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The Bright Land
The sweeping epic of a bold new land--and a bold new kind of woman
Suddenly, magically, Abby-Delight was swept away on a daring adventure. Here she was, only nineteen, riding West on a romantic canal boat wiht a dashing man at her side - a man she had met only five days before! Behind her lay the stifling memories of the puritanical New England house she had fled. Before her stretched the bright promise of the endless frontier - a land of expansive men, free-spirited women, and stirring adventure.
Written in 1932 and giant in scope, The Bright Land is a stunning evocation of a mighty era -- from the days of Andrew Jackson through teh ravages of the Civil War to the new century. But primparily it is the bold and intimate story of Abby-Delight Flagg - her her lifelong love, her heartbreaks, and her passionate quest to free her soul from the past.
Suddenly, magically, Abby-Delight was swept away on a daring adventure. Here she was, only nineteen, riding West on a romantic canal boat wiht a dashing man at her side - a man she had met only five days before! Behind her lay the stifling memories of the puritanical New England house she had fled. Before her stretched the bright promise of the endless frontier - a land of expansive men, free-spirited women, and stirring adventure.
Written in 1932 and giant in scope, The Bright Land is a stunning evocation of a mighty era -- from the days of Andrew Jackson through teh ravages of the Civil War to the new century. But primparily it is the bold and intimate story of Abby-Delight Flagg - her her lifelong love, her heartbreaks, and her passionate quest to free her soul from the past.
416 pages, Mass Market Paperback
First published January 1, 1932
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February 9, 2015
For this review along with a matching cocktail, check out my blog.
Abby-Delight is well named. Not because her combination Hostess product/stripper name makes any damn sense for a Puritan, but because she really is a delightful character to follow. The reader delights in this young girl, raised by a domineering father in an repressed society, as she slowly discover all the little delights of the world outside of her small New England town — everything from Dickens to dancing.
Bright Land takes place from 1835 to 1888ish, hitting all the major points in history along the way, chief among them the expansion westward, which Abby-Delight gets swept up in when she is swept off her feet by one of those wild Illinois men.
I’m not sure if this book is enjoyably melodramatic pulp or completely brilliant. Can I choose all of the above?
The one thing I can confidently say is that this 1932 novel was just about impossible to put down. Ayer Fairbank has that knack for raising questions that — no matter how trivial– you just have to know the answer to, and, before you know it, 10 chapters have gone by. I went through most of the book thinking it was just an extremely well-written, smart, self-aware, feminist pulp novel. Awesome.
But, little did I know Ayer Fairbank was lulling me into a false sense of security with her 1800’s dress porn and boring historical asides, only to hit me with a gut-punch of depth and insight.
Example: one of the subplots involves a typically tarty “other woman” in love with Abby-Delight’s husband. And Other Woman is charming and flirtatious and Abby feels inferior even though her husband wouldn’t even dream of… blah, blah, blah — Twilight did it too. The whole thing comes to a head when Abby sees them together and a misunderstanding ensues. DRAMA! But, then it’s all solved neatly within two chapters, without Abby having to grow, change, or face up to any of her insecurities. The whole episode just seemed like a cheap way to keep (female) readers engaged.
But then, many years later, Abby and her husband Stephen run into the woman, Lily, by chance. We get our first and only switch to her point of view as she views her rival,
"There she sat, the woman who had what she would have given her life for. She was singularly unchanged: beside her Lily felt battered by life, and yet, how little this cold creature knew of the impulses and passions which ran so strongly under the surface which had kept unruffled! She was like a child, a righteous, unsuspecting little girl. The thoughts which she had rigorously kept out of her mind had made her like that. Lily did not know whether to envy or pity her."
Which… yes? I hadn’t realized it till then because I’d spent some 400 pages taking Abby-Delight’s side, but she is childish and self-centered. In one paragraph, Ayer Fairbank flips the paradigm and makes the the conniving, “loose” woman more sympathetic and complex than our protagonist.
Which is not to say that the book is perfect. It can never for a minute forget that it’s historical fiction, and the real-life people therein — namely Lincoln and Ulysses S. Grant — feel more like cameos than characters. Their entries may as well have been copied directly from a history textbook.
But then that ending. Oh, the ending. It’s quiet anticlimax is ironically one of the darker things I’ve read so far, both because it’s so unexpected and yet so realistic.
You know, the more I write out my thoughts on this story, the more I’m leaning to the side of brilliant. Flawed? Yes. But still with the right amount of nuanced human understanding that we expect from a great novel.
Actually, I was having flashbacks to my beloved Years of Grace through most of this book. Although a very different character, point of view, time period, and — to a certain extent– tone, it has essentially the exact same structure, following its female protagonist from early adolescence/first love through late middle age/grandmotherhood.
I made a mental note of her last name and finally googled the author after I finished, and, yes, Margaret Ayer Barnes of Years of Grace<.I> fame and Janet Ayer Fairbank were indeed sisters. A fascination with the passing of the time, the interactions between generations, the inner lives of women, and men named Stephen (Seriously, the husbands in both books were named Stephen. WHY? Were they both in love with a Stephen? Was their father named Stephen? Inquiring minds must know!) is apparently genetic.
So I guess now I’m an official Ayer-sisters fangirl. Go obscure, out-of-print, midcentury, feminist, progressive, female authors!!! Woot!
Anyway, it’s pretty much a crime against literary history that The Bright Land isn’t better remembered. Not as much of a crime as it is for Years of Grace, but still. If you are in any way drawn to historical fiction and/or complex character exploration, check it out.
Abby-Delight is well named. Not because her combination Hostess product/stripper name makes any damn sense for a Puritan, but because she really is a delightful character to follow. The reader delights in this young girl, raised by a domineering father in an repressed society, as she slowly discover all the little delights of the world outside of her small New England town — everything from Dickens to dancing.
Bright Land takes place from 1835 to 1888ish, hitting all the major points in history along the way, chief among them the expansion westward, which Abby-Delight gets swept up in when she is swept off her feet by one of those wild Illinois men.
I’m not sure if this book is enjoyably melodramatic pulp or completely brilliant. Can I choose all of the above?
The one thing I can confidently say is that this 1932 novel was just about impossible to put down. Ayer Fairbank has that knack for raising questions that — no matter how trivial– you just have to know the answer to, and, before you know it, 10 chapters have gone by. I went through most of the book thinking it was just an extremely well-written, smart, self-aware, feminist pulp novel. Awesome.
But, little did I know Ayer Fairbank was lulling me into a false sense of security with her 1800’s dress porn and boring historical asides, only to hit me with a gut-punch of depth and insight.
Example: one of the subplots involves a typically tarty “other woman” in love with Abby-Delight’s husband. And Other Woman is charming and flirtatious and Abby feels inferior even though her husband wouldn’t even dream of… blah, blah, blah — Twilight did it too. The whole thing comes to a head when Abby sees them together and a misunderstanding ensues. DRAMA! But, then it’s all solved neatly within two chapters, without Abby having to grow, change, or face up to any of her insecurities. The whole episode just seemed like a cheap way to keep (female) readers engaged.
But then, many years later, Abby and her husband Stephen run into the woman, Lily, by chance. We get our first and only switch to her point of view as she views her rival,
"There she sat, the woman who had what she would have given her life for. She was singularly unchanged: beside her Lily felt battered by life, and yet, how little this cold creature knew of the impulses and passions which ran so strongly under the surface which had kept unruffled! She was like a child, a righteous, unsuspecting little girl. The thoughts which she had rigorously kept out of her mind had made her like that. Lily did not know whether to envy or pity her."
Which… yes? I hadn’t realized it till then because I’d spent some 400 pages taking Abby-Delight’s side, but she is childish and self-centered. In one paragraph, Ayer Fairbank flips the paradigm and makes the the conniving, “loose” woman more sympathetic and complex than our protagonist.
Which is not to say that the book is perfect. It can never for a minute forget that it’s historical fiction, and the real-life people therein — namely Lincoln and Ulysses S. Grant — feel more like cameos than characters. Their entries may as well have been copied directly from a history textbook.
But then that ending. Oh, the ending. It’s quiet anticlimax is ironically one of the darker things I’ve read so far, both because it’s so unexpected and yet so realistic.
You know, the more I write out my thoughts on this story, the more I’m leaning to the side of brilliant. Flawed? Yes. But still with the right amount of nuanced human understanding that we expect from a great novel.
Actually, I was having flashbacks to my beloved Years of Grace through most of this book. Although a very different character, point of view, time period, and — to a certain extent– tone, it has essentially the exact same structure, following its female protagonist from early adolescence/first love through late middle age/grandmotherhood.
I made a mental note of her last name and finally googled the author after I finished, and, yes, Margaret Ayer Barnes of Years of Grace<.I> fame and Janet Ayer Fairbank were indeed sisters. A fascination with the passing of the time, the interactions between generations, the inner lives of women, and men named Stephen (Seriously, the husbands in both books were named Stephen. WHY? Were they both in love with a Stephen? Was their father named Stephen? Inquiring minds must know!) is apparently genetic.
So I guess now I’m an official Ayer-sisters fangirl. Go obscure, out-of-print, midcentury, feminist, progressive, female authors!!! Woot!
Anyway, it’s pretty much a crime against literary history that The Bright Land isn’t better remembered. Not as much of a crime as it is for Years of Grace, but still. If you are in any way drawn to historical fiction and/or complex character exploration, check it out.
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