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Gifts for the Dead
Jack Hopper is holding tight to his secret, though it gets heavier by the day. Nora Sweeny is tired of suffering losses and ready to improvise. Their relationship, based on Jack’s lies and Nora’s pragmatism, builds against a background that includes World War I (as experienced from the docks of Hoboken, New Jersey) and escalates when Jack and Nora travel together to the rainforests of South America seeking closure for a life-shattering event that occurred years earlier. Equal parts romance, adventure, and psychological suspense tale, Gifts for the Dead shines a floodlight on the characters’ deepest yearnings and greatest fears.
- GenresHistorical Fiction
350 pages, Paperback
First published October 2, 2019
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Displaying 1 - 5 of 5 reviews
October 13, 2019
Entanglement
Gifts for the Dead is an absorbing story, with outstanding characters that navigate the tangled heart amidst precarious twists of love, loss, truth and guilt. Spanning a period prior to World War I, through the war years and later a dangerous expedition into the Amazon jungle, this story is utterly engrossing, crafting wonderful natural landscapes and a world ferociously transforming to satisfy industrial greed.
Jack and Baxter (Bax) Hopper are two brothers who have never been separated and prior to the war, travelled to the Amazon rainforest to tap rubber trees and make their fortune. Bax is the older brother, the more dominant personality and is betrothed to Nora Sweeny. Nora was orphaned when she was four and has grown up with the brothers since they were all children. She is a strong independent woman and becomes involved in women’s rights, often being asked to speak at gatherings. Jack is a quiet, broody character that has for as long as he can remember, secretly loved Nora. Jack and Nora are the two narrators of this story.
One day a knock comes to the door of Jack and Baxter’s mother in Hoboken, NJ, and Jack is carried into the house, he is almost dead, emaciated, carrying a fever and unconscious. It takes a long time for him to recover from his illness and regain even enough strength to speak. When he does, he explains Bax couldn’t return from the Amazon with him because he is dead. Of course he’s dead, he couldn’t have survived what happened – he’s sure, isn't he? This lingering doubt torments Jack and is masterfully infused through the story and weighs heavily on his mind, especially as he has left Maggie (his mother) and Nora in no doubt that Bax perished.
The relationship between Jack and Nora is always in motion as they draw closer with growing waves of passion and affection, and recede with feelings of guilt and loss. At a deeper level, there is a gnawing uncertainty that their relationship only exists because other opportunities didn’t materialise. Nora's memories of lost love seem more heartfelt and intense than the mechanical relationship with Jack.
The characters are richly drawn and developed with a master’s attention to detail. What I loved about Joan's writing is that the characters grow through their daily interactions with each other and the world around them. The storyline that cultivates the characters is never obvious and captures the historical atmosphere brilliantly. This accomplished novel by Joan Schweighardt is an intricate love story that delicately beats throughout a historical narrative that journeys through foreign expeditions, a world at war and the hopeless decisions families make with the best intentions.
For lovers of deep characterisation, a captivating narrative and intriguing historical insights, this is a book to read and savour. I would highly recommend it.
Gifts for the Dead is an absorbing story, with outstanding characters that navigate the tangled heart amidst precarious twists of love, loss, truth and guilt. Spanning a period prior to World War I, through the war years and later a dangerous expedition into the Amazon jungle, this story is utterly engrossing, crafting wonderful natural landscapes and a world ferociously transforming to satisfy industrial greed.
Jack and Baxter (Bax) Hopper are two brothers who have never been separated and prior to the war, travelled to the Amazon rainforest to tap rubber trees and make their fortune. Bax is the older brother, the more dominant personality and is betrothed to Nora Sweeny. Nora was orphaned when she was four and has grown up with the brothers since they were all children. She is a strong independent woman and becomes involved in women’s rights, often being asked to speak at gatherings. Jack is a quiet, broody character that has for as long as he can remember, secretly loved Nora. Jack and Nora are the two narrators of this story.
One day a knock comes to the door of Jack and Baxter’s mother in Hoboken, NJ, and Jack is carried into the house, he is almost dead, emaciated, carrying a fever and unconscious. It takes a long time for him to recover from his illness and regain even enough strength to speak. When he does, he explains Bax couldn’t return from the Amazon with him because he is dead. Of course he’s dead, he couldn’t have survived what happened – he’s sure, isn't he? This lingering doubt torments Jack and is masterfully infused through the story and weighs heavily on his mind, especially as he has left Maggie (his mother) and Nora in no doubt that Bax perished.
The relationship between Jack and Nora is always in motion as they draw closer with growing waves of passion and affection, and recede with feelings of guilt and loss. At a deeper level, there is a gnawing uncertainty that their relationship only exists because other opportunities didn’t materialise. Nora's memories of lost love seem more heartfelt and intense than the mechanical relationship with Jack.
“We walked together most evenings, we talked, we listened to the radio or played records on the phonograph and danced, and we made love, but we were always holding something back, giving each other more space than we needed, even when we were in the same room and sitting side by side. Space had grown around us and between us.”The turmoil of memories, the guilt felt by Jack and the uncertainty whether Bax in alive or not, finally comes to a momentous conclusion - Jack will return to the Amazon for closure and discover what actually happened Bax. Nora insists on coming along and the second half of the novel deals with their trip to the Amazon jungle. During the expedition, Jack finally speaks about the past with Nora and the consequences are far-reaching.
The characters are richly drawn and developed with a master’s attention to detail. What I loved about Joan's writing is that the characters grow through their daily interactions with each other and the world around them. The storyline that cultivates the characters is never obvious and captures the historical atmosphere brilliantly. This accomplished novel by Joan Schweighardt is an intricate love story that delicately beats throughout a historical narrative that journeys through foreign expeditions, a world at war and the hopeless decisions families make with the best intentions.
For lovers of deep characterisation, a captivating narrative and intriguing historical insights, this is a book to read and savour. I would highly recommend it.
December 26, 2019
Excellent!
This novel simply is a historical fiction gem. I didn't expect Gifts for the Dead, Rivers Book 2, to deliver such an amazing story. It had me rapture over every page as only historical fiction fans might savor or understand in kin. I do read a variety of other genres, but historical fiction is one fail poof choice for me to return to and balance out all my other reading. As an enthusiastic amateur and lover of history and historical facts, I appreciate the feel of authenticity in characters and setting, while historical events stir an evocative plot amidst conflict. Mainly in a character-driven fashion, this novel pulled all these elements together fluently with vivid details.
This sequel to Before We Died begins by the docks of Hoboken, NJ in the years 1911-1919 for part 1 and is sub-sequentially divided into two more parts for years 1927 and 1928. It has been two years since Jack and Baxter Hopper have left for the Amazon jungle to make their fortune in the rubber trade and have not returned. Maggie, their mother, is holding out on word from them every day and fears the worst. By her side are Nora, Bax’s fiance and childhood friend, offering comfort as much as possible when she isn’t working at the book store, and her friend Clementine, a stout Italian Immigrant woman with ‘gusto’ and no time for nonsense.
The three women fuffing in their ways around Maggie’s little place is one of my favorite parts at the beginning. A little slice of Americana from the docs in Hoboken, NJ imbues a sense of time and place colorfully inspired by hard-working immigrants during unstable economic times. Though Clementine isn’t in the novel for too long, I love the flavor her attitude brings in this generational trio. Nora, the youngest and orphaned at age four, is a rising activist, while Maggie, an Irish immigrant is more of a traditionalist. You will quickly understand that these ladies are different in background, but they come together in trying times. What they don’t know is, that it will turn a whole lot worse for everyone socio-economically and personally.
When the dreaded knock on the door happens, a sick and delirious Jack is dropped off to die on Maggie’s couch and she can hardly keep it together. Nora is the one that nurses Jack back to reality over the next many weeks that follow but he doesn’t want to talk about the haunting details of what happened in the jungle that caused his brother’s death.
After a time, Jack finds employment with the Lipton Tea Company and becomes a loyal employee. He rents a boarding room from a German immigrant lady and helps her whenever things need to be fixed in the house, while she spoils him with German dishes. Nora continues her work as an activist and neither one is really getting over Bax’s death in the haunted jungle. As the plot keeps moving, the narrative changes between the pov’s of Nora and Jack, giving the reader insight into their thoughts and longings and secrets kept on Jack’s part.
Nora makes a daring and unexpected move that turns the cards in the story into happier times for a little while, but a flu epidemic has hit the area hard after the events that lead to WWI. From the big cogs of the political war down to the docs, the workers and their families, the time has turned dire. What has been a thriving community and sprawling melting pot of the Irish, Italians, Germans, and others that have settled into the area, mistrust and hardship create a divide. Schweighardt did a wonderful job shedding light on the ramifications for the people who are torn by heart and nationality, as the events created mistrust and shattered the bond and idealism everyone shared by coming to America.
There are many details that make this story come to life. The characters of their respective nationalities are wonderfully authentic and bits of language here and there, and the little ‘isms’ as I call them make it more interesting. Some moments will have you grinning at the Italian hand gestures in the air for example or nod at the German accents and inherent stubbornness. All in good jest, they are all good neighbors as this story evolves, immigrants working next to each other until the war changes everything.
Jack is harboring secrets. In part three, he is planning to go back to the jungle and he won’t tell Nora why. She insists on going with him and the story changes into a breath of fresh air. The expanse of the Amazon, the lush vibrancy of the animals, people and cities invite to adventure as Nora is invigorated by a sense of freedom never before experienced. But Jack isn’t too far off with his warnings of the danger, albeit savoring her joy and revelry in this new environment.
The Amazon is accompanied by stories of Bax that Jack opens up about and tells Nora throughout their travels. By firelight under open skies or from larger boats to smaller boats, always traveling, their stories create an intimacy of friendship and honesty but not without bouts of disbelief and stubborn silence. A cat and mouse relationship per se is followed as each of them is dealing with Bax’s death in their way, but a huge surprise turn of events will either strengthen their relations or sever them for good.
You will have to find out!
***
I haven’t mentioned all the historical events that are part of this novel, such as the Black Tom Explosion in 1916 on the docs in NJ, other detailed events that lead to the war, The Lipton Tea Company’s reach on households or Fordlandia in Brazil, the prefabricated industrial town intended to be inhabited by 10,000 people to secure a source of cultivated rubber for the automobile manufacturing operations of the Ford Motor Company in 1928. The product is a novel that is jam-packed of historical details and an engrossing plot that snakes perfectly along to connect it all together.
To me, the tapestry of this novel was woven much tighter and more experienced than the first book. I love Schweighardt's historical insights into the areas of Hoboken, NJ and the Amazon jungle. Her voice spoke perfectly in tune with the historical ambiance and the writing was rendered flawless while the evocative plot left no emotion untouched. I cannot point out anything I didn't like about this novel.
Although this is a sequel, I think it can stand on its own without prior knowledge of events. If you are a historical fiction enthusiast, you may not want to miss this one. It is a gem, filled with historical events geographically detailed and rarely read of in other historical fiction novels, as well as executed superbly.
I hope you’ll enjoy it as much as I did.
I received a copy of this novel from the author in exchange for an honest review. All opinions are my own. Thank you.
More of my reviews here:
Through Novel Time & Distance
This novel simply is a historical fiction gem. I didn't expect Gifts for the Dead, Rivers Book 2, to deliver such an amazing story. It had me rapture over every page as only historical fiction fans might savor or understand in kin. I do read a variety of other genres, but historical fiction is one fail poof choice for me to return to and balance out all my other reading. As an enthusiastic amateur and lover of history and historical facts, I appreciate the feel of authenticity in characters and setting, while historical events stir an evocative plot amidst conflict. Mainly in a character-driven fashion, this novel pulled all these elements together fluently with vivid details.
This sequel to Before We Died begins by the docks of Hoboken, NJ in the years 1911-1919 for part 1 and is sub-sequentially divided into two more parts for years 1927 and 1928. It has been two years since Jack and Baxter Hopper have left for the Amazon jungle to make their fortune in the rubber trade and have not returned. Maggie, their mother, is holding out on word from them every day and fears the worst. By her side are Nora, Bax’s fiance and childhood friend, offering comfort as much as possible when she isn’t working at the book store, and her friend Clementine, a stout Italian Immigrant woman with ‘gusto’ and no time for nonsense.
The three women fuffing in their ways around Maggie’s little place is one of my favorite parts at the beginning. A little slice of Americana from the docs in Hoboken, NJ imbues a sense of time and place colorfully inspired by hard-working immigrants during unstable economic times. Though Clementine isn’t in the novel for too long, I love the flavor her attitude brings in this generational trio. Nora, the youngest and orphaned at age four, is a rising activist, while Maggie, an Irish immigrant is more of a traditionalist. You will quickly understand that these ladies are different in background, but they come together in trying times. What they don’t know is, that it will turn a whole lot worse for everyone socio-economically and personally.
When the dreaded knock on the door happens, a sick and delirious Jack is dropped off to die on Maggie’s couch and she can hardly keep it together. Nora is the one that nurses Jack back to reality over the next many weeks that follow but he doesn’t want to talk about the haunting details of what happened in the jungle that caused his brother’s death.
After a time, Jack finds employment with the Lipton Tea Company and becomes a loyal employee. He rents a boarding room from a German immigrant lady and helps her whenever things need to be fixed in the house, while she spoils him with German dishes. Nora continues her work as an activist and neither one is really getting over Bax’s death in the haunted jungle. As the plot keeps moving, the narrative changes between the pov’s of Nora and Jack, giving the reader insight into their thoughts and longings and secrets kept on Jack’s part.
Nora makes a daring and unexpected move that turns the cards in the story into happier times for a little while, but a flu epidemic has hit the area hard after the events that lead to WWI. From the big cogs of the political war down to the docs, the workers and their families, the time has turned dire. What has been a thriving community and sprawling melting pot of the Irish, Italians, Germans, and others that have settled into the area, mistrust and hardship create a divide. Schweighardt did a wonderful job shedding light on the ramifications for the people who are torn by heart and nationality, as the events created mistrust and shattered the bond and idealism everyone shared by coming to America.
There are many details that make this story come to life. The characters of their respective nationalities are wonderfully authentic and bits of language here and there, and the little ‘isms’ as I call them make it more interesting. Some moments will have you grinning at the Italian hand gestures in the air for example or nod at the German accents and inherent stubbornness. All in good jest, they are all good neighbors as this story evolves, immigrants working next to each other until the war changes everything.
Jack is harboring secrets. In part three, he is planning to go back to the jungle and he won’t tell Nora why. She insists on going with him and the story changes into a breath of fresh air. The expanse of the Amazon, the lush vibrancy of the animals, people and cities invite to adventure as Nora is invigorated by a sense of freedom never before experienced. But Jack isn’t too far off with his warnings of the danger, albeit savoring her joy and revelry in this new environment.
The Amazon is accompanied by stories of Bax that Jack opens up about and tells Nora throughout their travels. By firelight under open skies or from larger boats to smaller boats, always traveling, their stories create an intimacy of friendship and honesty but not without bouts of disbelief and stubborn silence. A cat and mouse relationship per se is followed as each of them is dealing with Bax’s death in their way, but a huge surprise turn of events will either strengthen their relations or sever them for good.
You will have to find out!
***
I haven’t mentioned all the historical events that are part of this novel, such as the Black Tom Explosion in 1916 on the docs in NJ, other detailed events that lead to the war, The Lipton Tea Company’s reach on households or Fordlandia in Brazil, the prefabricated industrial town intended to be inhabited by 10,000 people to secure a source of cultivated rubber for the automobile manufacturing operations of the Ford Motor Company in 1928. The product is a novel that is jam-packed of historical details and an engrossing plot that snakes perfectly along to connect it all together.
To me, the tapestry of this novel was woven much tighter and more experienced than the first book. I love Schweighardt's historical insights into the areas of Hoboken, NJ and the Amazon jungle. Her voice spoke perfectly in tune with the historical ambiance and the writing was rendered flawless while the evocative plot left no emotion untouched. I cannot point out anything I didn't like about this novel.
Although this is a sequel, I think it can stand on its own without prior knowledge of events. If you are a historical fiction enthusiast, you may not want to miss this one. It is a gem, filled with historical events geographically detailed and rarely read of in other historical fiction novels, as well as executed superbly.
I hope you’ll enjoy it as much as I did.
I received a copy of this novel from the author in exchange for an honest review. All opinions are my own. Thank you.
More of my reviews here:
Through Novel Time & Distance
October 12, 2019
Sometimes it’s a gift to the dead to go on living. But under what terms?
Joan Schweighardt takes up the story of Baxter and Jack again. In the first book, Before We Died, the brothers, impoverished New Jersey dockworkers who travel to the Amazon to make their fortune as rubber collectors, encounter dismal working conditions, disease, and near starvation. When they learn they will not even be paid, Jack and Baxter are furious, and tragedy follows.
Gifts for the Dead opens with Jack, a shadow of his former self, arriving back in New Jersey to be nursed by his brother’s girlfriend, the sincere and idealistic Nora. Orphaned at a young age, she’s been part of Jack and Baxter’s life since they were children. Jack has always loved her, despite being eclipsed by his flamboyant and lively brother, and now, under her care, he finds himself drawing closer and closer to her.
As their relationship deepens into reciprocal love and commitment, there are only two shadows on their happiness: the lack of children and more importantly, Baxter’s fate. Only a trip back to the Amazon, where Baxter was lost, can give them closure, but that trip could well destroy their marriage.
Meticulously researched and sensitively written, Joan Schweighardt delivers a redemptive historical novel about a marriage built on precarious assumptions, and the tolls of loss.
Joan Schweighardt takes up the story of Baxter and Jack again. In the first book, Before We Died, the brothers, impoverished New Jersey dockworkers who travel to the Amazon to make their fortune as rubber collectors, encounter dismal working conditions, disease, and near starvation. When they learn they will not even be paid, Jack and Baxter are furious, and tragedy follows.
Gifts for the Dead opens with Jack, a shadow of his former self, arriving back in New Jersey to be nursed by his brother’s girlfriend, the sincere and idealistic Nora. Orphaned at a young age, she’s been part of Jack and Baxter’s life since they were children. Jack has always loved her, despite being eclipsed by his flamboyant and lively brother, and now, under her care, he finds himself drawing closer and closer to her.
As their relationship deepens into reciprocal love and commitment, there are only two shadows on their happiness: the lack of children and more importantly, Baxter’s fate. Only a trip back to the Amazon, where Baxter was lost, can give them closure, but that trip could well destroy their marriage.
Meticulously researched and sensitively written, Joan Schweighardt delivers a redemptive historical novel about a marriage built on precarious assumptions, and the tolls of loss.
Read
February 14, 2020Last summer, massive fires in the Amazon rain forest provoked environmental concerns around the world. But the history of exploitation—of the natural world of the rain forest and the people living in it—goes back at least to the rubber boom of the early twentieth century. This setting forms the backdrop for Joan Schweighardt’s compelling and well-written Rivers trilogy, which starts with Before We Died and continues with Gifts for the Dead and the forthcoming River Aria.
As Gifts for the Dead opens, it is 1911 and the heroine, Nora Sweeney, is waiting for bad news in Hoboken, NJ. A fortuneteller has prophesied that any day two dock workers will appear on the doorstep to report that both the man Nora loves, Baxter Hopper, and his brother, Jack, have died during their work as rubber tappers in Brazil. But when the dock workers arrive, it’s to deliver the comatose body of Jack, on the brink of death.
Nora and Jack’s mother, Maggie, nurse him back to health, and life goes on. With help from Maggie, Nora and Jack restore the family that was broken when the brothers left on their grand adventure. Through World War I, the Spanish Flu epidemic of 1918, and the Roaring Twenties, the trio perseveres. Everyone assumes Baxter died in the rain forest. Only Jack knows that his brother’s fate is less certain than he’s given the women reason to believe. And that one day he must go and find out the truth.
Interview with the author at New Books in Historical Fiction.
As Gifts for the Dead opens, it is 1911 and the heroine, Nora Sweeney, is waiting for bad news in Hoboken, NJ. A fortuneteller has prophesied that any day two dock workers will appear on the doorstep to report that both the man Nora loves, Baxter Hopper, and his brother, Jack, have died during their work as rubber tappers in Brazil. But when the dock workers arrive, it’s to deliver the comatose body of Jack, on the brink of death.
Nora and Jack’s mother, Maggie, nurse him back to health, and life goes on. With help from Maggie, Nora and Jack restore the family that was broken when the brothers left on their grand adventure. Through World War I, the Spanish Flu epidemic of 1918, and the Roaring Twenties, the trio perseveres. Everyone assumes Baxter died in the rain forest. Only Jack knows that his brother’s fate is less certain than he’s given the women reason to believe. And that one day he must go and find out the truth.
Interview with the author at New Books in Historical Fiction.
November 22, 2021
I was given the Rivers Trilogy in exchanged for an honest review. The second book in the series did not disappoint, I loved getting to read from Jack's perspective after his time in the rainforest and loved getting inside Nora's head. This series is so well-researched, when we got into Spanish Influenza territory the similarities between then and now made my skin crawl. Excellent characters and I can't wait to read the last book in the series!
Read the full review on my blog!
Read the full review on my blog!
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