The Red Garden

Not my favorite book by Hoffman. I am a huge fan of magical realism in books, I love how authors can write a bit of fanciful magic into a realistic book. I think that is how life should be, everyday viewed with a bit of wonder. On this level, The Red Garden delivered. On others, I was left a little wanting more.

The story in this book flows through time like the novel's Eel River, hopping from one generation to the next, with one character being somehow related to another in a previous chapter, whether it is niece, great-grandaughter, etc. Some of the stories I really enjoyed - the story with Johnny Appleseed, and the girl and the "monster" were my two favorites. I am going to say this for those out there who are like me, and can't stand show more when animals in books die- there are many deaths of beloved animals in this book. One story in particular, reminiscent of the Greyfriar's Bobby, killed me. I couldn't stand it, and I couldn't figure out why Hoffman kept throwing this heartwrenching animal stuff into the book. I also mentioned I was left wanting - the stories were short stories, and by the time you felt connected to a character, their particular story was over. I felt robbed in these instances.

As for recommending it? If you are not a Hoffman fan already, this is not a good one to start with. It is not her best work, in my opinion, and while you can get a sense of her style, it is lacking. If I didn't already like her, I would never have finished this book. I saw glimpses of the Hoffman I liked, but it was not enough.

This book, like The Kitchen House, to me was about love in all its forms, good, bad, ugly. More than anything, that is what I took away. The characters were imperfect, yet they all loved one thing more than anything in the world. show less

The Red Garden reads like a collection of interconnected short stories that weave together a generational tapestry of the Brady, Partridge, Starr, and Mott families in the small town of Blackwell, Massachusetts in the Berkshires. Each chapter is a treasure, and subtly communicates concepts of generational trauma, generational legacy, and something altogether a bit magical. The scenery isn't just a backdrop but an essential role in this drama, which is peppered with moments of light-heartedness. Hoffman is telling a tale of lives and while the stories of each person are interesting enough, it is the artful way in which she reaches the thread back to an earlier story and loops it in that made this book compelling. There are elements of show more magical realism: bonds with bears, a garden that turns all plants red, transformations, and ghosts, but it never distracts from the core humanity of the stories. On the contrary, these elements help illuminate the potential magic in our imaginations and maybe even our lives. show less

Six-word review: Linked stories explore dimensions of solitude.

Extended review:

When it comes to fiction, I'm not much of a day tripper. I prefer long journeys. So I don't read many short stories, not when I can settle into a hefty novel and live with it for a while.

For the Kindle, however, it's nice to have some brief reading matter to pick up on my way out the door when I'm going to be sitting in a waiting room or taking someone on an errand. So, without seeking it out or particularly choosing it, I just sort of happened to find myself reading "The Bear's House," the first story in Alice Hoffman's The Red Garden.

This, my friends, is what serendipity is for.

The first of these lovely stories, which together span more than two hundred show more years, sets the scene and the tone: in an eighteenth-century settlement in the Berkshires of western Massachusetts, an unconventional young woman's courage and resourcefulness save a snowbound village from starvation. Hallie Brady, like the main characters in the stories that follow, lives within herself, a part of and yet apart from the community. The bond that she forms with an orphaned bear cub imparts a mystical quality that tinges all fourteen of these contemplative tales.

Each of the individual protagonists is out of step with the community, and yet not disconnected from it. The town of Blackwell and the surrounding area, including Hightop Mountain and the Eel River, supply context and definition. Familial links among generations of residents, local lore, and natural and man-made features blend in a tapestry that evokes memories in the reader akin to the collective memories of the villagers. There is a sense that these fourteen tales, selected as if from the portraits in a gallery, are but a few of the many that might be told but that remain tantalizingly beyond reach. The evolution of place names and folklore and the commemoration in ritual of past events remind us of the inextricable threads of history, tradition, and myth.

Taken together, these stories form a cycle with universal themes of survival and loss, belonging and isolation, and existential aloneness. I found them beautiful and satisfying.

(Kindle edition) show less

This is an exquisite collection of short stories about the people who live in the isolated town of Blackwell, Massachussets -- and I don't usually care for short stories.

I haven't read a lot of Alice Hoffman's books, but the ones I have read show her to be a writer very much in tune with the secret magic in life, as well as -- if you'll forgive the hackneyed phrase -- the magic of the human heart.

And Hoffman doesn't just tell the stories of the humans of Blackwell. Bears, eels, apple trees, residences, a river, and the eponymous red garden all have important stories of their own, although they are never point of view characters. In fact, I should confess that one of the reasons I liked this book so much was because of the repeated, show more vivid presence of bears weaving in and out of the human narratives.

The stories are all stand-alone, but each new story weaves an increasingly detailed and rich tapestry of Blackwell and its environs, as people -- and homes and eels and bears and ghosts -- carry forward the heritage of almost-forgotten ancestors. show less

The Red Garden by Alice Hoffman is a series of interconnected short stories about the founding, growth and development of a small town in the Berkshires of Massachusetts and the people who lived there or passed through. Originally named Beartown, it was eventually renamed Blackwell.

Reading about this small town is much like reading a condensed history of America as wars, epidemics, and politics frame each story but this is a book written by Alice Hoffman so there are touches of magic and the paranormal as well. I often felt like I was reading a fairy tale. In all there are 14 stories offered in chronological order that take us from the towns’ beginning in 1750 up to the present. Some of the stories had a greater impact than others, show more but overall I am in awe at both Hoffman’s imagination and writing ability.

Haunting and luminous, The Red Garden seems to be a bouquet celebrating New England. In rich and colorful words, Alice Hoffman gives us a vivid picture of the traditions and spirit that are to be found in this corner of America. show less

I was a little unsure about reading another Alice Hoffman book because I disliked Practical Magic. But the Red Garden was much better than I expected. This is essential a book of short stories that revolve around a town in Massachusetts, starting with its founding in 1750 and continuing until the 1990's.
The first story "The Bear's House" is about the founding families and how the town comes to be. It revolves around Hallie Brady, who perseverance and gumption prevents everyone from starving and surviving their first winter. In the process she befriends a bear cub and the magic of Blackwell begins. The remainder of the stories follow her descendants until the present, each with their own short story.
The premise was good, but it all felt show more stilted, I didn't really connect with any of the characters and therefore didn't really connect with the book. It was a meh read for me.
For additional reviews please see my blog at www.adventuresofabibliophile.blogspot.com show less

The Red Garden by Alice Hoffman; shorts; (5*)

Alice Hoffman, my favorite contemporary author, is a quiet sort of writer, not known for showy prose, whirlwind plots, or doorstop blockbusters. However what she does she does very well. She creates memorable images and conveys moments of emotional intensity using spare prose and enviable stylistic restraint. In a single sentence, she can create a world or destroy it utterly. The simplicity of her prose belies its emotional power which often sneaks up on her audience unaware as they read her novels. For it turns out that in addition to being a talented observer and a gifted stylist Hoffman is a masterful storyteller.

This is especially true The Red Garden which is a collection of linked short show more stories that tell the history of fictional Blackwell, Massachusetts from its founding in 1750 to the late 20th century. This is a very small town which causes the same handful of surnames to surface from story to story and that the same handful of tall tales, gossip and legends persists from generation to generation. Careful readers will see how these myths grow out of the history of the community and how people's stories shape place as much as geography or historical events do.

Blackwell was known in its earliest years as Bearsville due to the large population of bears dotting nearby Hightop Mountain. The opening story about the earliest settlers' salvation by a young woman named Hallie Brady sums up many of the novel's themes and motifs; a plucky but melancholy young woman who longs for love and finds it only in the most surprising places, an intense but uneasy relationship between humans and the natural environment, an undercurrent of magic and mystery, a legacy of loss and sorrow. These themes rise again and again, taking on the force of myth as they repeat themselves through the generations.

Alice Hoffman is often known as a magic realist and The Red Garden is no exception. Ghosts, whether real or imaginary, surface again and again, their stories rooted in actual history, their recurrence a reminder that stories outlive their tellers. Hoffman relies at times on familiar archetypes such as the story of the eel wife but in a way that works perfectly with the very particular western Massachusetts environment she has created. And then there's the red garden of the novel's title, where the soil is red as blood and everything that's planted there also grows blood red, a symbol of the uncomfortable but inevitable intertwining of nature and culture, of love and loss.

The emotional level of The Red Garden can sneak up on you as the author conveys awful incidents, intense passions and haunting images in the simplest, most matter of fact prose. But this seeming simplicity, this careful restraint, also highlights the truths she conveys and the wonders that inhabit each page of her marvelous stories. "A story can still entrance people even while the world is falling apart," writes Hoffman. Blackwell seems at times a town outside of history even when history arrives, as it does from time to time, on these people's doorsteps. Their stories, however, timeless yet timely, will entrance readers from all times and places.

Alice Hoffman's works always entrance me. show less