A Northern Light
4/5
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About this ebook
Now with a fresh new look and introduction, Jennifer Donnelly's astonishing, Printz Honor-winning debut—the story of a young woman's coming-of-age and the murder that rocked turn-of-the-century America. A Printz Award Honor Book
"A contemporary classic. Jennifer Donnelly is the master of historical fiction!" —Ruta Sepetys, New York Times bestselling author and winner of the Carnegie Medal
Sixteen-year-old Mattie Gokey has a word for everything, and big dreams of being a writer but little hope of seeing them come true.
With the fresh pain of her mother’s death lingering over her and the only out from her impoverished life being marriage to the handsome but dull local rich boy, Maddie flees from her home. She takes a job at the Glenmore, where hotel guest Grace Brown entrusts her with the task of burning a secret bundle of letters. But when Grace's drowned body is fished from Big Moose Lake, Mattie discovers that the letters could reveal the grim truth behind a murder.
Set in 1906 in the Adirondack Mountains, against the backdrop of the murder that inspired Theodore Dreiser's An American Tragedy, this Printz Honor-winning coming-of-age novel effortlessly weaves romance, history, and a murder mystery into something moving, and real, and wholly original.
Jennifer Donnelly
Jennifer Donnelly writes books for children and adults, including the novel The Tea Rose. She lives in Brooklyn and upstate New York, with her husband and two greyhounds. She has a passion for tea and roses.
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Reviews for A Northern Light
1,090 ratings89 reviews
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5this is one of my favorite historical fiction novels for young adults.
New York state-1906, 16 year-old Mattie wants badly to attend college to become a writer. While working at the inn to earn money for college, a guest named Grace Brown asks her to burn a stack of secret letters. Shortly after the request, Grace's body is found in the nearby lake; might the letters hold the key to her murder? - Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Sixteen year old Mattie Gokey dreams of moving to New York City, attending college and becoming a writer but she's trapped. Her mother died, her old brother ran away and Mattie is forced to help her father take care of the farm and raise her younger sisters. Yet she refuses to give up her dream. She takes a job working at a nearby resort to earn money to pay for travel expenses to New York City and along the way begins to give up on her dreams and settles on the idea of marriage and family. Then, a woman's body is pulled from the lake the resort and, through the dead woman's letters, Mattie realizes that she was murdered.
I LOVED this book. Jennifer Donnelly has a beautiful way with words and the story was very compelling. I loved Mattie and how she never really gave up on her dreams. Maybe it is my own dreams of someday writing that made me love Mattie so much. I also loved the way that Donnelly used words and their definitions to tell the story. That just played to the English major in me. It's a beautifully told story and Donnelly is a master of language. - Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Historical fiction loaded with a myriad of details in 1906 small town life in the North Woods near the Canadian border. Mattie Gokey (Anglicized from the French) longs to finish high school, go to college, and become a writer. She grieves for her mother, recently died from cancer, and tries to understand her distant, stern father who also grieves. He depends on Mattie to care for the household, help with the farm, and maintain order with her younger sisters; Mattie struggles to not resent her older brother who fought with dad & ran away. Her father cannot imagine Mattie leaving them. She is thrilled when Royal Loomis, handsome neighbor, begins to courts her, and wants her to marry him, and settle down to a farming life. As these conflicting obligations begin to build, Mattie goes to work at the Glenmore, one of the huge resort hotels on the lake, & becomes drawn into a terrible tragedy, the disappearance of one of the visitors and the discovery of his drowned young woman companion- a mystery that adds to to the suspense. Mattie does have good friends, including Weaver, an African American boy who is also determined to head to college & her beloved teacher, Miss Wilcox, who turns out to have a secret life of her own. Themes of serving family v.s. finding one's own path, feminism, racism, among others lifts this story beyond just a coming of age for a young woman.
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Mattie Gokey wants to be a writer. But she promised her dying mother that she would stay and take care of her younger sisters. When she takes a job at a local resort to earn some cash so her family can buy a new mule, she meets a young girl who entrusts her with a bundle of letters. Later that day, the girl is dead, drowned in an apparent boating accident. Based on a true story.
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5This is such an accomplished, uplifting piece of writing, despite the suffering it depicts, and the tragic event at its centre. Perhaps that's because of the voice of narrator Mattie, who comes across as intelligent, spirited and tenacious. Ostensibly it's the story of a drowning, based on real events, but the real tension in the plot was the question of whether Mattie would be able to pursue her dream of getting an education in spite of her difficult home circumstances. It's a story that draws in big themes such as racism and women's rights but never becomes preachy.
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Mattie has big dreams. She wants to go to college and become a writer, but when her mother was dying she made a promise to stay and raise her sisters. Mattie lives a hard life as the daughter of a farmer, and her relationship with her father has become more and more strained. She takes a job at the Glenmore Hotel to help earn money, and a guest Grace Brown dies. Grace gave Mattie her letters to burn and now Mattie again finds herself caught between a promise and what she thinks she should do.
This novel was amazing. It was heartbreaking and moving and lovely. Mattie's voice is very true and I really felt tangles up in her emotions. - Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5a young woman must decide whether to stay with her controlling father and siblings on the family farm or follow her dream to go to college- many obstacles in her path- she is a skilled writer and imagines the lives of others- great book for young women, to think about following your own heart and dreams as opposed to doing what others expect of you
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Set in the Adirondacks of 1906, readers are introduced to Mattie, her rough life as the oldest of 4 girls forced to care for her father, the farm, and her sisters when her mother dies of cancer as well as to her best friend Weaver, the only African American in their town. Weaver also hopes to go to college one day, as the two of them share a love for learning and a dream of making something of their lives. Despite both being accepted at N.Y. colleges, racism and small mindedness conspire to keep them from their dreams. When Grace, a young tourist girl, is murdered at the summer resort where they work, Mattie is determined to find a way out of their dead end lives for both herself and Weaver.
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5I don't know when the last time was that I've given a book the ultimate glory of being rated 5 stars, but A Northern Light really is fitting for this. Historical fiction has always been one of my favorite genres, but as of late, I haven't exactly been blown away by any of the previous books.
This book has stolen the title of being one of my favorite historical fiction books not only this year, but of my entire life. The main character is lovable, the mystery is gripping, and the writing superb. I'd recommend this novel to feminists and history lovers everywhere. - Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Started off a little boring, but I ended up really hooked during the last two thirds. I wasn't too pleased with the very ending as it seemed to contradict the entire message of the story, but I'm probably in the minority.
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5I've read several of Jennifer Donnelly's other books & enjoyed them, and despite knowing this one had received high acclaim, for some reason this one just hadn't made it to the top of Mt. TBR. And now that it has, I almost feel disappointed. I can't put my finger on why. It's well-written, it showcases a strong female character (who loves books!), & it interweaves some historic fiction. Like the last novel of Donnelly's I read, Revolution, I liked it, but didn't love it, although for different reasons. I think ultimately this one just fell a little flat for me. I had such high hopes, and it was good, but....something was just missing. Perhaps more resolution at the end. I liked this one, but not sure it was my favorite of hers.
- Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5I just remembered having read this charming young adult novel quite a few years ago. My opinion on this book may, therefore, be of litte use, but the fact that I add this book after all means that it is a book that is somewhat worth remembering.
The main character is a smart girl named Mattie, who has a passion for the learning of new words. To achieve this, she opens the dictionary at a random page every day and picks a word, which she challenges herself to use over the course of the remains of the day. A nifty little idea that works well throughout the entire novel.
The specifics have fled from my mind like bunnies from a pitbull, but still. A charming novel of which I keep good memories. - Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5This book is founded around the murder of Grace Brown, a true story, and the mystery of her death, which is captured and seen through the eyes of the main character Mattie. She is a girl in the 1900’s who is expected to take care of her siblings and to marry and have a family of her own when her dreams and talents of reading and writing go much further than the norm. Anyone who wants more for themselves than what society has decided for them, can relate to this novel.
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5I would really give it 4 1/2 stars.
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Mattie Gokey is one of the most engaging characters I have read about in fiction in a long time. She is intelligent and hardworking, yet conflicted about her goals in life. She wants an education, but isn't sure if it is worth the cost of leaving her home, her family and her boyfriend behind. At first glance that might not seem to be the most original of plots, but Mattie is an amazingly intense character who is living through a very hard time.
This story resonated with me because the decisions that Mattie has to make; dealing with loyalty, breaking promises, putting others first or doing what's best for her; these are issues that we all have to deal with at one time or another. Mattie struggles to find that balance between personal achievement and self-sacrifice. She has to determine what cost her personal achievements are worth, and whether it is okay to put her own goals ahead of the needs of others.
Mattie is very smart, extremely creative and has a love of learning (she learns a new word from the dictionary every day). She has a great skill for creative writing, and her teacher encourages her by exposing her to the works of other great writers and poets. It was hard at times, reading Mattie's story and knowing that if she stays on the farm or marries a local boy her creativity will be smothered by the tasks of daily life.
This book takes the form of two parallel storylines, both told by Mattie in the first person. One storyline is written in the present tense as Mattie works at the Glenmore Hotel during the summer that Grace Brown drowns in the lake. (The tale of Grace Brown is based the true story of her death by drowning in a lake in the Adirondacks.)
The other storyline is written in past tense and starts near the end of the school year before Mattie's graduation examinations. In this section we discover that when Mattie's mom died she made Mattie promise to stay and take care of the family. Initially this doesn't seem to be a problem, but then Mattie finds out that she has an opportunity to study at Barnard. Not only does she not have the money to go, but she knows that she should stay to help her family and keep her promise to her mother. She has an idea though - if she can just talk her father into letting her work at the Glenmore Hotel then she can save enough money for school (and she'll worry about her promise later).
Now, I already knew from the other storyline that Mattie found a way to work at the Glenmore Hotel, so it just seemed like I was waiting for the two storylines to come together; to discover how Mattie ends up there. As the story went on though, I realized that Mattie's tale was not so clear-cut. Trials and troubles arise, not to mention the complications of a love interest, all of which put her dreams of higher learning in jeopardy.
It's hard for me to convey how much I liked this book. I've never even been to the Adirondacks, yet as I listened to this story I could relate so much to Mattie that it felt like I was reading about someone I knew. The setting was so real that I felt like I had been there.
This book should be a classic in young adult literature right alongside books like Anne of Green Gables and The Girl of the Limberlost. I mention these two books because Mattie reminded me so much of their main characters. Mattie has ingenuity and a strong spirit like Elnora in The Girl of the Limberlost, and the brains and creativity of Anne from the Green Gables series.
I would not recommend this book for young children though, because Mattie does live through some terrible and unpleasant situations. Some of the topics discussed include: death, sickness, racism, sex, illegitimate children, and a very entertaining scene where the girls at the Glenmore Hotel get revenge on a dirty old man.
I wholeheartedly recommend this book to young adults and adults alike. I was sad to come to the end of the book, hoping to stretch out my time in Mattie's world as long as possible.
Although I own a copy of this book, this review refers to the audiobook version of A Northern Light which I checked out from the library. I thought that the narrator was a very good fit for this audiobook (though I did read elsewhere that at least one reviewer didn't like the voice of the narrator). - Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/53.5/5Due storie si dipanano nel romanzo: quella di Mattie, inventata, e quella di Grace Brown, tristemente reale. Mattie, diventata dopo la morte della madre il sostegno del resto della famiglia, ha il sogno di andare all’università e lasciare una cittadina che non comprende lei e le sue aspirazioni.Lavorando in uno degli hotel del luogo incontrerà Grace che le lascerà un plico di lettere da distruggere; leggendole, e ripensando al proprio passato recente, Mattie darà nuova voce alla storia di Grace e alla propria.E’ un romanzo avvincente anche se alcuni (molti) elementi servono per sottolineare quanto poco invidiabile sarebbe la vita se Mattie restasse rinunciando all’università (l’immagine di Minnie con i gemelli, Royal che parla solo di granuturco etc…).---This novel speaks about two stories: the former, the fake one, about Mattie and the latter, tragically true, about Grace Brown.Mattie, being the support of her family after her mother’s death, aims at the university, leaving behind a town that does not understand her and her wills.Working in one of the hotel she will meet Grace who will leave are a pack of letters to destroy; reading them, and recalling her recent past, Mattie will give a new voice both to Grace story and her own.It’s an engaging novel, however some (lots of) elements are only useful to underline how poor Mattie life should be if she gives up her studies (e.g. Minnie with the twins, Royal talking only about corn etc…).
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5I am really pissed off at the moment.
I bought A Gathering Light and... A Northern Light thinking (of course) that it was a sequel)
Well thanks for wasting my money. Why change the title of a book for Europe and the US? Cause hoping for people like me that are stupid?
lol I wrote the above months ago but hey I was right so I am not going to delete it.
I finished this book last night June 2 and i was sad that it ended, I wanted to read more.
It took me a while to get into it but once I did I really enjoyed it. I wish The Northern Light was indeed a sequel. ;) - Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5A beautifully written story told through the eyes of Mattie, a 16 year old who is working at the Glenmore Hotel during the summer of 1906 when hotel guest Grace Brown's drowned body is found. Before her death, Grace had given Mattie a packet of letters and made her promise to burn them. Though Mattie's intentions are good, the opportunity does not present itself, and as she begins to read Grace's letters, it becomes more evident that what was initially thought to be an accidental drowning was in fact murder. The true events of the Brown murder are interwoven with Mattie's own story: expected to care for her younger sisters since their mother died, Mattie must put her own dreams of attending college on hold, even after she is awarded a full scholarship by Barnard College.
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5I think I'm pretty easy on books, I default to 4 stars. I reason I didn't go all the way to 5 with this one is that its a girl book. And not to be confused with girly, just has a female audience, clearly. A solid read about growing up and making hard decisions. Donnelly creates a great setting and an engaging story, especially for historical fiction which I'm not the biggest fan of.
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5This book was not what I was expecting. It's poignant and the writing is interesting and unique. My one issue was the fact there was a whole lot going on in those few months. Other than that, I loved it.
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5This was my first Jennifer Donnelly book - I will definitely read others. I enjoyed the combination of historical fiction and mystery aimed at young adults.
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5I absolutely adored this book! It’s the story of Mattie Gokey, a 16 year old girl living in the Adirondack Mountains. After her mother’s death Mattie is expected to be the women of the house and help raise her younger siblings. However, Mattie is a very intelligent young woman with too many dreams to let go.
There were many surprises with this book. For one there is the story within the story. Through Mattie’s eyes we experience the tragic account of Grace Brown’s murder. Grace’s letters were incorporated into the story weaving a true tale of her demise. I found that refreshing because I learned something new and I liked the mix of fiction and true life. The second surprise was the poignant moments that had me near tears. I didn’t expect this book to be so deep, but these characters were able to jump off the page and grab my heartstrings. There were some really beautiful moments, as well as some ugly ones. Themes of racism, feminism, marital infidelity and parental expectations are just some of the topics that Donnelly writes about. But it’s done in such a way that it never feels too heavy. Mattie’s story is about perseverance, passion and enlightenment.
This is my first Donnelly book, but I can’t wait to read more of her. :-) - Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5I didn't realize this book was YA at first, but sometimes I think they just define the category by who the main character is.
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The book wasn't exactly as I was expecting it to be. Despite this, it was a fantastic read. It was capturing, suspenseful, and a bit heart warming at parts. A wonderful story and a wonderful book.
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5A beautifully written YA book that deals tangentially with the murder that was the subject of Theodore Dreiser’s An American Tragedy, A Northern Light is a wonderful example of what a YA novel can and should be. Not only is it wonderful introduction to historical fiction, but it also offers a smart heroine who transcends the cookie-cutter heroines of so many YA books. Get this in the hands of your young adult and elevate their reading.
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Using Theodore Dreiser's An American Tragedy as a springboard, Jennifer Donnelly weaves a rich tapestry of history, romance, poverty, the desire to succeed, the love of books, and a turn of the century murder.When young Mattie Gokey's mother dies, she is overburdened by the needs of her father and siblings. Longing to escape poverty and the back woods of upstate New York, Mattie's love of books propels her forward to a dream of education and fulfillment of her dream.Highly recommended.
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5While I really did enjoy this book, I don't feel it can really be dubbed a mystery novel. I am drawn to novels that are set in local areas, and the fact that the story takes place in the Adirondacks, more specifically Lake Placid, intrigued me. I found the main character, Mattie Gokey, wonderful. She faced woman's conflict of being drawn between work, family, and dreams, and I could really relate to it. Using the murder as a catalyst for Mattie's ultimate decision to leave and follow her dream to become a writer was clever. Enjoyable, disturbing at times, but completely believable for the time period.
- Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5There was a lot to like about this book. The setting was clearly well researched and the characters very realistic. The protagonist Maddie works at a nearby hotel as a maid during the tourist season. A guest gives her a stack of letters to destroy but before she gets the chance to the girl is discovered dead. I'm too old for the intended audience for the book I'm afraid. I also grew up in a more cynical time. I had a hard time believing an avid reader such as Maddie didn't realise a few things about her crush or the neighbours problems.I won't fault the author for using these reveals since they are done to death for a reason.
- Rating: 2 out of 5 stars2/5I really wanted to like this book, and I did enjoy certain aspects, but for the most part I feel that it's nothing more than a diatribe against being a wife and mother. Once again, as in so many coming-of-age novels featuring a female protagonist, the author seems to overtly convey the message that a girl is nothing if she is not educated, and is not primarily concerned with her own fulfillment. The only redeeming portion of the book was the Grace Brown storyline; I wish that the author would have explored her story further.
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5This was overall a very good book, however there were some things I didn't love. For example I was looking forward to and particularly enjoyed the mystery aspects, however they were not very frequent. The mystery seemed to me to remain unsolved. I did enjoy it though because of its extreme honesty, even to the harsher parts of life in this time period-disease, land, families, starvation, racial discrimination, etc.
Book preview
A Northern Light - Jennifer Donnelly
Copyright © 2003 by Jennifer Donnelly
Introduction copyright © Jeanette Winterson 2007
All rights reserved. Originally published in hardcover by Harcourt Children’s Books, an imprint of Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company, 2003.
For information about permission to reproduce selections from this book, write to [email protected] or to Permissions, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company, 3 Park Avenue, 19th Floor, New York, New York 10016.
hmhbooks.com
Cover photographs © Getty Images (lake); © Laurence Dutton/Getty Images (woman)
Cover design by Lisa Vega
Epigraph by Adelaide Crapsey from To the Dead in the Graveyard Under My Window,
from The Complete Poems and Collected Letters of Adelaide Crapsey by Susan Sutton Smith, copyright © 1977; reprinted with permission of SUNY Press, Albany, New York.
The Library of Congress has cataloged the hardcover edition as follows:
Donnelly, Jennifer.
A northern light/by Jennifer Donnelly,
p. cm.
Summary: In 1906, sixteen-year-old Mattie, determined to attend college and be a writer against the wishes of her father and fiancé, takes a job at a summer inn where she discovers the truth about the death of a guest. Based on a true story.
[1. Education—Fiction. 2. Farm life—New York (State)—Fiction. 3. Hotels, motels, etc.—Fiction. 4. Murder—Fiction. 5. Adirondack Mountains (N.Y.)—Fiction. 6. New York (State)—History—20th century—Fiction.] I. Title.
PZ7.D7194No 2003
[Fic]—dc21 2002005098
ISBN 978-0-15-216705-9 hardcover
ISBN 978-0-358-06368-1 paperback
eISBN 978-0-547-54288-1
v4.0419
For Megan,
who escaped from the enchanted forest
And if the many sayings of the wise
Teach of submission I will not submit
But with a spirit all unreconciled
Flash an unquenched defiance to the stars.
ADELAIDE CRAPSEY
Saranac Lake, 1913
Introduction
By Jeannette Winterson
A woman’s body is dragged out of a lake.
The young girl Mattie, watching this, runs to make coffee and find a blanket, but it is too late for coffee and blankets, because the woman in Big Moose Lake is dead.
The day before, this strange sad figure, Grace Brown, had given Mattie a bundle of letters and begged her to burn them. Mattie, working in a tourist hotel, is used to odd requests from guests, but this one feels different, because her own life is caught up in the struggle, the sadness, and the loss.
Mattie’s mother has been dead four years, and her father has had to harden with the times, which are tough enough for raising children and working a farm. There is no tenderness in Mattie’s life, only scraping by, and making do, and secretly saving a few cents when she can, to buy an exercise book to write in.
Mattie is not used to kind words, but words themselves are the things that give her hope. She loves reading, loves books, loves to write her own stories and poems, as though she could write her life again, and change it.
At school, Mattie is lucky to have a teacher, Miss Wilcox, who encourages her to try for a scholarship and get to college in New York City. Miss Wilcox was at college there herself, and she is something of a dangerous eccentric in the tight-knit, hard-up farming and logging community in the North Woods at the turn of the century. Miss Wilcox is a woman with wider horizons than the sun setting over the lake, beautiful though that is, and it is she who first shows Mattie the struggle between what ordinary life has to offer, and the life someone could make for themselves, if they wanted it badly enough.
A Northern Light isn’t about simple choices between a two-bit town and the bright lights; Mattie falls in love at home, with a handsome son-of-the-soil boy, who wants to marry her and farm with her, in much the same way that his family has done for generations. What he offers is a genuine life, although cynically given, because he is more in love with Mattie’s father’s farmland than with Mattie herself, but it is a life she could choose. The story does not underestimate the pull of ordinariness; staying near home, settling down, meeting someone to care about, doing the things that come naturally, and finding satisfaction there. Mattie likes animals and the land—she lives in her body as well as in her head, so for her the choices are not simple. And she loves her father too, and recognizes how hard he works to put food on the table and keep his family together.
The refusal of simplicity gives this story its edge. There is no black and white; there are all the colors of the heart.
What is so well done is Mattie’s growing awareness of these many colors. When she accuses her teacher, Miss Wilcox, of oversimplifying, in the way that novels sometimes oversimplify, Miss Wilcox tells her to write it the way it is—to put in all the difficulty and the pain, but never to refuse life.
When Mattie sees Grace Brown dead, and reads her love letters to the man who turns out to have murdered her, Mattie realizes that whatever choice you make, right or wrong, you have to choose for life. Death ends all possibility; there are no more choices.
As she looks around her, she realizes there is such a thing as dying before you have even lived.
The morning she slips out of the hotel and away to the railway station, leaving letters of her own behind for those she loves, she knows she is not walking toward the cliché of a happy ending, but toward the conscious choice of a new beginning. Whatever she is doing, she is doing it for herself, wherever it leads, because words have made a bridge she has to cross.
Grace Brown’s letters, the pages of the novels Miss Wilcox has given her, the poems Miss Wilcox has written herself, the words that Mattie looks up every day in the battered dictionary—these words have become the struts and planks and piers of the bridge that she must cross.
Her heart is bursting with grief and fear and joy.
The complexity can’t be bleached out—it comes with the colors of life. In the end, it may be intensity, vividness, that is the choice, and nothing so simple as happiness. This book has a happy ending, not because everything is resolved, but because it isn’t. At the end of the book, life begins.
When summer comes to the North Woods, time slows down. And some days it stops altogether. The sky, gray and lowering for much of the year, becomes an ocean of blue, so vast and brilliant you can’t help but stop what you’re doing—pinning wet sheets to the line maybe, or shucking a bushel of corn on the back steps—to stare up at it. Locusts whir in the birches, coaxing you out of the sun and under the boughs, and the heat stills the air, heavy and sweet with the scent of balsam.
As I stand here on the porch of the Glenmore, the finest hotel on all of Big Moose Lake, I tell myself that today—Thursday, July 12, 1906—is such a day. Time has stopped, and the beauty and calm of this perfect afternoon will never end. The guests up from New York, all in their summer whites, will play croquet on the lawn forever. Old Mrs. Ellis will stay on the porch until the end of time, rapping her cane on the railing for more lemonade. The children of doctors and lawyers from Utica, Rome, and Syracuse will always run through the woods, laughing and shrieking, giddy from too much ice cream.
I believe these things. With all my heart. For I am good at telling myself lies.
Until Ada Bouchard comes out of the doorway and slips her hand into mine. And Mrs. Morrison, the manager’s wife, walks right by us, pausing at the top of the steps. At any other time, she’d scorch our ears for standing idle; now she doesn’t seem to even know we’re here. Her arms cross over her chest. Her eyes, gray and troubled, fasten on the dock. And the steamer tied alongside it.
"That’s the Zilpha, ain’t it, Mattie? Ada whispers.
They’ve been dragging the lake, ain’t they?"
I squeeze her hand. I don’t think so. I think they were just looking along the shoreline. Cook says they probably got lost, that couple. Couldn’t find their way back in the dark and spent the night under some pines, that’s all.
I’m scared, Mattie. Ain’t you?
I don’t answer her. I’m not scared, not exactly, but I can’t explain how I feel. Words fail me sometimes. I have read most every one in the Webster’s International Dictionary of the English Language, but I still have trouble making them come when I want them to.
Right now I want a word that describes the feeling you get—a cold, sick feeling deep down inside—when you know something is happening that will change you, and you don’t want it to, but you can’t stop it. And you know, for the first time, for the very first time, that there will now be a before and an after, a was and a will be. And that you will never again be quite the same person you were.
I imagine it’s the feeling Eve had as she bit into the apple. Or Hamlet when he saw his father’s ghost. Or Jesus as a boy, right after someone sat him down and told him his pa wasn’t a carpenter after all.
What is the word for that feeling? For knowledge and fear and loss all mixed together? Frisdom? Dreadnaciousness? Malbominance?
Standing on that porch, under that flawless sky, with bees buzzing lazily in the roses and a cardinal calling from the pines so sweet and clear, I tell myself that Ada is a nervous little hen, always worrying when there’s no cause. Nothing bad can happen at the Glenmore, not on such a day as this.
And then I see Cook running up from the dock, ashen and breathless, her skirts in her hands, and I know that I am wrong.
Mattie, open the parlor!
she shouts, heedless of the guests. Quick, girl!
I barely hear her. My eyes are on Mr. Crabb, the Zilpha’s engineer. He is coming up the path carrying a young woman in his arms. Her head lolls against him like a broken flower. Water drips from her skirt.
Oh, Mattie, look at her. Oh, jeezum, Mattie, look,
Ada says, her hands twisting in her apron.
"Sssh, Ada. She got soaked, that’s all. They got lost on the lake and . . . and the boat tipped and they swam to shore and she . . . she must’ve fainted."
Oh, dear Lord,
Mrs. Morrison says, her hands coming up to her mouth.
Mattie! Ada! Why are you standing there like a pair of jackasses?
Cook wheezes, heaving her bulky body up the steps. Open the spare room, Mattie. The one off the parlor. Pull the shades and lay an old blanket on the bed. Ada, go fix a pot of coffee and some sandwiches. There’s a ham and some chicken in the icebox. Shift yourselves!
There are children in the parlor playing hide-and-seek. I chase them out and unlock the door to a small bedroom used by stage drivers or boat captains when the weather’s too bad to travel. I realize I’ve forgotten the blanket and run back to the linen closet for it. I’m back in the room snapping it open over the bare ticking just as Mr. Crabb comes in. I’ve brought a pillow and a heavy quilt, too. She’ll be chilled to the bone, having slept out all night in wet clothing.
Mr. Crabb lays her down on the bed. Cook stretches her legs out and tucks the pillow under her head. The Morrisons come in. Mr. Sperry, the Glenmore’s owner, is right behind them. He stares at her, goes pale, and walks out again.
I’ll fetch a hot water bottle and some tea and . . . and brandy,
I say, looking at Cook and then Mrs. Morrison and then a painting on the wall. Anywhere and everywhere but at the girl. Should I do that? Should I get the brandy?
Hush, Mattie. It’s too late for that,
Cook says.
I make myself look at her then. Her eyes are dull and empty. Her skin has gone the yellow of muscatel wine. There is an ugly gash on her forehead and her lips are bruised. Yesterday she’d sat by herself on the porch, fretting the hem of her skirt. I’d brought her a glass of lemonade, because it was hot outside and she looked peaked. I hadn’t charged her for it. She looked like she didn’t have much money.
Behind me, Cook badgers Mr. Crabb. What about the man she was with? Carl Grahm?
No sign of him,
he says. Not yet, leastways. We got the boat. They’d tipped it, all right. In South Bay.
I’ll have to get hold of the family,
Mrs. Morrison says. They’re in Albany.
No, that was only the man, Grahm,
Cook says. The girl lived in South Otselic. I looked in the register.
Mrs. Morrison nods. I’ll ring the operator. See if she can connect me with a store there, or a hotel. Or someone who can get a message to the family. What on earth will I say? Oh dear! Oh, her poor, poor mother!
She presses a handkerchief to her eyes and hurries from the room.
She’ll be making a second call before the day’s out,
Cook says. Ask me, people who can’t swim have no business on a lake.
Too confident, that fellow,
Mr. Morrison says. I asked him could he handle a skiff and he told me yes. Only a darn fool from the city could tip a boat on a calm day . . .
He says more, but I don’t hear him. It feels like there are iron bands around my chest. I close my eyes and try to breathe deeply, but it only makes things worse. Behind my eyes I see a packet of letters tied with a pale blue ribbon. Letters that are upstairs under my mattress. Letters that I promised to burn. I can see the address on the top one: Chester Gillette, 17½ Main Street, Cortland, New York.
Cook fusses me away from the body. Mattie, pull the shades like I told you to,
she says. She folds Grace Brown’s hands over her chest and closes her eyes. There’s coffee in the kitchen. And sandwiches,
she tells the men. Will you eat something?
We’ll take something with us, Mrs. Hennessey, if that’s all right,
Mr. Morrison says. We’re going out again. Soon as Sperry gets the sheriff on the phone. He’s calling Martins, too. To tell ’em to keep an eye out. And Higby’s and the other camps. Just in case Grahm made it to shore and got lost in the woods.
His name’s not Carl Grahm. It’s Chester. Chester Gillette.
The words burst out of me before I can stop them.
How do you know that, Mattie?
Cook asks. They are all looking at me now—Cook, Mr. Morrison, and Mr. Crabb.
I . . . I heard her call him that, I guess,
I stammer, suddenly afraid.
Cook’s eyes narrow. Did you see something, Mattie? Do you know something you should tell us?
What had I seen? Too much. What did I know? Only that knowledge carries a damned high price. Miss Wilcox, my teacher, had taught me so much. Why had she never taught me that?
frac • tious
My youngest sister, Beth, who is five, will surely grow up to be a riverman—standing upstream on the dam, calling out warnings to the men below that the logs are coming down. She has the lungs for it.
It was a spring morning. End of March. Not quite four months ago, though it seems much longer. We were late for school and there were still chores to do before we left, but Beth didn’t care. She just sat there ignoring the cornmeal mush I’d made her, bellowing like some opera singer up from Utica to perform at one of the hotels. Only no opera singer ever sang Hurry Up, Harry.
Least not as far as I know.
So it’s hurry up, Harry, and Tom or Dick or Joe,
And you may take the pail, boys, and for the water go.
In the middle of the splashing, the cook will dinner cry,
And you’d ought to see them hurry up for fear they’d lose their pie . . .
Beth, hush now and eat your mush,
I scolded, fumbling her hair into a braid. She didn’t mind me, though, for she wasn’t singing her song to me or to any of us. She was singing to the motionless rocker near the stove and the battered fishing creel hanging by the shed door. She was singing to fill all the empty places in our house, to chase away the silence. Most mornings I didn’t mind her noise, but that morning I had to talk to Pa about something, something very important, and I was all nerves. I wanted it peaceful for once. I wanted Pa to find everything in order and everyone behaving when he came in, so he would be peaceable himself and well-disposed to what I had to say.
There’s blackstrap molasses, squaw buns as hard as rock,
Tea that’s boiled in an old tin pail and smells just like your sock.
The beans they are sour, and the porridge thick as dough—
When we have stashed this in our craw, it’s to the woods we go . . .
The kitchen door banged open and Lou, all of eleven, passed behind the table with a bucket of milk. She’d forgotten to take off her boots and was tracking manure across the floor.
"A-hitching up our braces and a-binding up our feet."
Beth, please!
I said, tying her braid with a ribbon. Lou, your boots! Mind your boots!
"A-grinding up our axes for our kind is hard to beat . . ."
What? I can’t hardly hear you, Matt,
Lou said. Cripes sake, shut up, will you?
she yelled, clapping a hand over Beth’s mouth.
Beth squealed and wriggled and threw herself back against the chair. The chair went over and hit Lou’s bucket. The milk and Beth went all over the floor. Then Beth was bawling and Lou was shouting and I was wishing for my mother. As I do every day. A hundred times at least.
When Mamma was alive, she could make breakfast for seven people, hear our lessons, patch Pa’s trousers, pack our dinner pails, start the milk to clabbering, and roll out a piecrust. All at the same time and without ever raising her voice. I’m lucky if I can keep the mush from burning and Lou and Beth from slaughtering each other.
Abby, fourteen, came in cradling four brown eggs in her apron. She carefully put them in a bowl inside the pie safe, then stared at the scene before her. Pa’s only got the pigs left to do. He’ll be in shortly,
she said.
Pa’s going to tan your ass, Beth,
Lou said.
"He’ll tan yours for saying ass," Beth replied, still sniffling.
Now you’ve said it as well. You’ll get a double tanning.
Beth’s face crumpled. She started to wail all over again.
That’s enough! Both of you!
I shouted, dreading the thought of Pa getting his strap, and hearing the whack of it against their legs. No one’s getting a tanning. Go get Barney.
Beth and Lou ran to the stove and dragged poor Barney out from behind it. Pa’s old hunting dog is lame and blind. He pees his bed. Uncle Vernon says Pa ought to take him out behind the barn and shoot him. Pa says he’d rather shoot Uncle Vernon.
Lou stood Barney by the puddle. He couldn’t see the milk, but he could smell it, and he lapped it up greedily. He hadn’t tasted milk for ages. Neither had we. The cows are dry over the winter. One had just freshened, though, so there was a little bit of milk for the first time in months. More were due soon. By the end of May, the barn would be full of calves and Pa would be off early every morning making deliveries of milk, cream, and butter to the hotels and camps. But this morning, that one bucket was all we’d had for a long while and he was no doubt expecting to see some of it on his mush.
Barney got most of the milk cleaned up. What little he left, Abby got with a rag. Beth looked a little soggy, and the linoleum under her chair looked cleaner than it did elsewhere, but I just hoped Pa wouldn’t notice. There was an inch or two left in the bucket. I added a bit of water to it and poured it into a jug that I set by his bowl. He’d be expecting a nice milk gravy for supper, or maybe a custard, since the hens had given four eggs, but I’d worry about that later.
Pa’ll know, Matt,
Lou said.
How? Is Barney going to tell him?
When Barney drinks milk, he farts something wicked.
Lou, just because you walk like a boy and dress like a boy doesn’t mean you have to talk like one. Mamma wouldn’t like it,
I said.
Well, Mamma’s not here anymore, so I’ll talk as I please.
Abby, rinsing her rag at the sink, whirled around. Be quiet, Lou!
she shouted, startling us, for Abby never shouts. She didn’t even cry at Mamma’s funeral, though I found her in Pa’s bedroom a few days after, holding a tin likeness of our mother so hard that the edges had cut her hand. Our Abby is a sprigged dress that has been washed and turned wrong side out to dry, with all its color hidden. Our Lou is anything but.
As the two of them continued to snipe, we heard footsteps in the shed off the back of the kitchen. The bickering stopped. We thought it was Pa. But then we heard a knock and a shuffle, and knew it was only Tommy Hubbard, the neighbor boy, hungry again.
You itching, Tom?
I called.
No, Matt.
Come get some breakfast, then. Wash your hands first.
Last time I’d let him in to eat he gave us fleas. Tommy has six brothers and sisters. They live on the Uncas Road, same as us, but farther up, in a shabby plank house. Their land divides ours from the Loomis’s land on one side, notching in from the road. They have no pa or they have lots of pas, depending on who you listen to. Emmie, Tommy’s mother, does the best she can cleaning rooms at the hotels, and selling the little paintings she makes to the tourists, but it isn’t enough. Her kids are always hungry. Her house is cold. She can’t pay her taxes.
Tommy came inside. He had one of his sisters by the hand. My eyes darted between them. Pa hadn’t eaten yet and there wasn’t so much left in the pot. I just brung Jenny is all,
he said quickly. I ain’t hungry myself.
Jenny had on a man’s wool shirt over a thin cotton dress. The shirttails touched the floor. The dress barely made it past her knees. Tommy had no overclothes on at all.
It’s all right, Tom. There’s plenty,
I said.
She can have mine. I’m sick to death of this damned slop,
Lou said, pushing her bowl across the table. Her kindnesses often took a roundabout path.
I hope Pa hears you,
Abby said. Mouth on you like a teamster.
Lou poked her tongue out, displaying her breakfast. Abby looked as if she’d like to slap her. Luckily, the table was between them.
Everyone was sick of cornmeal mush. Myself included. We’d been eating it with maple sugar for breakfast and dinner for weeks. And for supper, buckwheat pancakes with the last of fall’s stewed apples. Or pea soup made with an old ham bone that had been boiled white. We would have loved some corned beef hash or chicken and biscuits, but most everything we’d put in the root cellar in September was gone. We’d eaten the last of the venison in January. The ham and bacon, too. And though we’d put up two barrels of fresh pork, one of them had spoiled. It was my fault. Pa said I hadn’t put enough salt in the brine. We’d killed one of our roosters back in the fall, and four hens since. We only had ten birds left, and Pa didn’t want to touch them as they provided us with a few eggs now and would make us more eggs—and chickens, too—come summer.
It wasn’t like this when Mamma was alive. Somehow she provided good meals all through the winter and still managed to have meat left in the cellar come spring. I am nowhere near as capable as my mother was, and if I ever forget it, I have Lou to remind me. Or Pa. Not that he says the sorts of things Lou does, but you can tell by the look on his face when he sits down to eat that he isn’t fond of mush day in and day out.
Jenny Hubbard didn’t mind it, though. She waited patiently, her eyes large and solemn, as I sprinkled maple sugar on Lou’s leavings and passed the bowl to her. I gave Tom some from the pot. As much as I could spare while still leaving enough for Pa.
Abby took a swallow of her tea, then looked at me over the top of the cup. You talk to Pa yet?
I shook my head. I was standing behind Lou, teasing the rats out of her hair. It was too short for braids; it only just grazed her jaw. She’d cut it off with Mamma’s sewing scissors after Christmas. Right after our brother, Lawton, left.
You going to?
she asked.
Talk about what?
Beth asked.
Never mind. Finish your breakfast,
I said.
What, Matt? Talk about what?
Beth, if Mattie wanted you to know, she’d tell you,
Lou said.
You don’t know, neither.
Do, too.
Mattie, why’d you tell Lou and not me?
Beth whined.
Because you can’t never keep quiet,
Lou said.
That started another round of bickering. My nerves were grated down bald. "It’s can’t ever, Lou, not can’t never, I said.
Beth, stop whining."
Matt, you pick your word of the day yet?
Abby asked. Abby, our peacemaker. Gentle and mild. More like our mother than any of the rest of us.
Oh, Mattie! Can I pick it? Can I?
Beth begged. She scrambled out of her chair and raced into the parlor. I kept my precious dictionary there, out of harm’s way, along with the books I borrowed from Charlie Eckler and Miss Wilcox, and my mother’s Waverly Editions of Best Loved American Classics, and some ancient copies of Peterson’s Magazine that my aunt Josie had given us because, as it said in its Publisher’s Corner,
it was one of the few periodicals fit for families where there are daughters.
Beth, you carry it but let Lou pick the word,
I shouted after her.
I don’t want no part of baby word games,
Lou grumbled.
"Any, Lou. Any part," I snapped. Her carelessness with words made me angrier than her dirty mouth and the filthy state of her coveralls and the manure she’d tracked in, combined.
Beth returned to the kitchen table, carrying the dictionary as if it were made of gold. It might as well have been. It weighed as much. Pick the word,
I told her. Lou doesn’t want to.
She carefully flipped a few pages forward, then a few back, then put her index finger on the left-hand page. "Fff . . . fraaak . . . fraktee . . . frakteeus?" she said.
I don’t think there’s any such word. Spell it,
I said.
F-r-a-c-t-i-o-u-s.
"Frakshus, I said.
Tommy, what’s the meaning?"
Tommy peered at the dictionary. ‘Apt to break out into a passion . . . snappish, peevish, irritable, cross,’
he read. ‘P-per-verse. Pettish.’
Isn’t that just perfect?
I said. "Fractious," I repeated, relishing the bite of the f, teeth against lip. A new word. Bright with possibilities. A flawless pearl to turn over and over in my hand, then put away for safekeeping. Your turn, Jenny. Can you make a sentence from the word?
Jenny bit her bottom lip. It means cross?
she asked.
I nodded.
She frowned, then said, Ma was fractious when she chucked the fry pan at me ’cause I knocked her whiskey bottle over.
She chucked a fry pan at you?
Beth asked, wide-eyed. Why’d she do that?
Because she was out of sorts,
Abby said.
Because she was drinking,
Jenny said, licking bits of mush off her spoon.
Jenny Hubbard is only six years old, but the growing season is short in the North Woods, and children, like the corn, have to come up fast if they are to come up at all.
"Your mamma drinks