Year of Wonders in Aussie Readers

Jun 16, 2008 Catsalive rated it it was amazing

Shelves: 2005, aww

This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it, click here. Absolutely brilliant! I loved every moment of this book. What a wonderful, strong woman Anna was and became. I say "was and became" because she must have been strong to begin with to grow into such a person. It was more than a "Novel of the Plague", it was a novel of the ability of people to grow, of compassion, and of humanity.

SPOILERS. Highlight to read.
I loved this quote whilst reading the book, and I also include the section from the Readers' Guide:

"It is up to the story's heroine - a young, Absolutely brilliant! I loved every moment of this book. What a wonderful, strong woman Anna was and became. I say "was and became" because she must have been strong to begin with to grow into such a person. It was more than a "Novel of the Plague", it was a novel of the ability of people to grow, of compassion, and of humanity.

SPOILERS. Highlight to read.
I loved this quote whilst reading the book, and I also include the section from the Readers' Guide:

"It is up to the story's heroine - a young, widowed housemaid named Anna Frith - to raise the existential question about the origins of the plague, and she therefore becomes the embodiment of the conflict at the centre of the novel: God Versus Nature.

"It came to me then that we, all of us, spent a very great deal of time pondering these questions that, in the end, we could not answer. If we balanced the time we spent contemplating God, and why He afflicted us, with more thought as to how the Plague spread and poisoned our blood, then we might come nearer to saving our lives. While these thoughts were vexing, they brought with them also a chink of light. For if we could be allowed to see the Plague as a thing in Nature merely, we did not have to trouble about some grand celestial design that had to be completed before the disease would abate. We could simply work upon it as a farmer might toil to rid his field of unwanted tare, knowing that when we found the tools and the method and the resolve, we would free ourselves, no matter if we were a village of sinners or a host of saints."

After suffering the death of her suitor and her two children and despite her own spiritual beliefs and adoration for the rector and his wife, Anna boldly rejects the idea that the pestilence is a call for repentance. And in a time of such turmoil, she shrugs off the social and religious mores that would keep a weaker woman in her place.......
..... Caught up in the struggle between science and religion, Anna's dilemma mirrors that of the world in her time. Ultimately she confesses: "I cannot say that I have faith anymore. Hope, perhaps. We have agreed that it will do for now.""

I had an inkling about the situation between the Rector and Elinor but I'm sorry that Anna & he parted as they did. I knew there must have been a point to the early reference to the Musalman so I'm quite happy that Anna found a fulfilling life there. ...more

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Mar 05, 2009 Kate rated it really liked it

Shelves: fiction

I enjoy Geraldine Brooks' writing very much. This story set almost entirely in the Peak District during the plague year 1666 is based on historical records. The evocation of life in a tiny mining village (which cuts itself off from the rest of the country to keep the plague 'seeds' confined) is excellently done. I must say i kept being reminded of Jane Eyre and The Crucible as I read, but that's not to take anything away from Brooks' own deft storytelling via the narrator, Anna Frith for whom th ...more

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Aug 30, 2007 Kristin rated it liked it

This book was okay. Interesting to read about the plague. The ending felt forced and unrealistic. For almost the entire book the rector is such a compassionate figure and suddenly in the end she throws in the weird twist about him wittholding sex from his wife. And the fact that she would travel to Oran and marry a doctor... how strange.

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Jul 10, 2008 Lindsay rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: fiction, top100, z2007

I really enjoyed this book. The main character was strong, interesting, realistic and likeable. The story itself is powerful and kept me enthralled the whole way through.

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