An exquisite and intimate novel about four people’s lives and our changing relationship with nature—for fans of Jon McGregor and Robert Macfarlane.
See more at the New Statesman.
Goodreads Reviews
Average Rating:
3.7 rating based on 1,114 ratings (all editions)
ISBN-10: 1408859041
ISBN-13: 9781408859049
Goodreads: 25160958
Author(s): Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing (UK)
Published: 4/23/2015
An exquisite and intimate novel about four people’s lives and our changing relationship with nature—for fans of Jon McGregor and Robert Macfarlane.
Howard and Kitty have been married for thirty years and now sleep in different rooms. It was always Kitty’s dream to move from their corner of north London into the countryside, and when the kids had left home they moved north, to the pretty village of Lodeshill with its one ailing pub and outlying farms. Howard often wonders if anyone who lives in this place really has a reason to be there—more reason than him.
Jack was once a rural rebel, a protestor who only ever wanted to walk the land in which he had been born, free and subject to nobody. After yet another stint in prison for trespass, he sets off once more to walk north up the country’s spine with his battered old backpack and notebooks full of scribbled poetry, looking for work in the fields and sleeping under the stars.
Jamie is a nineteen-year-old Lodeshill boy who works in a distribution center and has a Saturday job at a bakery. He spent his childhood exploring the woods and fields with his grandfather, and playing with his friend Alex, who lived in the farmhouse next door. Now, though, all he dreams of is cars—and escape.
As the lives of these four people overlap, we realize that mysterious layers of history are not only buried within them, but also locked into the landscape. A captivating novel, At Hawthorn Time is about what it means to belong—to family, to community, and to place—and about what it is to take our own, long road into the unknown.
3.7 rating based on 1,114 ratings (all editions)
ISBN-10: 1408859041
ISBN-13: 9781408859049
Goodreads: 25160958
Author(s): Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing (UK)
Published: 4/23/2015
An exquisite and intimate novel about four people’s lives and our changing relationship with nature—for fans of Jon McGregor and Robert Macfarlane.
Howard and Kitty have been married for thirty years and now sleep in different rooms. It was always Kitty’s dream to move from their corner of north London into the countryside, and when the kids had left home they moved north, to the pretty village of Lodeshill with its one ailing pub and outlying farms. Howard often wonders if anyone who lives in this place really has a reason to be there—more reason than him.
Jack was once a rural rebel, a protestor who only ever wanted to walk the land in which he had been born, free and subject to nobody. After yet another stint in prison for trespass, he sets off once more to walk north up the country’s spine with his battered old backpack and notebooks full of scribbled poetry, looking for work in the fields and sleeping under the stars.
Jamie is a nineteen-year-old Lodeshill boy who works in a distribution center and has a Saturday job at a bakery. He spent his childhood exploring the woods and fields with his grandfather, and playing with his friend Alex, who lived in the farmhouse next door. Now, though, all he dreams of is cars—and escape.
As the lives of these four people overlap, we realize that mysterious layers of history are not only buried within them, but also locked into the landscape. A captivating novel, At Hawthorn Time is about what it means to belong—to family, to community, and to place—and about what it is to take our own, long road into the unknown.
