Beverly Jensen (1953–2003)

Beverly Jensen died in 2003, but her collection of short stories (which taken together form something of a novel) have been published by Viking this year as The Sisters from Hardscrabble Bay. The stories (apparently drawn from family tales) center around two sisters, Avis and Idella Hillock, and take place over the course of their lives, from 1916 through 1987.

From the opening installment (if not from the title itself) it becomes quite clear that this is not going to be a book filled with show more sweetness and light: the girls and their family members face crushing hardships right from the get-go as they deal with some of life's most cruel slings and arrows long before anyone should have to do so. When they leave their rural Canadian home for life in America (small-town Maine in Idella's case, Boston and other cities for Avis), they confront additional pressures and trials throughout their lives. And yet, somehow, a bond of devotion keeps them together, often laughing (even if sometimes through tears) at their shared struggles and triumphs.

Jensen's created some marvelous characters here, from the two Hillock girls themselves, to their hard-drinking and miserable father Bill, to Idella's indomitable and hilarious mother-in-law. The rocky coasts and gritty small towns Jensen captures here are embodied in her writing style; no flowers, just the brutal reality of life as it is. Sometimes very sad, sometimes incredibly amusing (the penultimate story, "Wake," is both at once), and always written with a graceful, passionate strength, these stories deserved to be published, and they deserve to be widely read.

http://philobiblos.blogspot.com/2010/07/book-review-sisters-from-hardscrabble.ht... show less

This story flows from 1916 to 1986, from New Brunswick to Boston, from fathers to sisters to husbands. Idella and Avis are just little girls growing up on poor land in a poor family when their mother dies in childbirth having Emma. Their father Bill is bereft without his loving wife and struggles to care for the girls and their older brother Dalton, and gives Emma away to relatives. The girls make their way south and to partners who cheat on them and cause them to be imprisoned. It's all show more pretty bleak, but there are lyrical and well-told passages which break through into humor and empathy. Idella's first visit to fiancé Eddie's home, complete with awful mother-in-law; her confrontation with a young robber in her grocery store (he spends his evening serving customers and stocking the beer cooler); and Avis and Dalton losing their father's coffin on their way back to New Brunswick during a historic ice storm, are the longer stories and the family legends that bring power and passion to the novel. show less

Idella and Avis are the second and third children of a poor family in rural New Brunswick at the beginning of the 20th century. They have an older brother and, as the story begins, their mother is pregnant with her fourth child. When the mother dies in childbirth, much of the warmth and light goes out of their lives as their father struggles to cope. We follow the sisters to 1986. It's an interesting story with fairly well-drawn characters. I have no real criticisms; it just didn't seem that show more special to me. show less

Jensen has created indelible characters in the form of Idella and Avis, the sisters. They have another sister, Emma, who was given to relatives after their mother died in giving birth to her, and a brother, Dalton, who is enigmatic and seldom seen. Their father, destroyed by grief, rears the elder three children as best he can given his own demons. As they grow up, Idella and Avis go different ways but always keep in touch. There are some uneven moments in this posthumously published book, show more but its strengths outshine them It tells of a time an place - rural Maine in the early part of the 20th century and speaks to what limited choices women had at that time. show less