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A Gracious Plenty
Badly burned in a household accident when she was a child, Finch Nobles grows into a courageous and feisty loner who eschews the pity of her hometown and discovers that she can hear the voices of the people buried in her father's cemetery. Finally, when she speaks to them, they answer, telling their stories in a remarkable chorus of regrets, expla-nations, and insights. A Gracious Plenty is like an extraordinary amalgam of Steinbeck and Faulkner, Spoon River Anthology and Our Town . It is a reading experience that you will not soon forget.
224 pages, Paperback
First published September 8, 1997
35 people are currently reading
1940 people want to read
About the author
Sheri Reynolds
16 books307 followersSheri Reynolds is an author of contemporary Southern fiction.
Sheri Reynolds was born and raised in rural South Carolina. She graduated from Conway High School in 1985, Davidson College in 1989, and Virginia Commonwealth University in 1992.
Her published novels include Bitterroot Landing, The Rapture of Canaan (an Oprah book club selection and New York Times bestseller), A Gracious Plenty (98), Firefly Cloak (06), The Sweet In-Between (08), and The Homespun Wisdom of Myrtle T. Cribb (12) and The Tender Grave (21). Her first play, Orabelle's Wheelbarrow, won the Women Playwrights' Initiative playwriting competition for 2005.
Also Professor of English and the Ruth and Perry Morgan Chair of Southern Literature at Old Dominion University in Norfolk, VA, Sheri teaches creative writing and literature classes. She won the Outstanding Faculty Award from the State Council for Higher Education of Virginia in 2003. In 2005, she received a grant from the Virginia Commission for the Arts in playwriting. She has also taught at Virginia Commonwealth University, The College of William and Mary, and Davidson College.
Sheri lives in the town of Cape Charles on Virginia's Eastern Shore.
Sheri Reynolds was born and raised in rural South Carolina. She graduated from Conway High School in 1985, Davidson College in 1989, and Virginia Commonwealth University in 1992.
Her published novels include Bitterroot Landing, The Rapture of Canaan (an Oprah book club selection and New York Times bestseller), A Gracious Plenty (98), Firefly Cloak (06), The Sweet In-Between (08), and The Homespun Wisdom of Myrtle T. Cribb (12) and The Tender Grave (21). Her first play, Orabelle's Wheelbarrow, won the Women Playwrights' Initiative playwriting competition for 2005.
Also Professor of English and the Ruth and Perry Morgan Chair of Southern Literature at Old Dominion University in Norfolk, VA, Sheri teaches creative writing and literature classes. She won the Outstanding Faculty Award from the State Council for Higher Education of Virginia in 2003. In 2005, she received a grant from the Virginia Commission for the Arts in playwriting. She has also taught at Virginia Commonwealth University, The College of William and Mary, and Davidson College.
Sheri lives in the town of Cape Charles on Virginia's Eastern Shore.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 353 reviews
February 5, 2021
I wrote a review for this book when I finished it last week, but it seems to have disappeared. I won't try to reconstruct it from my Covid/aged/winter weary brain, but I will say that I loved this book set in a graveyard. Finch Nobles is the owner/caretaker of the graveyard. She was badly burned and disfigured as a small child and as a result walled herself away from her community and made friends with the dead spirits that surrounded her. This novel tells us how she returned to the real people of her small town, with a little help from a lot of others, dead and alive, but mostly her own feisty self, once she realized that everyone is lonely in their own way.
February 5, 2021
Your truth may not look like mine, but that is not what matters. What matters is this. You can look at a scar and see hurt or you can look at a scar and see healing. Try to understand.
A unique and one of a kind story, A Gracious Plenty packs a punch in a very short book. Sheri Reynolds’ prose is succinct and concise allowing her to cover a lot of story in a brief manner. I believe it worked beautifully. There are some really fascinating passages.
I have been old all my life, my face like a piece of wood left out in snow and wind.
Finch Nobles becomes the caretaker of the cemetery where she lived all her life after her parents died. She was so isolated and lonely as a child and as an adult chose to remain elusive to those around her who feared her. At 4 years old, she was accidentally scalded on her face, neck and shoulder. Initially, people sympathized with the family helping how they could, but they suddenly turned away and left her feeling segregated from the world. She became scary to other children and then the butt of jokes of the teenagers who endlessly taunted her. Her only respite was the solitary life where she kept to herself to tend the cemetery land.
I tend this land. This land and the things that grow here are the only family I have left.
The ones without scars, they kept their secrets, hid their losses, lied in ways that only the living world does.
Finch has a very rare and uncommon connection with the Dead that “live” in the cemetery. She figures out that she can actually talk and interact with them. The Dead bring a magical realism aspect to this story that was, in all honesty, a bit weird for me. I don’t usually want to suspend my disbelief in order to enjoy a story. I have spent some time going over the parts that I had trouble with. I have gone back to reread sections at the beginning that will help to explain the purpose of the Dead in this story. The Dead play a role in showing Finch about sorrows and regrets. They actually help her to realize that friendship is possible even after the outcast life that she has lived.
The idea of the person and the heart of the person — those are wholly different landscapes.
A unique and one of a kind story, A Gracious Plenty packs a punch in a very short book. Sheri Reynolds’ prose is succinct and concise allowing her to cover a lot of story in a brief manner. I believe it worked beautifully. There are some really fascinating passages.
I have been old all my life, my face like a piece of wood left out in snow and wind.
Finch Nobles becomes the caretaker of the cemetery where she lived all her life after her parents died. She was so isolated and lonely as a child and as an adult chose to remain elusive to those around her who feared her. At 4 years old, she was accidentally scalded on her face, neck and shoulder. Initially, people sympathized with the family helping how they could, but they suddenly turned away and left her feeling segregated from the world. She became scary to other children and then the butt of jokes of the teenagers who endlessly taunted her. Her only respite was the solitary life where she kept to herself to tend the cemetery land.
I tend this land. This land and the things that grow here are the only family I have left.
The ones without scars, they kept their secrets, hid their losses, lied in ways that only the living world does.
Finch has a very rare and uncommon connection with the Dead that “live” in the cemetery. She figures out that she can actually talk and interact with them. The Dead bring a magical realism aspect to this story that was, in all honesty, a bit weird for me. I don’t usually want to suspend my disbelief in order to enjoy a story. I have spent some time going over the parts that I had trouble with. I have gone back to reread sections at the beginning that will help to explain the purpose of the Dead in this story. The Dead play a role in showing Finch about sorrows and regrets. They actually help her to realize that friendship is possible even after the outcast life that she has lived.
The idea of the person and the heart of the person — those are wholly different landscapes.
December 22, 2012
Finch had her face burned to a crisp when she was four. Now she tends a cemetery and communes with the dead.
You think its easy writing about dead people? There is a litany of failures dotting the literary landscape in this particular ouvre. The prosecution calls the following culprits to the stand:
http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/34...
http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/18...
http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/11...
http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/12...
Just like Goldilocks would allege: its never just right: too sentimental, too maudlin, too trying too hard, annoying, cloying, patronising, proselytising, evangelical, or transparently cynical, cliché, retro-che, too much, too little, banal, or not: its never right. For me. Till now.
If ever there is a literary hot potato, death must surely be it par excel lance. It doesn’t matter if you’re a fervent religionist or a Buddhist pacifist or an enlightened atheist: you’re gonna take the afterlife personally. Trust me. It hits on so many levels and tinkers with so many principles you never thought you had. It teases hope and phoenixes faith and fuddles logic and generally fucks with your mind. I usually avoid run ins with the genre like the devil (well. Except for the examples above, read under duress and the pretence of bookclub requisites).
But Reynolds hits a cord, brave lady that she is. To tackle the morass of heaven and hell.
In my professional career I’ve had to deal with a concept in law regarding joint and several liability which stipulates ‘A designation of liability by which members of a group are either individually or mutually responsible to a party in whose favor a judgment has been awarded’
Its this concept which Reynolds manages to translate in literary lingo which makes the story work: a distinct separateness of the spiritual world, guided by but not informed by the realm of reality. Connections between the here and beyond are not linear, but joint and several. Finch is not so much a conduit as a ‘marker’: like a lighthouse in the dark which populates a compass point on a map of chaos theory.
But its not the structure or synchronicity which bewitch me: its the ‘sense’ of a peace decoded. For the first time in my life I feel content, and hopeful, that death is not a fear to be dissipated into nothingness or prolonged into eternity.
You think its easy writing about dead people? There is a litany of failures dotting the literary landscape in this particular ouvre. The prosecution calls the following culprits to the stand:
http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/34...
http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/18...
http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/11...
http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/12...
Just like Goldilocks would allege: its never just right: too sentimental, too maudlin, too trying too hard, annoying, cloying, patronising, proselytising, evangelical, or transparently cynical, cliché, retro-che, too much, too little, banal, or not: its never right. For me. Till now.
If ever there is a literary hot potato, death must surely be it par excel lance. It doesn’t matter if you’re a fervent religionist or a Buddhist pacifist or an enlightened atheist: you’re gonna take the afterlife personally. Trust me. It hits on so many levels and tinkers with so many principles you never thought you had. It teases hope and phoenixes faith and fuddles logic and generally fucks with your mind. I usually avoid run ins with the genre like the devil (well. Except for the examples above, read under duress and the pretence of bookclub requisites).
But Reynolds hits a cord, brave lady that she is. To tackle the morass of heaven and hell.
In my professional career I’ve had to deal with a concept in law regarding joint and several liability which stipulates ‘A designation of liability by which members of a group are either individually or mutually responsible to a party in whose favor a judgment has been awarded’
Its this concept which Reynolds manages to translate in literary lingo which makes the story work: a distinct separateness of the spiritual world, guided by but not informed by the realm of reality. Connections between the here and beyond are not linear, but joint and several. Finch is not so much a conduit as a ‘marker’: like a lighthouse in the dark which populates a compass point on a map of chaos theory.
But its not the structure or synchronicity which bewitch me: its the ‘sense’ of a peace decoded. For the first time in my life I feel content, and hopeful, that death is not a fear to be dissipated into nothingness or prolonged into eternity.
June 3, 2017
Southern Gothic at its best.
February 2, 2021
"A Gracious Plenty" is a magical story that pulls at the emotions. When Finch Nobles was a toddler she pulled a pot of boiling water off the stove, burning her face and shoulders. The resulting scars made her an outcast, and she was taunted by the children in the small town. After her parents died, Finch took over the job of caretaker of the cemetery located on her family's land.
Finch is able to communicate with the dead in the cemetery who still have unfinished business before they eventually "lighten" and ascend to their final reward. They also control the weather, help the growing crops, and keep the four seasons on track. A former beauty queen, a crying baby, and a man with a secret past are among the dead that Finch befriends. Her path crosses that of the local policeman as she tries to make things right between the ghosts in the cemetery and the living people they left behind.
Finch is a likable character with lots of spirit. As the book progresses, we see her opening up to friendship which is difficult after all the rejection she faced as a child. This Southern story is compelling and heartwarming.
Finch is able to communicate with the dead in the cemetery who still have unfinished business before they eventually "lighten" and ascend to their final reward. They also control the weather, help the growing crops, and keep the four seasons on track. A former beauty queen, a crying baby, and a man with a secret past are among the dead that Finch befriends. Her path crosses that of the local policeman as she tries to make things right between the ghosts in the cemetery and the living people they left behind.
Finch is a likable character with lots of spirit. As the book progresses, we see her opening up to friendship which is difficult after all the rejection she faced as a child. This Southern story is compelling and heartwarming.
October 25, 2018
This is a book that grabs you from the start and sneaks up on you, becoming something of a page-turner. It's not a ghost story in the traditional sense, but there are a few significant ghost characters.
The protagonist is Finch Nobles. Her father was the caretaker of the local cemetery, and after he passes, she takes over. She is able to communicate with the dead who are buried there. This isn't a creepy story; instead, it offers an interesting take on the purpose of the dead in the natural world.
If you're into small-town, southern lit, and are looking to lose yourself in a fast read, with some beautiful lines sprinkled throughout, then this is a good one to pick up.
The protagonist is Finch Nobles. Her father was the caretaker of the local cemetery, and after he passes, she takes over. She is able to communicate with the dead who are buried there. This isn't a creepy story; instead, it offers an interesting take on the purpose of the dead in the natural world.
If you're into small-town, southern lit, and are looking to lose yourself in a fast read, with some beautiful lines sprinkled throughout, then this is a good one to pick up.
March 1, 2021
Five stars as the book truly surpassed my expectations. Moreover, it left me looking to try more from the author.
I am very northern... as in measurable maple sap content in my blood. So, I'm leery of southern fiction in general; will I "get" it? Here, I was drawn in by the protagonist Finch Nobles right away. Setting wasn't overly drawn, thus I had no issues with settling into each scene. It's largely character-driven, each pursuing their own demons. While, of course, Finch grows and changes, she serves as a catalyst for others to do so as well.
If I had to quibble, I suppose it struck me that there was little (or no) racial aspect involved, which seems nearly mandatory for Southern fiction, although this was written twenty years ago when that was, perhaps, less sought-after as a factor (shall we say)? There's a prominent LGBT angle present later in the book.
Anyway, what I liked best about the story (other than Finch, who's anything but passive-aggressive) had to do with the secondary characters as a diverse lot, definitely not a collection of (cardboard) stereotypes.
Definitely recommended!
I am very northern... as in measurable maple sap content in my blood. So, I'm leery of southern fiction in general; will I "get" it? Here, I was drawn in by the protagonist Finch Nobles right away. Setting wasn't overly drawn, thus I had no issues with settling into each scene. It's largely character-driven, each pursuing their own demons. While, of course, Finch grows and changes, she serves as a catalyst for others to do so as well.
If I had to quibble, I suppose it struck me that there was little (or no) racial aspect involved, which seems nearly mandatory for Southern fiction, although this was written twenty years ago when that was, perhaps, less sought-after as a factor (shall we say)? There's a prominent LGBT angle present later in the book.
Anyway, what I liked best about the story (other than Finch, who's anything but passive-aggressive) had to do with the secondary characters as a diverse lot, definitely not a collection of (cardboard) stereotypes.
Definitely recommended!
September 20, 2018
This is the perfect read. Loved every word and truthfully would not have been disappointed if it was a little longer. The title is a little misleading, I was thinking too sappy but the title is explained and fits perfectly. If you liked Gaiman's The Graveyard Book then this needs to be one you pick up sooner than later. Thank you Wyndy for the recommendation.
January 19, 2024
One of my favorite books. I couldn't put it down. I loved this book. The story revolves around the main character, Finch, who has been an outcast her whole life. Then she finds she has a special gift. The secrets and twists that intertwine her with those that have cast her out make for a moving and fascinating read all the way through.
June 7, 2012
I thought it was about time that I added my favourite book of all time, one of the few books that I've read and then re-read and then re-read again.
The setting for A Gracious Plenty is a cemetary, and its world is inhabited by ghosts. This is not a horror story though - ghosts are portrayed as the benevolent beings that create an added richness to our world. They are the best friends, the only real friends of Finch, who is badly scarred from burns she received as a child. She finds solace with her friends the ghosts, who she can see because she has shunned the human world.
Oh my gosh, this book is beautiful.
I have loaned this book to friends and neighbours on numerous occasions, and last year I finally loaned it to someone who didn't give it back. I'm a little bit shattered - I could buy a new copy I suppose, but it'll be a different edition and it won't be exactly like the one that I loved.
Gosh, I'm a sop! Weak and emotional! Bah!
Anyway, I made a decision when I joined Goodreads that I wouldn't add anything to My Books that I'd read before I joined.... but I'm breaking the rule for this book because I loved it so much and want to see it appearing on my Favourites shelf whenever I open this site.
The setting for A Gracious Plenty is a cemetary, and its world is inhabited by ghosts. This is not a horror story though - ghosts are portrayed as the benevolent beings that create an added richness to our world. They are the best friends, the only real friends of Finch, who is badly scarred from burns she received as a child. She finds solace with her friends the ghosts, who she can see because she has shunned the human world.
Oh my gosh, this book is beautiful.
I have loaned this book to friends and neighbours on numerous occasions, and last year I finally loaned it to someone who didn't give it back. I'm a little bit shattered - I could buy a new copy I suppose, but it'll be a different edition and it won't be exactly like the one that I loved.
Gosh, I'm a sop! Weak and emotional! Bah!
Anyway, I made a decision when I joined Goodreads that I wouldn't add anything to My Books that I'd read before I joined.... but I'm breaking the rule for this book because I loved it so much and want to see it appearing on my Favourites shelf whenever I open this site.
September 27, 2009
While Reynolds' Rapture of Canaan got the most attention, I think this book is spectacular. Set in a graveyard, narrated by a woman who has endured living with a disfigured face, the language and sentiments are hypnotic. The protagonist blurs her reality between the dead and the living, but remains distant from her own soul. I've taught this book several times and each read through I see something new -- a compelling read.
February 11, 2021
Chilling! Made me think deeply about conversations I would have with my numerous beloved departed. But my strongest honest reaction is that it was also too weird for me to understand barely half of the affect expressed. Not only Finch's by any means. Extremely sad and dripping with regrets.
Dialect makes all the communications even more crossover blurred. But beautifully embellished just as fully.
Dialect makes all the communications even more crossover blurred. But beautifully embellished just as fully.
May 25, 2018
Not my cup of tea. Too bored to finish.
March 12, 2020
3.5 to 4 stars. A young girl who is disfigured during an accident, later befriends all the occupants of the cemetery her father cares for, and then takes over as caretaker when her father dies. This was good. The premise was interesting, and I really cared for the lonely protagonist, Finch Nobles, and all her dead friends. It was a great twist on what happens when we die. The writing was lyrical, and the descriptions of people and place vibrant.
January 28, 2025
"....death happens slow sometimes. How sometimes people are dead before their hearts stop beating. How sometimes they walk around that way for a long time before their bodies let them go. Sometimes they even have to chase death down."
This Southern gothic novel dives into the life of Finch Nobles, who’s faced more hardship than most. Scarred and isolated after a childhood accident, Finch has always felt like an outsider in her small town. After her parents pass away, she takes over their cemetery. Here’s the twist: Finch can talk to the dead.
The cemetery becomes her haven, where the ghosts have their own unresolved stories to tell. Finch builds friendships with these spirits—a beauty queen, a crying baby, and a man with a hidden past, to name a few. These spirits are far from typical; they influence the world around them in small, magical ways, like nudging the weather or helping crops grow.
What really makes this book special is its emotional depth. Finch is a tough yet deeply sensitive character. She’s been through so much rejection, so opening up to the spirits, and even the living, is a huge step for her. The connections she builds feel real and raw.
This isn’t your typical ghost story. It’s not creepy but rather a thoughtful take on life, loss, and the little things that connect us all. The story is a blend of sadness, warmth, and hope. It made me think about what conversions I would have with loved ones who have passed.
If you like Southern lit with a sprinkle of magic realism, or just want a story that feels both comforting and haunting, A Gracious Plenty is definitely worth picking up.
TW: death/grief, burn injuries, bullying and social rejection, parental abuse and neglect, mental health struggles, self-harm, and homophobia/anti-LGBTQ+.
February 18, 2021
In this superb example of southern gothic literature, the dead continue to exist if they still have a story to tell. The more their story is told the lighter they become until they moves on. During this interim period, the dead in ghostly forms are not idle; they are responsible for "the weather, the tides and the seasons."
Normally these wraiths go about their business unseen; however, not to Finch Nobles who regularly talks with them in her role as a groundskeeper of a small community's cemetery. This paranormal ability may be because she was traumatized and disfigured when she pulled a pot of boiling water onto her when four-years-old. She grew up teased, friendless, and lonely. As Finch enmeshes herself in the stories of some of the cemetery's resident's stories she begins to heal.
I highly recommend this well crafted bit of literary fiction with themes of emotional pain and isolation but also friendship, acceptance and redemption.
Normally these wraiths go about their business unseen; however, not to Finch Nobles who regularly talks with them in her role as a groundskeeper of a small community's cemetery. This paranormal ability may be because she was traumatized and disfigured when she pulled a pot of boiling water onto her when four-years-old. She grew up teased, friendless, and lonely. As Finch enmeshes herself in the stories of some of the cemetery's resident's stories she begins to heal.
I highly recommend this well crafted bit of literary fiction with themes of emotional pain and isolation but also friendship, acceptance and redemption.
February 27, 2021
Finch Nobels works in a graveyard. That suits her fine. She can talk with the living and the dead. If you know a dead person well, then they are easy to talk to. It’s not exactly like having a conversation with yourself, but it’s pretty close, I guess. Conversation with regular folks can be a drag; there are a lot of jerks.
Most of the time, I could tell if Finch was talking to the dead or the living. For some unknown reason, the ambiguity didn’t bother me.
Most of the time, I could tell if Finch was talking to the dead or the living. For some unknown reason, the ambiguity didn’t bother me.
June 2, 2019
Great!
August 4, 2020
This was a little gem. When my good friend borrowed it to me, it embarrassingly sat for too long in my TBR pile. Let me tell you this little read has a huge punch.
The book centres around a girl who is disfigured after being badly burnt and she becomes the town recluse.
She speaks to ghosts in the graveyard but this really isn’t a supernatural book but a book about living in the present. The characters are perfectly staged and you feel like you know everyone in this small town.
Quirky and sentimental.
Thanks Chels for lending me this treasure.
“Your truth may not look like mine, but that is not what matters. What matters is this. You can look at a scar and see hurt or you can look at a scar and see healing. Try to understand.”
The book centres around a girl who is disfigured after being badly burnt and she becomes the town recluse.
She speaks to ghosts in the graveyard but this really isn’t a supernatural book but a book about living in the present. The characters are perfectly staged and you feel like you know everyone in this small town.
Quirky and sentimental.
Thanks Chels for lending me this treasure.
“Your truth may not look like mine, but that is not what matters. What matters is this. You can look at a scar and see hurt or you can look at a scar and see healing. Try to understand.”
October 7, 2008
Yet another book where I completely disagree with all of the goodreads reviews. I was really looking forward to reading this because most of the reviews gave it 4 or 5 stars. The only reason it is getting 2 instead of 1 is because it is not like anything else I have ever read. I like the uniqueness of the story but in general it really grossed me out. Between the way she described her scrapings and the cat that was pooping worms, and the cat that she killed.... I was very tempted to stop reading. I really wish I had.
February 7, 2022
A unique story, beautifully written. I loved the beginning and the end but found the middle a little slow. I’m glad I read this one.
January 24, 2022
A unique gem
February 8, 2021
South Carolina is not well known for women novelists, so it was fun to read something by a native daughter. Reynolds' plot is distinctive: Finch Nobles, a reclusive woman with a disfigured face who tends the local cemetery, becomes able to communicate with the deceased. When she makes this known to the living descendants, conflict results. But it also opens a door for Finch to renew contact with people.
A good read that keeps moving along.
A good read that keeps moving along.
December 3, 2014
Finch Nobles, the narrator of this story, was badly burned as a toddler when she pulled a pot of boiling water off the stove in her mother’s kitchen. Her father was caretaker of the town cemetery. When her parents die, Finch takes over the care of the land, living alone in the house on the grounds. Cruelly teased by the town children, Finch retreats into the world of the dead after she learns that she is able to talk to and see the spirits of the dead. Her isolation protects her from pain and rejection, but it also keeps her from love and friendship. We soon find that most of the book’s characters have their own emotional scars.
It is evident that author Sheri Reynolds has some talent as a writer, but this isn’t brilliant stuff. It’s a fairly easy read that is simply written. The story itself moves fairly quickly and is somewhat engaging. But when we come to the climactic storm (which is summoned up by two of the dead spirits because some of the living refuse to accept their truths), the story starts to seem terribly contrived. My enjoyment of the book was also diminished by its rather stereotypical treatment of “religious” people (Ms. Reynolds would make a good television writer) and the strong influence of postmodern thinking.
It is evident that author Sheri Reynolds has some talent as a writer, but this isn’t brilliant stuff. It’s a fairly easy read that is simply written. The story itself moves fairly quickly and is somewhat engaging. But when we come to the climactic storm (which is summoned up by two of the dead spirits because some of the living refuse to accept their truths), the story starts to seem terribly contrived. My enjoyment of the book was also diminished by its rather stereotypical treatment of “religious” people (Ms. Reynolds would make a good television writer) and the strong influence of postmodern thinking.
September 11, 2011
I had no idea what to expect from this book and the fact that she wrote another book ("The Rapture of Canaan") with an overly religious title that was also an Oprah book club selection was kind of a turnoff. But I started with the story and really got pulled in. The people who gave it bad reviews or said they didn't understand it or that they had to suspend belief obviously have a lack of imagination in their lives. This is a wonderful, creative story, almost a fable, and Reynolds' writing is really great. Her main character, Finch, is strong, but not as strong as we, or she, might think. As for any particular religious leanings, Finch blasts the so-called Christian characters in the book with their hypocritical behavior while at the same time coming to terms with her own behavior which could be characterized the same way. I have a feeling I'll read this again.
August 27, 2016
This was a lovely story about a woman who was badly burned when young and now is tending the local cemetery. Oh, and she can speak with the dead who linger there. In this story, the dead must get their issues resolved before they can 'lighten' and release themselves from the cemetery and arise to the afterlife. It is well written and there is so much here about life and redemption. Not all scars are on the outside and the dead have much to teach us.
Quotes to remember:
In death, all the wounds begin to heal from the inside out.
What binds us is the scars.
Quotes to remember:
In death, all the wounds begin to heal from the inside out.
What binds us is the scars.
February 14, 2023
A girl is burned when she pulls a pot off a stove. her mother blames herself and the guilt slowly kills her. The father is the town cemetery caretaker and when he dies, the girl, Finche Nobles, takes over.
She can hear and see the dead and through them she learns many things.
The book is about accepting people, seeing the good in people, understanding we all have stories to tell.
This was a fabulous read!
She can hear and see the dead and through them she learns many things.
The book is about accepting people, seeing the good in people, understanding we all have stories to tell.
This was a fabulous read!
March 3, 2020
A Gracious Plenty is a well written book about a girl named Finch who had a bad accident when she was four. Sheri Reynolds does a great job of constructing this book. It's almost like she writes about a bunch of little stories and composes them into one large book. At the beginning, it's kind of difficult to understand exactly what is going on, but the more the reader reads the better the book gets and the more the reader can get into the book.
January 6, 2010
A wonderful novel by the amazing Southern writer Sheri Reynolds. A gentle, funny, moving story about a woman whose community includes both neighbors and folks living in the cemetary, and I came to care for all of them.
If you want to cuddle up and read a great story, read this book.
If you want to cuddle up and read a great story, read this book.
Displaying 1 - 30 of 353 reviews