ElCicco #CBR4 Review#38: Year of Wonders: A Novel of the Plague by Geraldine Brooks

I am a huge fan of Geraldine Brooks’ novels and I think I have now read them all. Year of Wonders was her first novel. A journalist by trade, Brooks always does thorough research on the historical time periods she covers and often is inspired by an actual event in developing her plots. In Year of Wonders, Brooks imagines what actually happened in a plague village in England in 1666, where the populace agreed to quarantine themselves from neighboring villages and towns until the plague passed so as not to spread it. Two-thirds died and it is believed that the plague was introduced to village via a bolt of cloth.

The protagonist, Anna, has lost her sons, husband and a potential new spouse. As fellow villagers perish, she and some others manage not to catch plague (a wonder) and Anna finds herself doing work that she never would have imagined herself capable of doing (wonders!) such as learning herbs and healing, mining and befriending Elinor Mompellion, the educated wife of minister Michael Mompellion. Other wonders during the plague year include the way in which ideas concerning religion and faith change, how differences matter less, how some go mad and others take advantage of gullibility of poor villagers, how some with more were so generous while others were so cowardly.

I’m a big fan of Brooks’ novels. She goes to great trouble to learn the details of her time periods and creates interesting female characters, often women who desire knowledge and learning that is forbidden to them and who have to find unorthodox means of acquiring it. While the descriptions of the ravages of plague upon the body are disturbing, even more unsettling are the descriptions of the horrors that villagers perpetrated upon each other, in particular the punishments for suspected witchcraft. The ending of the novel surprised me a little, as it seemed a bit far fetched, but I’ve no doubt that her setting for it was accurately depicted.

TheFatling’s #CBR4 Review #3: March by Geraldine Brooks

I probably should have written this review right after I finished the book.  It might have squeaked by with two stars, but the longer I thought about Geraldine Brooks’ March, the angrier I got.

More!  Some PG language!

ElCicco#CBR4Review#03: Caleb’s Crossing by Geraldine Brooks

I have read three of Geraldine Brooks’ four novels and they have each been absolutely outstanding. Brooks is a journalist by trade, but she is an historian at heart. I am so blown away by her imagination, creative story lines and her dedication to getting her history right. [March is Brooks' Pulitzer Prize winning novel imagining what happened to the father of Louisa May Alcott's Little Women in the Civil War; People of the Book is a novel that traces the history of a religious tome back through various periods of history.]

Caleb’s Crossing made a number of 2011 “best book” lists and deserves its place there. Brooks’ inspiration for this novel came from a small scrap of information she discovered while visiting Nantucket — that a couple of Wampanoag youths from Nantucket actually graduated from Harvard in 1665. Caleb was one of those young men and is one of the main characters of this novel. The other main character and our narrator, Bethia, is fictional. Brooks did extensive research to be sure that her treatment of life in the Massachusetts Bay Colony (a rather oppressive place) and that her depiction of lives for women and Native Americans there are accurate. In her Afterward, she lays out what parts of her novel are fact (a few names, dates and places) and how much is fictionalized (the bulk). Just because it is fiction, however, does not make it implausible and Brooks does a fine job of arguing in her Afterward why some the situations she imagines might be closer to the truth than what historians have concluded.

Caleb’s Crossing is about the secret friendship between Bethia, an English colonist on Nantucket and daughter of a minister, and Cheeshahteaumauk (later known as Caleb), the son of the Wampanoag sonquem (public or social leader) and nephew of the pawaaw (spiritual leader). Their friendship is illicit, as neither culture would sanction a friendship between the two worlds, much less between a male and female. Initially, Caleb teaches Bethia about the natural world and the secrets of the island where they live. Bethia teaches Caleb the alphabet, English and how to read. Each character crosses into the world of the other to some extent. As they grow older, events unfold to tear them from one another and then reunite. Bethia’s father, whose ministry is devoted to the conversion of the “salvages,” takes on Caleb and another native youth, Joel, as students. He strives to prepare them alongside his son Makepeace for matriculation at Harvard. Bethia, who is much smarter and intellectual than Makepeace and has a great desire to learn, listens to the lessons as she does her chores and learns as much as the boys. Due to a series of tragic events, Bethia ends up an indentured servant in Cambridge while Caleb, Joel and Makepeace are studying there. As a result, our narrator can continue to tell us the story of the first Native American Harvard graduates, along with her own personal story as a woman of intelligence in an oppressive and restrictive society.

“Crossing” has several meanings in this novel. It can refer to the journey between the island and the mainland, a sometimes treacherous and deadly affair. It also refers to natives giving up their traditional ways for Christianity and the ways of the English. Crossing can also refer to death, and there is quite a bit of death in this story. The Massachusetts Bay Colony was established in 1630 and as anyone who remembers their history knows, the early years of the settlement were a time of struggle, privation, sickness and battles between colonists and natives. Another meaning for “crossing” is betrayal, and the English often took advantage of Natives’ misunderstanding of their ways to cheat them out of land and renege on promises. Caleb experiences several types of “crossing” in this novel, as do other characters. This really is an excellent novel and a pretty quick read. You will learn a lot while being drawn into a brilliantly crafted story.