Donna Foley Mabry

Be kind, for everyone you meet is fighting a hard battle.
-Ian Maclaren

The quote by Maclaren kept ringing in my mind as I was reading Maude, and days later, she is still on my mind.

Maude is a heartbreakingly beautiful story about a young woman's life. Married at 14, a widow at 16, and willing to do anything necessary for her family. Her story had me going through an emotional rollercoaster wondering, "What could possibly happen next?"

Donna Mabry artistically tells the story of her show more grandmother's life in a way that had me on the edge of my seat and reading late into the night. We always understand how difficult it was to be a woman in the 1900s, but "hearing" the story of one woman's life makes it all the more realistic and relatable.

Maude left me with the book hangover I love to hate and hate to love.

For more of my thoughts on Maude visit: Under Literary Construction: Maude: A Review. show less

I enjoyed reading this book as I found it to echo the lives of my grandparents. Although, they did not have the meanness nor the drinking involved. It was not an easy book to read, as it evoked emotion and heartfelt sorrow for Maude, who struggled so much to be a good person, a good wife, a good mother/grandmother. I adored Maude when I finished the book. Nothing in this time could be as horrific as some of the things she faced, and this was apparently based on the facts of her life.

I didn't realize, until the end of this book, that this was a story about the life of the author's Grandmother, Maude. The book is told in first person, with Maude taking you through her life from the time she is a young girl, at the turn of the 20th Century, through marriage, children, deaths, wars and The Great Depression. This was a true page-turner for me and I truly loved this book.

I do not dole out 5 stars very often. This isn't an eloquent literary crafted book but the main characters voice is so interesting i was engaged from beginning to end. The voice you imagine comes from the past before cars, washing machines, electricity, maternity wards, indoor plumbing. When you buried your babies before you and when women didn't have the vote and were basically at the mercy of their husbands. Maude was born in a small rural hamlet of western Tennessee. She was married at 14 show more and so began her adult life.

It is a non fiction book with some literary license. It was authored by Maude's granddaughter but written in Maude's voice from stories she told her growing up.

It reminded me a lot of Little House on the Prairie but with an adult viewpoint. show less