Crow Lake
A moving New York Times bestseller about siblings, sacrifice and lives that might have been
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3.5 • 2 Ratings
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- $17.99
Publisher Description
After their parents die, the Morrison siblings try to stay together – but one brother’s sacrifice changes them all.
Kate Morrison has spent years away from Crow Lake, the small northern Ontario farming community where her childhood changed in an instant. After her parents died in an accident, she and her siblings clung to one another while trying to remain a family.
Her brilliant brother Matt once seemed destined for a life far beyond the farm. Kate escaped through education and the natural world, but she could not escape the story she had built around Matt’s sacrifice or the neighbouring Pye family’s violence and secrets. Returning home as an adult, she must look again at what she believed she knew.
Crow Lake is a restrained and deeply affecting novel about siblings, rural life, grief, ambition and the cost of survival.
'I've been trying to tell everyone I know about Mary Lawson . . . Each one of her novels is just a marvel' Anne Tyler
'A remarkable novel, utterly gripping...I read it at a single sitting, then I read it again, just for the pleasure of it' Joanne Harris
'Full of blossoming insights and emotional acuity...a compelling and serious page-turner' Observer
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Four children living in northern Ontario struggle to stay together after their parents die in an auto accident in Lawson's fascinating debut, a compelling and lovely study of sibling rivalry and family dynamics in which the land literally becomes a character. Kate Morrison narrates the tale in flashback mode, starting with the fatal car accident that leaves seven-year-old Kate; her toddler sister, Bo; 19-year-old Luke; and 17-year-old Matt to fend for themselves. At first they are divided up among relatives, but the plan changes when Luke gives up his teaching college scholarship to get a job and try to keep them together. The fractured family struggles mightily against the grinding rural poverty of Crow Lake, and the brothers conduct a fierce battle of wills to control their fate, until they both finally land jobs and the family gets some assistance from a neighbor. Unfortunately, that assistance can't overcome the deranged rage of a neighboring farmer, Cyrus Pye, and when Matt becomes involved with Pye's daughter, Maria, a tragic incident robs the brilliant young man of a chance to pursue a career as a naturalist. Kate goes on to become a zoologist at a Toronto college and marry a fellow academic, but her frustration with her brother's fate renders her unable to return to Crow Lake to visit him until the pivotal climax. Lawson delivers a potent combination of powerful character writing and gorgeous description of the land. Her sense of pace and timing is impeccable throughout, and she uses dangerous winter weather brilliantly to increase the tension as the family battles to survive. This is a vibrant, resonant novel by a talented writer whose lyrical, evocative writing invites comparisons to Rick Bass and Richard Ford.
