Hanna's Daughters

Hanna's Daughters

3.54 of 5 stars 3.54  ·  rating details  ·  2,233 ratings  ·  265 reviews
Anna has returned from visiting her mother. Restless and unable to sleep, she wanders through her parents' house, revisiting the scenes of her childhood. In a cupboard drawer, folded and pushed away from sight, she finds a sepia photograph of her grandmother, Hanna, whom she remembers as old and forbidding, a silent stranger enveloped in a huge pleated black dress. Now, lo...more
Paperback, 320 pages
Published October 3rd 2002 by Orion mass market paperback (first published January 1st 1994)
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Corinne
I'm still reeling from the depth of this book. Hanna's Daughters is a story of three generations of Swedish women, trying their hardest to find out who they are in a world that never seems to fit them completely. Hanna, Johanna and Anna - grandmother, mother and daughter, their lives winding through Swedish history: war and famine, prosperity and vague pleasures, from a mountain cabin on a lake in the mid 1800s to the streets of modern Göteborg.

The narrative is both personal and real, each women...more
Cynthia
I didn't get this book. The book tells the life story of 3 women Hanna (grandmother of Anna, mother to Joanna), Joanna (other of Anna), and Anna living in Sweden.

What I liked about the book: Hanna's lifestory was very interesting. Born to a poor country family during the last half of 1800's, Hanna's life was a grim struggle. She was a servant for her uncle and cruel aunt. She was raped, then viewed as a whore by the town, and had a boy by the time she was 13 years old. Later she married the mil...more
Brenna Bonner
Mar 13, 2008 Brenna Bonner rated it 4 of 5 stars Recommends it for: all families
A memoir of a family on the Norway/Sweden boarder by the 4 generations of women, Maja-Lisa, Hanna, Johanna, and Anna. The author reveals how generational differences within a family can cause misunderstandings and strain. How can one transition from a farming life to city life? How can children who grew up in town relate to their grandparents/parents who seem "country" and "uneducated"? How can the grandparents/parents help their children navigate a completely unknown world that doesn't value th...more
Linda
Growing up in a three-generation household in which my grandmother lived with my family for nearly 40 years, Hanna’s Daughters held a special fascination for me. The author found an interesting voice for the three, really four, generations of Swedish women who were introduced in the first and third persons. The younger generation discovered the older generation through letters and journals as well. That which rang most deeply for me was the disconnection and sometimes isolation between mothers a...more
Elaine
Somewhat hard to follow at times. Maybe lost in translation?

Karl XII, King of Sweden-Karl XII was born in 1682. He was the son of King Karl XI and Ulrika Eleonora. He became king when he was only 15 years old, because of the death of his father in 1697. He continued his father's concentration of power to the monarchy. This was the old struggle for power between the aristocracy and the king, and now the aristocrats were losing. When he was crowned, he himself put the crown on his head to show tha...more
Xirxe
Das Thema des Romans ist schnell erzählt: Die Lebensgeschichte dreier Frauen einer Familie in Schweden aus aufeinanderfolgenden Generationen, Großmutter, Mutter, Tochter. Daneben wird der Leserin und dem Leser in beeindruckender Art und Weise die Entwicklung der schwedischen Gesellschaft über zwei Jahrhunderte vor Augen geführt.
Beeindruckend finde ich wie es der Autorin gelingt, jeder ihrer Protagonistinnen eine eigene Sprache zu geben, die nicht nur die Zeit, sondern ebenso die Lebensverhältni...more
Iris
Hanna's Daughters: A Novel of Three Generations is the type of book that one would expect to be on Oprah's book club list, due to its focus on women's histories and lives. Beginning in 1871 and ending in 1986 the lives of Hanna, Johanna, and Anna are traced through personal and social history. Hanna's story is told in a narrative story form, but Johanna and Anna speak from the first person. There is a thread of magic running through the book which never quite solidifies, but maybe that is requ...more
Bonnie Jeanne
This is a wonderful read. It starts out a bit slow, and a bit confusing. I wished many times I had written a family tree to keep track of the characters. However, by the time I was halfway through, I had a pretty good handle on the names. The story switches generations, but the style of narration changes, too, so I never got confused. [return:][return:]What I love is the history of Sweden, and the bits about how the Socialist Party came to be in Sweden, and that there isn't ever blame placed on...more
Laurel-Rain
Three generations of Swedish women whose lives are linked through a century of great love and great loss vividly people this family saga.

Told from the points of view of Hanna, her daughter Johanna, and granddaughter Anna, "Hanna's Daughters: A Novel" is a spellbinding tale that almost immediately grabs the reader.

In the beginning, we meet Johanna, suffering from Alzheimer's disease, and visited by her daughter Anna, a writer who is divorced from her husband Rikard and is the mother of two daught...more
Dyana
The description of this book is that it is the story of three generations of Swedish women - but, in actuality, it's about four generations of Swedish women. There is Maja-Lisa, Hanna, Johanna, and Anna. Maja-Lisa buries four children who have died from disease and famine. She must start her family over again but focuses her attention on her dead children rather than the live ones. Hanna comes from a poor country family, is uneducated, and is brutally raped at age twelve and has a child, Ragnar,...more
Becky
The multi-generational novel set in Sweden actually covers 4 generations of interesting, and not always likeable, women from 1871 to 1981. The most fascinating character is Hanna, raped at 12 and giving birth at 13 at a time when such a "disgrace" placed the "sin" on the woman. The family, very poor and unsophisticated, is portrayed in a very realistic, blunt manner. Luck is on Hanna's side as an older man sees her value and creates a home for her. However, the internal struggles, the superstiti...more
Tess Mertens-Johnson
Books like this make me glad I was born in the generation I did.
Hanna's daughters follow the life of Hanna, her daughter Johanna, and her daughter Anna. Hanna's story begins in 1871 with her rape at 12 and birth of a son at 13. Her life as a marked woman and later marriage which brought about many miscarriages (STDs not know at the time?) and then her daughter Johanna. Then Johanna is raised and bears Anna, who is writing this book in search of her own calling in life. While writing it she finds...more
Alesa
This was a fascinating book, and would be enjoyed by two audiences: women in general, and people of Swedish descent. It traces three generations of mothers/daughters, from 19th century Sweden on the farm to urban living in the present. The language is gorgeous. The relationships are (predictably) fraught with tension and guilt. But what was most fascinating to me was learning about rural life in old Sweden, and how hard it was. I didn't know, for instance, that the years of the Irish Potato Fami...more
Kirsten
This book is about three generations of Swedish women starting from the tough life of a farmer's wife to the city transplant and the development of modern urban life and socialism in Sweden. I am not so much interested in Swedish history and farm life as I am in Norwegian farm life, but the setting for the first generation turns out to be on the Norwegian border and to be not far away from the town my mother was born in.

The book is framed by Anna, the third generation who is writing a book abou...more
Lysanxia
Je viens tout juste de terminer ce roman qui m'a beaucoup remué. D'habitude, je n'aime pas spécialement ce type d'écriture, un brin sèche, distante, à la poésie un peu froide. Finalement, cette chronique familiale m'a tellement tenue en haleine que je l'ai terminée en deux jours.
L'auteure relate la destinée de trois femmes à travers trois générations, de la Suède du XIXème siècle finissant à celle des années 1980. Outre l'aspect historique réellement passionnant (surtout en ce qui concerne Hanna...more
Femke
Marianne Frederiksson beschrijft het leven van een kleindochter, dochter en moeder. In de drie generaties, die op vele vlakken sterk van mekaar verschillen (van simpele boerendochter tot hoogopgeleide stadsvrouw), laat ze zien hoe gelijk ze eigenlijk zijn en hoeveel hun gedrag bepaald wordt door wat hun moeders hen leerden. Hoewel de vrouwen streven naar onafhankelijkheid en zelfstandigheid, schetst de auteur dat feminisme slechts een illusie is en dat het zelfs tegengewerkt wordt door de vrouw...more
Janneke
Anna, de dochter en kleindochter in het boek, beseft na een bezoek aan haar demente moeder Johanna hoe weinig zij eigenlijk van haar weet. Dat brengt haar ertoe het spoor terug te volgen om zo te ontdekken waardoor de persoonlijkheden van haar grootmoeder, Hanna, haar moeder, Johanna, en haarzelf zijn gevormd. Haar grootmoeder, Hanna, was een boerendochter uit Dalfsland die op haar twaalfde op brute wijze is verkracht, maar later toch een gezin heeft gesticht met de molenaar John Broman. Haar do...more
Adri
The book started off rather slowly and was quite confusing at first - especially since the three women had such similar names - Hanna, Johanna and Anna - and there being a number of other characters with the same names. However, once that gets sorted out one is really drawn into the story which is sad beyond words, but also rather beautiful.

Definitely an author whose other books I will read. I find it very interesting to read about countries other than those which are anglophone as it is almost...more
Åsa Von Westerberg
Absolutely HATE IT!!! :-S Must be one of the most over rated authors EVER...! I´ve read two of her books and this was the first. I thought maybe the others would be slightly better, since I have friends who tell me they 'loooove' Marianne Fredriksson (maybe they´re joking), but the second one was also crappy!! Her books are amongst the worst nonsense I´ve ever forced myself to read - couldn´t even finish the second one, gave up a few pages from the end. The authors use of language is horrible an...more
Laura LeAnn
I picked up this book a few years ago in a book trade in a small town in NC. I was intrigued by the setting and the following of three generations of Swedish women. Since I know very little about Swedish history and geography, I learned a lot from the novel and the descriptions of the physical setting. The depth of the characters and their relationships with one another and how these relationships affect the generations after was amazing. It seemed so real I often forgot I was reading a novel an...more
Jacki
For me, this book was stunning. Maybe because it was given to me by my mom a couple of weeks ago after she read it... just knowing that she read it and it touched her enough for her to give it to me...

This is the story of 3 generations of women and how they related to each other. It was neat to hear about it from the mother's point of view and then from the daughter's.... and it made me want to know more about my grandmother who has been dead since I was very young.

Beyond the story (which I lov...more
Paula
Hanna's Daughters is a beautifully written account of three generations of Scandinavian women. Anna is dealing with impending old age and the sickness and death of both of her parents. As she struggles through this hard time, she finds herself needing to know more about her mother and her grandmother's lives. On this journey, she reveals so much about her grandmother Hanna's strength growing up in a poor region of farm country a century ago. Sent out into service as a young girl, raped at 12 and...more
Amber
Hanna's Daughters spans the lives of three generations of women of Norwegian decent. Johanna, while researching material for her thesis begins to discover greater truths about herself. As she uncovers the histories of her Grandmother and Mother Johanna discovers struggles she never imagined and strength she might have inherited.

A great generational novel about women and the things they must suffer to keep going forward in life.

A little confusing, being that the main characters are Hanna, Anna, a...more
Elizabeth
The synopsis Goodreads has for this book isn't even remotely related to the book I just read, Hanna's Daughters by Marianne Fredriksson. This is the story of 3 generations of Swedish women: grandmother, mother, daughter. They've each had a different life yet each has had to deal with great loss. It is the story of how the events of one generation affect the next generation. It was a little hard to keep all the names and places straight. The time period is from the second half of the 1800's throu...more
Hazel McHaffie
A family chronicle tracing the lives of three generations of Swedish women. The more I read these sprawling sagas the more I recognise the difficulty of retaining the context for different characters and in this one more than most I needed a family tree beside me to keep me straight, because even the names (or derivatives of them) were inherited and reappeared. I bought Hanna's Daughters because it deals with Alzheimer's but learned more about the genre of writing than about hinging a story arou...more
Cissy
I had a hard time figuring out if I liked this or not. It's the story of a grandmother, her daughter, and her daughter, starting with the grandmother (Hanna) when she was a child. It takes place in Sweden (it is actually a translation of a Swedish book) and I liked the history and culture. I would not say it is historical fiction, though. I just mean since it covered something like 120 years, it was interesting seeing how things changed (and didn't). However, almost all the relationships are ser...more
Tracy
Even though this is written about Scandinavian women, this story echoes true in many families that have come from such meager roots. And though the child and the grandchildren have come so far financially speaking, they don't come so far away from the habits and the mindset of those beginnings. This was a very touching book. It reminded me of many stories that I'd heard of my own great-grandparents and of my grandparents. I think that this is a good read for anyone.
Hope
I thought I was over that habit of resisting the last couple pages of a book I love. Guess not!

Hanna's Daughters is a beautiful story about 3 generations of Swedish women, their relationships, their joys and sorrows. I did not realize it at first, but I was deeply affected by the three women and their stories. Sympathetic emotions is what I experienced--not sympathy for the characters, but whatever they were feeling, I was feeling, long after putting the book down.

A beautiful book, I recommend i...more
Maria
Family saga of three generations of Swedish women. Hannah, born to a miller in the late 19th century is the mother of Johanna who moves to a city and discovers the wonders of modern world while Anna has arrived in a postmodern culture.
The story is rather blunt, but what caught my attention are the detailed descriptions of everyday life in the past and the role of women back then. Makes me glad to live in the 21st century and enjoy all the advantages of our age!
Janine
The first page got me hooked though I have to say the translation from the Norwegian/Swedish was quite bland and matter of fact. This caused me to reduce my score - the story was of a great great grand-daughter looking back through the generations to her great great grandmother, grandmother, and mother and examining her own life through the experiences of these family members. An interesting story and somewhat historical since it goes back to the later 1800s and of course society changed so much...more
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Marianne Fredriksson was a Swedish author who worked and lived in Roslagen and Stockholm. Before becoming a novelist, she was a journalist on various Swedish newspapers and magazines, including Svenska Dagbladet.

Fredriksson published fifteen novels, most of which have been translated into English, German, Dutch and other languages. Most of her earlier books are based on biblical stories. A central...more
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“She had realized there are only fragments, that 'memories' always consist of fragments the mind puts together into a pattern, adapts a picture staked out early without the need for a conenction with anything that really happened. A great deal is misunderstood by small children, then stored as images that attract similar images, confirming and reinforcing.” 8 people liked it
“When our patterns are threatened by new facts, reason is seldom the victor: 'I know what I think, so don't go confusing me with new opinions.” 6 people liked it
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