Rating: ****
Tags: Retired Teachers, Short Stories (Single Author), General, Fantasy, City and Town Life - Maine, Social Change, Fiction, Short Stories, Maine, City and town life, Women, Lang:en
Summary
At times stern, at other times patient, at times perceptive,
at other times in sad denial, Olive Kitteridge, a retired
schoolteacher, deplores the changes in her little town of
Crosby, Maine, and in the world at large, but she doesn’t
always recognize the changes in those around her: a lounge
musician haunted by a past romance; a former student who has
lost the will to live; Olive’s own adult child, who feels
tyrannized by her irrational sensitivities; and her husband,
Henry, who finds his loyalty to his marriage both a blessing
and a curse.
As the townspeople grapple with their problems, mild and
dire, Olive is brought to a deeper understanding of herself and
her life–sometimes painfully, but always with ruthless
honesty. Olive Kitteridge offers profound insights into the
human condition–its conflicts, its tragedies and joys,
and the endurance it requires.
Praise for *Olive Kitteridge*:
“Perceptive, deeply empathetic . . . Olive is the axis
around which these thirteen complex, relentlessly human
narratives spin themselves into Elizabeth Strout’s
unforgettable novel in stories.”
“Fiction lovers, remember this name:
Olive Kitteridge. . . . You’ll never forget her.
. . . [Elizabeth Strout] constructs her stories with rich irony
and moments of genuine surprise and intense emotion. . . .
Glorious, powerful stuff.”
“Funny, wicked and remorseful, Mrs. Kitteridge is a
compelling life force, a red-blooded original. When she’s
not onstage, we look forward to her return. The book is a
page-turner because of her.”
“
Olive Kitteridge still lingers in memory like a
treasured photograph.”
“Rarely does a story collection pack such a gutsy
emotional punch.”
“Strout animates the ordinary with astonishing force.
. . . [She] makes us experience not only the terrors of change
but also the terrifying hope that change can bring: she plunges
us into these churning waters and we come up gasping for
air.”
Starred Review. Thirteen linked tales from Strout (
Abide with Me, etc.) present a heart-wrenching,
penetrating portrait of ordinary coastal Mainers living lives
of quiet grief intermingled with flashes of human connection.
The opening Pharmacy focuses on terse, dry junior high-school
teacher Olive Kitteridge and her gregarious pharmacist husband,
Henry, both of whom have survived the loss of a psychologically
damaged parent, and both of whom suffer painful attractions to
co-workers. Their son, Christopher, takes center stage in A
Little Burst, which describes his wedding in humorous, somewhat
disturbing detail, and in Security, where Olive, in her 70s,
visits Christopher and his family in New York. Strout's fiction
showcases her ability to reveal through familiar
details—the mother-of-the-groom's wedding dress, a
grandmother's disapproving observations of how her
grandchildren are raised—the seeds of tragedy. Themes of
suicide, depression, bad communication, aging and love, run
through these stories, none more vivid or touching than
Incoming Tide, where Olive chats with former student Kevin
Coulson as they watch waitress Patty Howe by the seashore, all
three struggling with their own misgivings about life. Like
this story, the collection is easy to read and impossible to
forget. Its literary craft and emotional power will surprise
readers unfamiliar with Strout.
(Apr.)
Starred Review “Hell. We’re always alone.
Born alone. Die alone,” says Olive Kitteridge,
redoubtable seventh-grade math teacher in Crosby, Maine. Anyone
who gets in Olive’s way had better watch out, for
she crashes unapologetically through life like an emotional
storm trooper. She forces her husband, Henry, the town
pharmacist, into tactical retreat; and she drives her beloved
son, Christopher, across the country and into therapy.
But appalling though Olive can be,
Strout manages to make her deeply human and even
sympathetic, as are all of the characters in this
“novel in stories.” Covering a period of 30-odd
years, most of the stories (several of which were
previously published in the New Yorker and other magazines)
feature Olive as their focus, but in some she
is bit player or even a footnote while other
characters take center stage to sort through their own
fears and insecurities. Though loneliness and loss haunt these
pages, Strout also supplies gentle humor and a
nourishing dose of hope. People are sustained by the rhythms of
ordinary life and the natural wonders of
coastal Maine, and even Olive is
sometimes caught off guard by life’s baffling
beauty. Strout is also the author of the well-received Amy and
Isabelle (1999) and Abide with Me (2006). --Mary Ellen
Quinn
–O: The Oprah Magazine
–USA Today
–
San Francisco Chronicle
–Seattle Post-Intelligencer
–Entertainment Weekly
–The New Yorker
From Publishers Weekly
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