There was once a family living in New Brunswick: parents, two daughters and a son. Though life wasn't easy, they were surviving as their father worked his potato farm and their mother worked at making their humble home on the edge of the sea a haven for her family. She found the beauty in life, and their father loved her for that even if he didn't exactly know this. Their mother instructed her children in the rhythms of life and the glories of the natural world and tempered her husband's hardness. But this world falls apart, and the sisters have to learn to survive as best they can, mostly on their own. This is their story, Idella and Avis, and it is a wonderful novel, spanning half a century. Stephen King says, "It's profane, loving, hardnosed and completely beautiful."
It reminded me a bit of The House on Salt Hay Road which I read a few weeks ago. Both novels are far removed from our modern lives and the mental, emotional and psychic turmoils of contemporary people, troubles we recognize from all the novels written about them, but different from the troubles of those who lived 50 to 100 years ago. Hardscrabble Bay is sweet and sad and full of nostalgia for those of us who actually remember some of those times. For those who are younger and for whom this book will not be evocative, it is still a wonderful novel bringing to life a time not so far gone with its universal, timeless characters.
Sadly, the author died in 2003.
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