with her a few lines about soup and dogs from my library book — a book one of my blog readers and commenters had … Continue reading
Late Night Reading
As summer blended into autumn, the days were warm enough to swim, but we simply didn’t. Instead, I lie awake at night, listening to the tree frogs thrip, thrip, thrip, singing as though this season will linger on and on, and … Continue reading
Book From the Past
Stopping by the new coffee shop in Hardwick last weekend — Front Seat Coffee — I discovered this gold-covered book which I am darn sure was The Book of my childhood. My dad actually bought this book for our house; … Continue reading
Female Talk
A friend and I both read Lisa Taddeo’s Three Women. We compare notes: where are you? Reading, I wonder what my friend will think of this section, or that; I wonder what we’ll say. Irritatingly, Taddeo divides these women’s three stories … Continue reading
