Housekeeping by Marilynne Robinson
#52 in my book challenge for the year, and finally, a really good book! It feels as if I haven’t read one in a while. Housekeeping centers around two young sisters and the family members that care for them. It is a meditation on family, loss, home, transcience, and more. The editors of a recent anthology of contemporary writing noted that most of the submissions from women writers ahd been “disapointingly domestic.” Domestic does not mean disappointing, as Robinson’s novel clearly demonstrates. Her writing is lovely, the characters full-fleshed and compelling, the sense of place concrete, and the story pulls the reader right through. Housekeeping met with much critical acclaim when it was published in 1980, and it was only last year that Robinson published her second novel, Gilead, which I am now eager to read.
July 25th, 2005 at 8:36 am
i am reading ‘gilead’ right now and it is lovely. i’m rather in awe of robinson’s use of language. look forward to finally getting to ‘housekeeping’ afterward. -d