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Threads
One woman has an amazing gift, another desperately needs one and the man in the middle is indifferent.
Irene is content in her new marriage of convenience and her young life is going according to plan. Her husband plays the stock market, they own a convenience store and they live in an upscale neighborhood of a small town.
But when sudden tragedy strikes, Irene is unable to cope... that is, until she rediscovers knitting. In her search for solace, she compulsively fills the rooms of their house with more and more beautiful little sweaters. Finally, her husband decides to donate them to an international charity and one of the sweaters is stolen by a poverty-stricken single mother on the other side of the world who is wrestling with her own issues. Seeing the little sweater's extraordinary value, she repurposes it.
As the two women struggle to get by, their distinct coping methods take bizarre twists. Sprinkled with magic realism and humor, the story brings to light social inequities and global environmental damage. But it's really about overcoming loss and our shared humanity.
Irene is content in her new marriage of convenience and her young life is going according to plan. Her husband plays the stock market, they own a convenience store and they live in an upscale neighborhood of a small town.
But when sudden tragedy strikes, Irene is unable to cope... that is, until she rediscovers knitting. In her search for solace, she compulsively fills the rooms of their house with more and more beautiful little sweaters. Finally, her husband decides to donate them to an international charity and one of the sweaters is stolen by a poverty-stricken single mother on the other side of the world who is wrestling with her own issues. Seeing the little sweater's extraordinary value, she repurposes it.
As the two women struggle to get by, their distinct coping methods take bizarre twists. Sprinkled with magic realism and humor, the story brings to light social inequities and global environmental damage. But it's really about overcoming loss and our shared humanity.
318 pages, Paperback
Published September 30, 2022
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Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews
November 17, 2022
THREADS
Edie Ayala
THREADS, the title of the book has more than one meaning. In the most obvious case, it refers to fabrics and yarns. The second case is the intertwining of three people: Irene, the reluctant wife of a merchant in Canada who desperately wants a child; Columba, a poor woman in Chile who struggles to support herself and her son; and Gavin, a young man in a small town in Canada trying to find himself. By the end of the book, their lives intertwine.
Irene, who feels her husband is too controlling, eventually has a daughter. Sadly, the child dies and she enters into a long, deep depression. Eventually, she turns to yarn, buying them and collecting skeins of them. She then begins knitting and crocheting amazing sweaters for her deceased daughter. The collection of them fills the house and eventually her husband sends them to a charity which is supposed to donate used clothing to poor people in South America.
Columba worked in a bank and part time sorting out clothing for a company that received donated clothing. Recycled clothing was a new, very popular trend in her country. The bosses, however, looked at the clothes as a business opportunity, not a charity, and took the best items to sell in his own stores. They also paid themselves before paying the workers. Many of the donated items were discarded or trashed.
After four years at that company, she asked for and was refused a raise. The boss treated her like she was below contempt. Basically an honest person, she decided to take some of the donated items because other workers were doing so and she realized she could sell the better ones herself and earn more money. She also began collecting discarded items from piles along the roadside.
Gavin, had gotten a mail-order private investigator license in hopes of finding a career and please his father who owned a men’s and boy’s clothing store. Since everyone in town already knew everyone else’s business, his career choice wasn’t working. After his father died, Gavin took over the store, with the help of his father’s assistant. It turned out that Gavin had a gift for distinct items and attracting a wider market.
In an attempt to get Irene out of her depression, Irene’s husband decided to take her sweaters and donate them to a charity for needy people in South America. Some of them ended up in Columba’s company. She took one of them for her son and it became very special to her.
Realizing their value, Gavin was able to get almost all of Irene’s sweaters and was making a very good profit selling them.
And then Irene realized that her sweaters were gone and other people were buying them.
The results were catastrophic.
Edie Ayala’s THREADS is presented in chapters alternating between the three main characters and a few people close to them. It exposes the corruption in the recycled, donated clothing industry though I don’t know how wide-spread it is.
It describes the lives and communities of the people involved, especially those in South America and, at one point the corruption in the Catholic Church: ‘[there were decades] of corruption in the church followers blamed themselves because they were lowly sinners, and what did they know?...The church hierarchy harvested the fruits of their labors and made it possible for Progresso’s clergy of today to live in comfort and security.”
The connections among the main characters takes awhile to become obvious, but it does make sense. Ayala offers philosophic observations, especially through Gavin, and has some delightful observations: “She tucked snippets of conversation behind her ears like cigarettes, that she might pluck them out later, and leisurely draw on them.”
I received a review copy of THREADS from LibraryThing.
Edie Ayala
THREADS, the title of the book has more than one meaning. In the most obvious case, it refers to fabrics and yarns. The second case is the intertwining of three people: Irene, the reluctant wife of a merchant in Canada who desperately wants a child; Columba, a poor woman in Chile who struggles to support herself and her son; and Gavin, a young man in a small town in Canada trying to find himself. By the end of the book, their lives intertwine.
Irene, who feels her husband is too controlling, eventually has a daughter. Sadly, the child dies and she enters into a long, deep depression. Eventually, she turns to yarn, buying them and collecting skeins of them. She then begins knitting and crocheting amazing sweaters for her deceased daughter. The collection of them fills the house and eventually her husband sends them to a charity which is supposed to donate used clothing to poor people in South America.
Columba worked in a bank and part time sorting out clothing for a company that received donated clothing. Recycled clothing was a new, very popular trend in her country. The bosses, however, looked at the clothes as a business opportunity, not a charity, and took the best items to sell in his own stores. They also paid themselves before paying the workers. Many of the donated items were discarded or trashed.
After four years at that company, she asked for and was refused a raise. The boss treated her like she was below contempt. Basically an honest person, she decided to take some of the donated items because other workers were doing so and she realized she could sell the better ones herself and earn more money. She also began collecting discarded items from piles along the roadside.
Gavin, had gotten a mail-order private investigator license in hopes of finding a career and please his father who owned a men’s and boy’s clothing store. Since everyone in town already knew everyone else’s business, his career choice wasn’t working. After his father died, Gavin took over the store, with the help of his father’s assistant. It turned out that Gavin had a gift for distinct items and attracting a wider market.
In an attempt to get Irene out of her depression, Irene’s husband decided to take her sweaters and donate them to a charity for needy people in South America. Some of them ended up in Columba’s company. She took one of them for her son and it became very special to her.
Realizing their value, Gavin was able to get almost all of Irene’s sweaters and was making a very good profit selling them.
And then Irene realized that her sweaters were gone and other people were buying them.
The results were catastrophic.
Edie Ayala’s THREADS is presented in chapters alternating between the three main characters and a few people close to them. It exposes the corruption in the recycled, donated clothing industry though I don’t know how wide-spread it is.
It describes the lives and communities of the people involved, especially those in South America and, at one point the corruption in the Catholic Church: ‘[there were decades] of corruption in the church followers blamed themselves because they were lowly sinners, and what did they know?...The church hierarchy harvested the fruits of their labors and made it possible for Progresso’s clergy of today to live in comfort and security.”
The connections among the main characters takes awhile to become obvious, but it does make sense. Ayala offers philosophic observations, especially through Gavin, and has some delightful observations: “She tucked snippets of conversation behind her ears like cigarettes, that she might pluck them out later, and leisurely draw on them.”
I received a review copy of THREADS from LibraryThing.
October 12, 2022
How can two completely different worlds be so connected? This is what Threads deals with in a gripping way - I say gripping because I was constantly curious to see what would happen next to each of the characters. It made me laugh and cry and think about how one or two small actions can have a massive impact on somewhere or someone far away. Edie Ayala's characters are what I loved the most - a real insight into human nature.
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September 21, 2024There was an urgency to write THREADS when I realized that my home country of Canada was tied to my adopted country of Chile by more than mining resources. The Atacama desert has become a dumping ground for discarded North American clothing. So this became an underlying theme for a story of two very different women in two very different societies who share a common reality.
September 15, 2022
This was a well written book but not one I enjoyed. I found the writing ponderous and the plot very slow.
Entwined is the danger of rampant consumerism and its dire implications for the environment
I received a free ARC and this is my honest review
Entwined is the danger of rampant consumerism and its dire implications for the environment
I received a free ARC and this is my honest review
Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews