Thursday, February 06, 2003
Just finished one of the best books I’ve read in a long time. The Danger Tree by David Macfarlane mixes family history, memory and research into a deeply moving portrait of Newfoundland and the effects of war.
Three of his great-uncles died in the First World War, and with great skill and wisdom, he tells their stories and the stories of those left behind. And the island of Newfoundland itself becomes a character, with all its barren beauty, heartache and missed chances. A beautiful and at times very funny book, and riveting.
In more prosaic news, Powells has become my new US-based online bookshop of choice, with all the stuff I wanted that Amazon didn’t have, or said they had and then couldn’t send me. And it feels good to be supporting an independent bookseller. What I wanted was a pile of maps, and a book about the Irish in Canada.
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