Items related to The Hatbox Letters
In this beautiful and deeply moving novel, a young widow struggles to come to terms with her solitary life in the rambling Victorian house she shared until recently with her husband and children in semi-rural New Brunswick.
It is in this house, surrounded by heirloom gardens and the gentle sounds of a river, that Kate Harding, 52, faces her second winter since the untimely death of her husband. Her children, now grown, are living away, and Kate is truly on her own. In her living room are several hatboxes filled with letters and other ghostly ephemera, recently brought by her sister from the attic of their grandparents’ 18th-century Connecticut house. Their sweet mustiness tinges the air and makes Kate dream of her childhood and of her beloved grandparents. She remembers the sense of permanence and refuge that she felt in their apple-scented world, as well as, more recently, with her husband. As she begins to read the hatbox letters, she discovers that what to a child seemed a serene and blissful marriage was in fact founded on a tragic event. As Kate’s eyes clear to the truth of the past, a new tragedy unfolds, and her own house, filled with the shared detritus of marriage and motherhood, becomes the refuge where Kate can connect the strands of her unravelled life.
In The Hatbox Letters — which is both sad and exhilarating, touching and illuminating — Beth Powning offers readers an unforgettable story of love, grief and renewal, both past and present, as well as her extraordinary perceptions of the natural world.
Excerpt from The Hatbox Letters
The birds rise with a muted thunder, their wings serrate the light. For an instant, a peregrine falcon zigzags through the flock. Then it drops from the belly of the rising bird-cloud. In its talons is a sandpiper, crumpled like a ball of paper. It is hard to decide which drama to observe, the escape of the falcon with its prey or the flock’s display as the birds rush seaward like a single entity, a ballooning flame that rises and falls, expands and implodes, one instant silver and the next black. The flock speeds back towards the beach, passes close to the watchers, makes a dazzling turn, fast as thought. Then, with a diminishing roar, the birds waver, their legs drop, stretch. They touch down. They fluff their feathers, Kate observes, the way humans pull coats up around necks after a shock. Trying to put ourselves back as we were.
It is in this house, surrounded by heirloom gardens and the gentle sounds of a river, that Kate Harding, 52, faces her second winter since the untimely death of her husband. Her children, now grown, are living away, and Kate is truly on her own. In her living room are several hatboxes filled with letters and other ghostly ephemera, recently brought by her sister from the attic of their grandparents’ 18th-century Connecticut house. Their sweet mustiness tinges the air and makes Kate dream of her childhood and of her beloved grandparents. She remembers the sense of permanence and refuge that she felt in their apple-scented world, as well as, more recently, with her husband. As she begins to read the hatbox letters, she discovers that what to a child seemed a serene and blissful marriage was in fact founded on a tragic event. As Kate’s eyes clear to the truth of the past, a new tragedy unfolds, and her own house, filled with the shared detritus of marriage and motherhood, becomes the refuge where Kate can connect the strands of her unravelled life.
In The Hatbox Letters — which is both sad and exhilarating, touching and illuminating — Beth Powning offers readers an unforgettable story of love, grief and renewal, both past and present, as well as her extraordinary perceptions of the natural world.
Excerpt from The Hatbox Letters
The birds rise with a muted thunder, their wings serrate the light. For an instant, a peregrine falcon zigzags through the flock. Then it drops from the belly of the rising bird-cloud. In its talons is a sandpiper, crumpled like a ball of paper. It is hard to decide which drama to observe, the escape of the falcon with its prey or the flock’s display as the birds rush seaward like a single entity, a ballooning flame that rises and falls, expands and implodes, one instant silver and the next black. The flock speeds back towards the beach, passes close to the watchers, makes a dazzling turn, fast as thought. Then, with a diminishing roar, the birds waver, their legs drop, stretch. They touch down. They fluff their feathers, Kate observes, the way humans pull coats up around necks after a shock. Trying to put ourselves back as we were.
"synopsis" may belong to another edition of this title.
Review:
"A novel about death that makes you glad that you are alive, The Hatbox Letters is both elegy and song of joy."
--"The Globe and Mail
"The imagery is evocative and clear, and the feelings of love and loss are transmitted effectively and elegantly. The Hatbox Letters conveys a sense of wonder and wisdom."
--"The Vancouver Sun
"[A] novel of stunning beauty ... The Hatbox Letters is a moving elegy to things lost and found."
--New Brunswick Reader
"Powning's descriptions of gardens and birds rival any Audubon painting. The Hatbox Letters is not only an absorbing literary experience, but an exquisite visual experience as well."
--"The Gazette (Montreal)
"Powning writes about grief with uncanny precision; she gets all its ambushes and piercing aches exactly right."
--"National Post
"The writing is highly sensual, painterly even, vividly portraying the natural world and its changing seasons.... [T]he depth of detail feels appropriate, mirroring the deliberate pace of Kate's recovery and regeneration. Powning's subject here is no less than the relationship of life and death, and she engages it with rigour and grace."
--"Quill & Quire
"
"Beth Powning reminds us of the essential links and threads that bind family and loved ones, past generations to future. In gentle prose, she illuminates passages through grief, yet the novel is studded with vitality. A story of unexpected endings and new beginnings -- of life surging forward."
--Frances Itani
"Like Annie Dillard, Beth Powning is a keen observer of the natural world. In language both erotic and exact, she explores the conflicting emotions of love and loss in a novel redolent with memory and thetruth of experience, hard won."
--Joan Clark
"Beth Powning's language is lush with stunning images that linger long after the reading experience -- and with soothing insights, especially of the healing potency available in family histories and connections with friends. She takes us by the hand and leads us through the landmines of grief. We can trust her: she knows the way back to the safety of emerging hope and belief in renewal."
--Marjorie Anderson, co-editor, Dropped Threads
Praise for "Shadow Child and "Seeds of Another Summer
"Tenacious, unsparing, in anguish sometimes, but mostly with moving lyricism, Beth Powning pursues and completes what she calls her 'apprenticeship in love and loss', a long and not easy journey that we all, women and men, in our way, try to carry through."
--Ernest Hillen, author of Small Mercies: A Boy After War
"Beth Powning's. . .pure, powerful prose lure us into [its] embrace, laying bare our desire for a union with the natural world. This is the work of a gifted artist."
--Courtney Milne, author of Prairie Skies
"Powning's writing is lyrical, with its focus on the hatboxes' secrets and the earthy beauty of the Canadian countryside. The author poignanty and creatively draws parallels between Giles' trials and Kate's tragix loss and ability to rediscover life on her own."--"Romantic Times," four stars"Powning has a delicate and lyrical touch."--"Kirkus""Powning does an excellent job of portraying Kate's Sadness, divulging the tales of her family and focusing on the quiet beauty of her surroundings."--"Publishers Weekly"
From the Back Cover:
--"The Globe and Mail
"The imagery is evocative and clear, and the feelings of love and loss are transmitted effectively and elegantly. The Hatbox Letters conveys a sense of wonder and wisdom."
--"The Vancouver Sun
"[A] novel of stunning beauty ... The Hatbox Letters is a moving elegy to things lost and found."
--New Brunswick Reader
"Powning's descriptions of gardens and birds rival any Audubon painting. The Hatbox Letters is not only an absorbing literary experience, but an exquisite visual experience as well."
--"The Gazette (Montreal)
"Powning writes about grief with uncanny precision; she gets all its ambushes and piercing aches exactly right."
--"National Post
"The writing is highly sensual, painterly even, vividly portraying the natural world and its changing seasons.... [T]he depth of detail feels appropriate, mirroring the deliberate pace of Kate's recovery and regeneration. Powning's subject here is no less than the relationship of life and death, and she engages it with rigour and grace."
--"Quill & Quire
"
"Beth Powning reminds us of the essential links and threads that bind family and loved ones, past generations to future. In gentle prose, she illuminates passages through grief, yet the novel is studded with vitality. A story of unexpected endings and new beginnings -- of life surging forward."
--Frances Itani
"Like Annie Dillard, Beth Powning is a keen observer of the natural world. In language both erotic and exact, she explores the conflicting emotions of love and loss in a novel redolent with memory and thetruth of experience, hard won."
--Joan Clark
"Beth Powning's language is lush with stunning images that linger long after the reading experience -- and with soothing insights, especially of the healing potency available in family histories and connections with friends. She takes us by the hand and leads us through the landmines of grief. We can trust her: she knows the way back to the safety of emerging hope and belief in renewal."
--Marjorie Anderson, co-editor, Dropped Threads
Praise for "Shadow Child and "Seeds of Another Summer
"Tenacious, unsparing, in anguish sometimes, but mostly with moving lyricism, Beth Powning pursues and completes what she calls her 'apprenticeship in love and loss', a long and not easy journey that we all, women and men, in our way, try to carry through."
--Ernest Hillen, author of Small Mercies: A Boy After War
"Beth Powning's. . .pure, powerful prose lure us into [its] embrace, laying bare our desire for a union with the natural world. This is the work of a gifted artist."
--Courtney Milne, author of Prairie Skies
"Powning's writing is lyrical, with its focus on the hatboxes' secrets and the earthy beauty of the Canadian countryside. The author poignanty and creatively draws parallels between Giles' trials and Kate's tragix loss and ability to rediscover life on her own."--"Romantic Times," four stars"Powning has a delicate and lyrical touch."--"Kirkus""Powning does an excellent job of portraying Kate's Sadness, divulging the tales of her family and focusing on the quiet beauty of her surroundings."--"Publishers Weekly"
Powning's writing is lyrical, with its focus on the hatboxes' secrets and the earthy beauty of the Canadian countryside. The author poignanty and creatively draws parallels between Giles' trials and Kate's tragix loss and ability to rediscover life on her own. "Romantic Times, four stars"
Powning has a delicate and lyrical touch. "Kirkus"
Powning does an excellent job of portraying Kate's Sadness, divulging the tales of her family and focusing on the quiet beauty of her surroundings. "Publishers Weekly""
"Powning's writing is lyrical, with its focus on the hatboxes' secrets and the earthy beauty of the Canadian countryside. The author poignanty and creatively draws parallels between Giles' trials and Kate's tragix loss and ability to rediscover life on her own." --Romantic Times, four stars
"Powning has a delicate and lyrical touch." --Kirkus
"Powning does an excellent job of portraying Kate's Sadness, divulging the tales of her family and focusing on the quiet beauty of her surroundings." --Publishers Weekly
Praise for The Hatbox Letters
"Powning brilliantly illuminates grief in all its shape-shifting pain, and in so doing, expands her characters' lives, and ours...a deeply beautiful book...an extraordinary achievement."
- The Globe and Mail
"Tender and lush. . . . Powning writes about grief with uncanny precision; she gets all its ambushes and piercing aches exactly right."
- National Post
"Powning's subject here is no less than the relationship of life and death, and she engages it with rigor and grace."
- Quill & Quire
Praise for Home: Chronicle of a North Country Life
"A beautiful celebration of natural life. . . . "
- E. L. Doctorow
"In a world increasingly cynical and numb, Powning puts a light in the window for us all. . . . " - Chicago Tribune
"Powning combines an extraordinary understanding and sense of place with an affinity for the world of nature...this book imparts a feeling of serenity; Annie Dillard fans will enjoy it."
- Publishers Weekly
"An eloquent celebration of the rural lifestyle and a joy to experience."
- The Bloomsbury Review
"Powning's choice of language and the rhythm of her prose wondrously evoke the idea of living within a natural setting. . . ."
- San Francisco Book Review
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- PublisherKnopf Canada
- Publication date2004
- ISBN 10 0676976395
- ISBN 13 9780676976397
- BindingHardcover
- Edition number1
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The Hatbox Letters Powning, Beth
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ISBN 10: 0676976395
ISBN 13: 9780676976397
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