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Loading... What the Stones Remember: A Life Rediscovered (2004)by Patrick Lane
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Sign up for LibraryThing to find out whether you'll like this book. No current Talk conversations about this book. Lane's memoirs is an interesting blend of his first year of sobriety, spent in the garden, and memories of the rest of his life. He switches back and forth between describing the plants and animals in his garden and a vignette from his past. This is done gracefully, though, and the present is *so* focused on the garden, that you're never confused about which time period you're in. Many reviews have noted how this is a memoir and a gardening book, but I also think it's worth noting that this is also a book about writers. Lane is a writer, and every chapter here contains multiple quotes from other poems and novels (usually not Lane's own). I think reading and writing are almost as prevalent as gardening in this book. As I am not a gardener, I occasionally found the plant descriptions to be tedious. I could appreciate Lane's knowledge and the beautiful ways he described his garden, but occasionally these sections went on just a bit too long for me before leading back into the past. Lane tells about his past in a non-linear fashion. He speaks a lot about his mother, and alludes to many events of his life (his father's murder, his brother's death) for hundreds of pages before he actually describes them in full detail. This strategy kept me reading. I have also lived in or near all of the towns and cities that Lane has lived in, so it was personally enjoyable to recognize the names of nearby lakes, etc. I would recommend this book to anyone who enjoys gardening and plants, the writing process, possibly someone going through the early stages of sobriety, and BC readers. If you aren't sure you could read through long descriptions of plants and gardening, skip this book, though. no reviews | add a review
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In this exquisitely written memoir, poet Patrick Lane describes his raw and tender emergence at age sixty from a lifetime of alcohol and drug addiction. He spent the first year of his sobriety close to home, tending his garden, where he cast his mind back over his life, searching for the memories he'd tried to drown in vodka. Lane has gardened for as long as he can remember, and his garden's life has become inseparable from his own. A new bloom on a plant, a skirmish among the birds, the way a tree bends in the wind, and the slow, measured change of seasons invariably bring to his mind an episode from his eventful past. What the Stones Remember is the emerging chronicle of Lane's attempt to face those memories, as well as his new self--to rediscover his life. In this powerful and beautifully written book, Lane offers readers an unflinching and unsentimental account of coming to one's senses in the presence of nature. No library descriptions found. |
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Google Books — Loading... GenresMelvil Decimal System (DDC)811.54Literature English (North America) American poetry 20th Century 1945-1999LC ClassificationRatingAverage:
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I also felt betrayed by the idea that this is a memoir. It is more a confession and a diary. He does reminisce about his life, but it is done in such way that at times I felt I was eavesdropping in a soliloquy that was never meant to be heard by anyone.
Yet, yet..., there are some jewels in here. The few pages where he talks of his love of words are the best I remember reading from any writer explaining the same love. And the sincere sympathy he portraits for his father’s murderer does reveal something bigger about the man that Patrick Lane must be.
3 stars are maybe unfair. They only mean: “I like it” no more, no less.
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