A Map of The World (1994)

I read this years ago, but still remember hating it. Like so many novels, the author uses a shocking death to make the novel significant. I'm so tired of that, and this novel just didn't justify the tragedy (then again, I even blame Wallace Stegner for the death of a child in Angle of Repose, a novel I believe is otherwise brilliant) ( )

on Monday, May 31, 2004 I wrote:

I loved this book.After reading 3 pages I came to the shocking realisation that I had already read this book.I still don't know when, and how, where i have read it, but it did not really matter, cause i wanted to re read it anyway and it was very nice to do this in English.Loved the writing style of Jane Hamilton.I felt the fear and guilt of the main character.Thinking how I would react if I would have been in her shoes and I did not pay enough attention when i was babysitting and something would happen to the child.A Real Powerful book.thanks meshe ( )

this book started out so intense, it was almost brutal to read. i felt like it got a bit less heavy as it went along (ironic considering the subject matter - sexual abuse of a 6 year old) but remained pretty intense. i was always wanting to read on and keep turning the pages, but needing to put the book down and sort of shake it off every so often. well done.

i'm not sure this will resonate out of context, but these short few sentences exemplifies, for me, the intensity and just how brutal and honest the first third of this book was:

"In church I would try my best to cry enough to make an impression, but not so much that I couldn't stop. Because the service was not much more than a show, like a wedding, a clean and public accounting of the horror and mess that had gone before. [P] I took a deep breath and licked my lips as I rounded the bend into the vestibule. The casket was before us, the white casket with gold trim around the edges, as if it had come with a little girl's vanity and canopy bed set." ( )

Several years ago I noticed a copy of Jane Hamilton's A Map of the World and stuffed it into my bulging bag to purchase. I recognized it as having been a big seller and remembered hearing of Hamilton as a wonderful literary writer. Then the book sat on my shelf until recently when I had time between review books to explore a little. I hadn't noticed it was also an Oprah pick or I might not have bought it to begin with. I haven't had much luck with her book club choices.

As I opened the cover a couple weeks ago, I discovered a previous reader had left a post-it note: "An awful lot of introspective and retrospective in the beginning. Heats up a bit when trial and jail episodes are told." It was signed with the reader's initials. If that note hadn't been there, I think I would have given up on the story before I had gotten very far, but thanks to it I persevered.

To say I liked A Map of the World would be going too far. However, the story with all that introspection and retrospection made me think. I did get involved with the characters and the concept of how we have a tenuous grasp at best on our own lives, and in the blink of an eye it can all come spiraling out of control. A farm couple, Howard and Alice, struggling to make their living and working hard have two small daughters. They are friends with a couple who also have two daughters and one day while all four girls are at the farm, the friends' youngest daughter wanders away and drowns in their pond. Alice has a breakdown.

Alice has been working part-time as the elementary school nurse. A boy she dislikes who has been abused at home makes some accusations out of spite, and now the whole world has gone crazy in Alice's mind. Meanwhile, sensible, calm Howard can't seem to make sense of the world either.

This is no happily-ever-after story. In fact, I found it depressing reading at a time when I should have been reading cheerful stories. It's definitely food for thought though and I'm not sorry I stuck with it to the end. The quality of Hamilton's writing cannot be denied and I think my literary education is better for having read this book. ( )

The accidental drowning of her best friend's two-year old (Lizzy) while she is babysitting leads to the destruction of Alice's reputation, and the end of her family's "back to the land" lifestyle. The characters are extremely well developed. I loved this book. ( )