78th out of 401 books
—
296 voters
February
by
Lisa Moore
Longlisted for the Man Booker Prize and Winner for Canada Reads 2013
In 1982, the oil rig Ocean Ranger sank off the coast of Newfoundland during a Valentine's Day storm. All eighty-four men aboard died. February is the story of Helen O'Mara, one of those left behind when her husband, Cal, drowns on the rig. It begins in the present-day, more than twenty-five years later, bu...more
In 1982, the oil rig Ocean Ranger sank off the coast of Newfoundland during a Valentine's Day storm. All eighty-four men aboard died. February is the story of Helen O'Mara, one of those left behind when her husband, Cal, drowns on the rig. It begins in the present-day, more than twenty-five years later, bu...more
Hardcover, 310 pages
Published
June 15th 2009
by House of Anansi Press
(first published 2009)
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I have been waiting for a new book by Lisa Moore and this did not disappoint. I read slowly right from the start, so that I could absorb each essential phrase, to appreciate how one sentence moved to the next, to marvel at a particular paragraph, or to pause at the end of a subsection to reflect on the way Lisa Moore had crafted a scene.
February is a fictional story about how one Newfoundland family of five deals with the loss of husband and father Cal, in the real-life tragic sinking of the of...more
February is a fictional story about how one Newfoundland family of five deals with the loss of husband and father Cal, in the real-life tragic sinking of the of...more
Some may say that this is a book about death or life or love, but for me this is a book about the "ifs" and the "whens."
The plot is irrelevant because whatever the plot is it is only the plot because of the perspective from which the story is told. It is a story of moments, the ifs and whens of one woman's life, and those moments, unrelated but for the woman who experienced them, are the tale.
February is a novel of fragments. And in those fragments is one of the truest stories I've ever read.
I'v...more
The plot is irrelevant because whatever the plot is it is only the plot because of the perspective from which the story is told. It is a story of moments, the ifs and whens of one woman's life, and those moments, unrelated but for the woman who experienced them, are the tale.
February is a novel of fragments. And in those fragments is one of the truest stories I've ever read.
I'v...more
This book languished in a stack on a to-be-read shelf for almost two years, squashed between a Julian Barnes below and some short story anthology above.
It was 31 years ago on Valentine's Day that the Ocean Ranger oil rig sank off the coast of Newfoundland, killing all aboard.
31 years later, on Valentine's Day yesterday, February won the Canada Reads award. (Oh crap, now the masses will like it, it will be popular, and more often than not that means the writing sucks, but jeez, it's Lisa Moore,...more
It was 31 years ago on Valentine's Day that the Ocean Ranger oil rig sank off the coast of Newfoundland, killing all aboard.
31 years later, on Valentine's Day yesterday, February won the Canada Reads award. (Oh crap, now the masses will like it, it will be popular, and more often than not that means the writing sucks, but jeez, it's Lisa Moore,...more
Had I not found out about February through the CBC's Canada Reads top 40 Canadian books list, it is doubtful that I ever would have picked it up. I'm not much in to slow-paced books without a strong storyline or intense characters. But, because of its rave reviews, and an understanding that it is important to break custom once in a while, I gave it a go. Although I'm not likely to recommend it to anyone that is not grieving a profound loss, I'd say I still enjoyed certain elements of the story....more
I tried.
I wanted to like this book. My goal this year was to read each of the five "Canada Reads" choices, so that I could follow along with the CBC debates. These were supposed to be quintessential Canadian novels - the cream of the crop.
Perhaps I made a mistake in trying to read this during February itself - the most grey, depressing time of year here. Maybe in the summer I will try again. In the meantime though, there was so much I just could not like: the main characters frustrated me, I fou...more
I wanted to like this book. My goal this year was to read each of the five "Canada Reads" choices, so that I could follow along with the CBC debates. These were supposed to be quintessential Canadian novels - the cream of the crop.
Perhaps I made a mistake in trying to read this during February itself - the most grey, depressing time of year here. Maybe in the summer I will try again. In the meantime though, there was so much I just could not like: the main characters frustrated me, I fou...more
Again, Moore's prose is lovely. She's got a gift for being poetic without descending into overwrought emotionalism. And I love her ear for the salty tang of Newfoundland English.
Moore has certainly captured the devestation - and even the terror - of the Ocean Ranger disaster. Her descriptions of the rig's last moments, and the men in the water, are gut-wrenching.
I did feel like some of her transitions could be better, particularly in the beginning. There were times when I didn't know what, or...more
Moore has certainly captured the devestation - and even the terror - of the Ocean Ranger disaster. Her descriptions of the rig's last moments, and the men in the water, are gut-wrenching.
I did feel like some of her transitions could be better, particularly in the beginning. There were times when I didn't know what, or...more
I read somewhere that as a writer you should never give up the backstory of your character in the first few pages of the book because an interested reader doesn’t need to know it upfront. Part of the experience is taking the journey with the character and discovering. Lisa Moore does a good job of following this in February. As the story unfolds, we are given a glimpse into the life of Helen O’Mara – a fifty six year old widow and mother of four – who has spent the last 25 years of her life copi...more
This is fiction based largely in Newfoundland, Canada, although its backdrop is based on a real event: the sinking of the oil rig Ocean Ranger, and a woman whose husband died, and the life lived subsequently with four children, and their lives. The book is a set of stories, about the family, before, during and after the disaster. The poignancy of this book lies in the deeply written emotional depth in every day events including loss, loneliness, family trials, family milestones, heartache, joy,...more
FEBRUARY is a story of real people - people who love, laugh, argue,
shop at WalMart and Value Village and raise their children in the best
way that they know how.
FEBRUARY is also a story of loss and grief - grief that is not of the
moment, but rather of the decades. It is the story of three
generations: Helen O*Mara and her husband Cal who perished with the
Ocean Ranger, their four children - John, Cathy, Lulu and Gabrielle -
and their children.
The novel has a complex structure where the past and pres...more
shop at WalMart and Value Village and raise their children in the best
way that they know how.
FEBRUARY is also a story of loss and grief - grief that is not of the
moment, but rather of the decades. It is the story of three
generations: Helen O*Mara and her husband Cal who perished with the
Ocean Ranger, their four children - John, Cathy, Lulu and Gabrielle -
and their children.
The novel has a complex structure where the past and pres...more
Another finalist for the Evergreen award 2010. This novel follows Helen, moving back and forth over time from her early adulthood and life with her husband Cal and more recent times. Cal worked on the Ocean Ranger oil rig and was one of the crew that died when it sank in early 1982. Helen was left pregnant with three young children. We see how this has affected her life, and we also see the effect on her children, most noticably on John, her eldest.
The changes in time let us see how some things...more
The changes in time let us see how some things...more
This was a love story of another kind. I loved this book! One I will soon not forget, I so enjoy when a book has the ability to adjust your attitudes and change your perceptions. I hope I will look at my husband in a new light since reading this, I am right now, but you know how momentum fails.
I fell in love with the main character immediately, I wanted to know how she dealt with her life, her family after the tragic loss of her husband. The story was told in choppy fragments, which I felt blend...more
I fell in love with the main character immediately, I wanted to know how she dealt with her life, her family after the tragic loss of her husband. The story was told in choppy fragments, which I felt blend...more
I may have rated this book more highly had she not used the strange chapter jumps or whatever they may be called. I can't help but think it is an author weakness to do so as unable to maintain a narrative momentum otherwise. I am now reading her 2005 novel Alligator so may be unfair to compare. Although it also jumps between separate characters, repeatedly. Am only just started and may sign off without finishing if it is too annoying. There are too many good books to read without convincing myse...more
I don't remember the sinking of the Ocean Ranger off Newfoundland in 1982, but I was only 14 at the time (such a self-involved age) and living through the most grief-producing event of my own life-- my parents had decided to tear us from our friends and familiar setting (seven years since we had been schlepped from New Brunswick to Ontario) and displace the family to Alberta, and although my father didn't work in oil, he was chasing the good times of the oil boom that brought so many Maritimers...more
"Solitude, she thinks, is a time-release drug... it enters the system slowly and you can become addicted. It's not an addiction, it is a craft."
On Valentine's Day 1982, the Ocean Ranger, an assumed-to-be unsinkable oil rig, sank during a vicious storm out in the North Atlantic. Thirty years later the tragic events of that night still resonate deeply with the affected communities of Newfoundland. Families lost fathers, brothers, sons and lovers during a night when hope and prayers for a miracle t...more
On Valentine's Day 1982, the Ocean Ranger, an assumed-to-be unsinkable oil rig, sank during a vicious storm out in the North Atlantic. Thirty years later the tragic events of that night still resonate deeply with the affected communities of Newfoundland. Families lost fathers, brothers, sons and lovers during a night when hope and prayers for a miracle t...more
I don't want to give a negative review to a book about the 1982 Ocean Ranger disaster. I don't want to appear insensitive to the people affected by that tragic event. The families and friends of those lost have my sympathies.
But I really didn't like this book.
Lisa Moore writes beautifully descriptive passages. She writes beautifully descriptive passages about scattered, disconnected and, frankly, not very interesting events. Finishing this book was a chore, and I only did so because I had to giv...more
But I really didn't like this book.
Lisa Moore writes beautifully descriptive passages. She writes beautifully descriptive passages about scattered, disconnected and, frankly, not very interesting events. Finishing this book was a chore, and I only did so because I had to giv...more
A stunning and at times haunting read, which had be lost in some of the passages throughout the book. It will easily be one of my favourite reads of the year.
There were many times I was completely lost in the writing and the passages throughout the book, the author is a spectacular writer and I found myself constantly making notes on many passages throughout the book - sometimes two or three on the same page. It was absolutely stunning and it helped the reader get inside Helen's mind and almos...more
There were many times I was completely lost in the writing and the passages throughout the book, the author is a spectacular writer and I found myself constantly making notes on many passages throughout the book - sometimes two or three on the same page. It was absolutely stunning and it helped the reader get inside Helen's mind and almos...more
Lisa Moore’s ‘February’ is not unlike listening to a particularly evocative piece of music. Each sentence is exquisitely composed with exact, appropriate words lined up in the perfect order. Her writing is beautiful on the reader's "ear" so to speak, and the images it calls forth are vivid and detailed. The novel has no particular sequenced narrative but repeatedly takes the reader from era to era, and back again, in protagonist, Helen Omara’s life before and after the death of her husband, a vi...more
11/14/2010: This novel is extraordinary. Lisa Moore writes the most gorgeous prose I've read in a long time. Very spare, but the word choice is precise and the descriptions convey a huge amount in those few words. It's hard to give an example--I kept looking for a small section, so I could demonstrate--because it's all part of the larger whole; you get to know the characters (especially Helen, the protagonist) through the smallest of details, and that is hard to show by reading only a few senten...more
The 2013 Canada Reads candidate from Atlantic Canada, this book is historical fiction based upon the loss of 87 men who drowned when their oil rigger sank off the coast of Newfoundland in 1982. It features the family of one of the men in particular. Very poignant. I wasn't sure that I would like it during the first few pages, but once I was hooked it was compelling. Everything revolves around the impact of the wreck on the lives of the characters, yet what happens to these people as the years pa...more
Jul 26, 2011
Ian Young
added it
This is a thoughtful and beautifully written book,based on a true incident when an oil rig was last off the Canadian coast. The book follows the life of the widow of one of the workers who died, and the focus is the long and slow process by which she deals with her grief and eventually moves into a new phase of her life. Facebook reviews of this book seem very mixed, and sometimes focus on the fact that not much seems to happen. This is true, but misses the entire point of the novel. This is not...more
I like the deep interiority of this novel--rather, the way that she gets at the interiority of her characters while describing them in different moments, from the outside in. I feel like she's a contemporary Virginia Woolf, in a sense, seeking to reproduce consciousness through language. I have to agree with some of the other reviewers, however, that the haphazard structure was a chore. I felt an old-fashioned yearning for a bit more cause and effect. Manipulative plotting? Perhaps. But I wanted...more
I didn't think I'd enjoy this. It turns out, I did. A lot. The writing style takes a bit of getting used to, as it's all memories and dreamy thoughts, but once you do it hooks you and it's such a great book. Not only because of the story itself which is very interesting (it centers around the wife and family left behind by a man who died when the "Ocean Ranger" oil rig sank on Valentines Day 1982), but because Lisa Moore is a poet through and through. Her metaphors were vivid yet hazy...it's har...more
Jun 02, 2011
Arlene
added it
Centred around a real event – the sinking of an oil rig off the coast of Newfoundland in 1982 – February is the story of how one family is affected, immediately after the tragedy and 20 years on. The novel is recounted mainly from the point of view of Helen, who becomes a widow when the Ocean Ranger goes down. She is left, not only without her beloved husband, but with the continuing responsibility of bringing up their three small children while pregnant with a fourth. Her voice is set against t...more
A friend told me about this book and said she'd like to read it with her book club. After reading reviews and learning that it was the winner of Canada Reads, I also recommended it to my book club. I just finished reading it this morning and although I liked it, I didn't love it. I was very surprised when it ended...I felt there was more to the story and was a bit disappointed that it would not be shared with the reader. I struggled to relate to Helen and tried to put myself in her shoes through...more
Honestly, it was a struggle to keep reading this book until the end. The language was beyond irritating and extremely confusing. It was written almost as if the characters were taking down every thought as they move through their lives. It was constantly switching from past to present and from character to character and I could never keep up. Just when I thought I understood what was going on, the whole thing shifted again and I was completely lost. There didn't really seem to be much of a plot...more
There were things about this book that I loved, and things that annoyed me. I loved the "sparse" and colloquial use of language (I found myself reading it in my head with a mish-mash of every one of the people I've known in my life with a strong Newfoundland accent), but then at times I found the author rambled on about things that really didn't make any sense.
The best thing about the book is the very raw description of this woman who's had her life force sucked out of her with the loss of her h...more
The best thing about the book is the very raw description of this woman who's had her life force sucked out of her with the loss of her h...more
I was surprised by how much I liked this book. I listened to Canada Reads and was a (disappointed) supporter of Indian Horse, which I thought was a stellar book. I didn't love what I heard about February, but I thought I owed it a read. Even though I would say I am someone who is prone to find anything the least bit sad depressing, I wasn't especially depressed by this book. I actually thought it was about the risks we take in life and how sometimes there are rewards and sometimes there are trag...more
Lisa Moore's writing style reminds me a bit of Carol Shields. This is based on the true story of the oil rig that went down off the coast of Newfoundland in 1982, losing all men aboard. Told in third person, it travels back and forth in time and between characters, to follow the widow of one of the lost men and her four children.
In my opinion, the best lines in the book can be found on page 238: "That's the enigma of the present. The past has already infiltrated it; the past has set up camp, de...more
In my opinion, the best lines in the book can be found on page 238: "That's the enigma of the present. The past has already infiltrated it; the past has set up camp, de...more
"The more time passed, the more convincing Helen became. There was the smell of chicken nuggets; there were bread crumbs under the toaster. She made lunches and had the oil company fill the tank and she went to the children's Christmas concerts. Her lowest point ever was when the pipes froze. Down in the basement with its earthen floor, low ceiling, and damp stone walls, going at the pipes with a blowtorch. The hawking sputter as the flame shot out, strange blue, and the hiss. It frightened the...more
This moving book captures powerfully the sheer physicality of enormous, yearning grief. Lisa Moore has forged a memorable portrait of a brave, no nonsense individual on her journey to a form of peace after devastating loss. Moore traces in plain-spoken but evocative prose Helen O'Mara's happy, passionate early life as a wife and mother, to the shattering loss of her beloved husband Cal in the Ocean Ranger disaster, to her struggle to raise her family and keep herself emotionally afloat. Moore en...more
| topics | posts | views | last activity | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| CBC Books: February by Lisa Moore discussion | 11 | 56 | Feb 11, 2013 10:16am | |
| February | 1 | 20 | Feb 27, 2010 04:02pm |
Lisa Moore has written two collections of stories, Degrees of Nakedness and Open, as well as a novel, Alligator.
Open and Alligator were both nominated for the Giller Prize. Alligator won the Commonwealth Prize for the Canadian Caribbean Region and the ReLit Award, and Open won the Canadian Authors' Association Jubilee Prize for Short Fiction.
Lisa has also written for television, radio, magazines (...more
More about Lisa Moore...
Open and Alligator were both nominated for the Giller Prize. Alligator won the Commonwealth Prize for the Canadian Caribbean Region and the ReLit Award, and Open won the Canadian Authors' Association Jubilee Prize for Short Fiction.
Lisa has also written for television, radio, magazines (...more
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