The Canning Season was not my first Polly Horvath. I've read at least three of her other books, including The Trolls, my first and favorite. Horvath is Canadian and known for wacky, off-kilter characters, particularly adults, who act in unpredictable and bizarre ways.
One of my concerns about the group reading The Canning Season is that it would be too strange, but, believe it or not, Horvath toned down the irresponsiblitity and craziness of the adults in this book. Was the wackiness too great for anyone? I do love me a bit of quirky.
Did it strike anyone else that this book is not just for young readers? I know people go on and on about books that can be read on multiple levels, but I kept running across parts that I thought kids would not necessarily understand. --- that's not a bad thing; I liked it. The story is also morbid and dark! Ratchet's mother is cruel, Harper's aunt is cruel, the house is surrounded by lethal bears, and then there's the whole story of Tilly?Penpen? (I forget) tripping over her mother's head. Despite this (or because of?), Tilly and Penpen have a healthy view of death.
Horvath does not skimp on the language. She uses big words, curses; the two aunts speak freely in their antiquated manner. I forgot about her use of "fuck" until I read through the Amazon reviews and saw that Horvath lost some fans because of it. In my library, the book is shelved in the YA section, which I agree with. And I LIKE that the aunts have a little sass and say "inappropriate" things (Tilly just can't help herself) -- they are not old pushover spinsters, but fiercely independent women who live as they see fit, regardless of the opinion of others. They may be naive about technology and current affairs, but they are happy and loving people.
(Really, I thought people would be more upset about Harper's repeated use of "Christ" as an explitive than "fuck.")
Any thoughts on the ending? I thought it moved a little too fast, and wrapped up a little too neatly, but I liked it.
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- The Book Thief - Markus Zusak
- Absolutely, Positively Not - David LaRochelle
- Zap - Paul Fleischman
- Stay with Me - Garret Freymann-Weyr
- Blow Out the Moon - Libby Koponen
- The Book of Lost Things - John Connolly
- American Born Chinese - Gene Luen Yang
- Kalpana's Dream - Judith Clarke
- The Body of Christpher Creed - Carol Plum-Ucci
- The Canning Season - Polly Horvath
- Nick & Norah's Infinite Playlist - Rachel Cohn & David Levithan
- Wrecked - E. R. Frank
- Burning City - Ariel & Joaquin Dorfman
- Stuck in Neutral - Terry Trueman
- Criss Cross - Lynne Rae Perkins
- Sandpiper - Ellen Wittlinger
- Looking for Alaska - John Green
- Full Service - Will Weaver
- Black Hole - Charles Burns
- Autobiography of My Dead Brother - Walter Dean Myers
- Geography Club - Brent Hartinger
- So B. It - Sarah Weeks
- A Great and Terrible Beauty - Libba Bray
- Bound - Donna Jo Napoli
- Fortune's Bones: The Manumission Requiem - Marilyn Nelson
- The Outcasts of 19 Schuyler Place - E. L. Konigsburg
- Chasing Vermeer - Blue Balliett
- The Gravedigger's Cottage - Chris Lynch
- House of Stairs - William Sleator
- HOOT - Carl Hiaasen
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4 comments:
Ohh... I loved it. More later -- probably tomorrow or Friday, I don't have time right now. But thank goodness you put it on the list, Sarah. My first Horvath.
Yes, I really enjoyed it. I love the quirky and the morbid, especially this month, and I liked the way it walked the line between reality and nonsense. See, I can go with a forest filled with bears out for blood as long as there's also a kid spouting the virtues of internet commerce.
I actually got the feeling this wasn't even written for kids, from the swearing and the liquor. I had to check the shelving sticker (J). I suppose kids would get it, but maybe miss a few things, or have to look them up. ("Mommy, what's cointreau?")
The ending was fine. It did move much faster than the rest of the book, but I feel like it was only there to tie together the loose ends, and if it had been drawn out, I would have gotten bored. Horvath didn't seem to concerned with plotlines through most of the book, so a quick tie-up at the end was all I needed. I like that the girls stayed there, but had lives. I would have been sad if they both turned out so isolated like Tilly and Penpen.
See, I think it’s absolutely written for kids, because it’s all about the importance of being honest and open-eyed in the world and not letting anyone try to sugarcoat things for you. It says it’s ok to be curious about “adult” topics like death and marriage and how crazy people sometimes are, and I think the way that Horvath uses words that kids might not understand is deliberate – that’s how you learn about stuff when you’re a kid, isn’t it? By hearing words like “cointreau” and “placenta” and not having them explained, but then looking them up, or asking your friends about them, and going “ohhhhh.” In fact, I might even give this book to a precocious 6th grader rather than a YA reader, because it’s really pre-teens who are filled with this particular type of curiosity about the adult world and who find themselves blocked from it usually. By the time you get to be a high-schooler you’ve usually become both more able to enter into the world of adult conversations if you want, and at the same time more inward-looking, so that you’re not as interested in them.
Erica! We've found our Holy Grail of fiction! :-)
Wow -- when was the last time we all liked a book?
I highly recommend Horvath's The Trolls.
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