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    The Girl in the Garden
    The Girl in the Garden
    The Girl in the Garden
    Audiobook7 hours

    The Girl in the Garden

    Written by Melanie Wallace

    Narrated by Elise Arsenault

    4/5

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    About this audiobook

    When June arrives on the coast of New England, baby in arms, an untrustworthy man by her side, Mabel-who rents them a cabin-senses trouble. A few days later, the girl and her child are abandoned.
    June is soon placed with Mabel's friend, Iris, in town, and her life becomes entwined with a number of locals who have known one another for decades: a wealthy recluse with a tragic past; a widow in mourning; a forsaken daughter returning for the first time in years, with a stranger in tow; a lawyer, whose longings he can never reveal; and a kindly World War II veteran who serves as the town's sage. Surrounded by the personal histories and secrets of others, June finds the way forward for herself and her son amid revelations of the others' pasts, including loves-and crimes-from years ago.
    In vivid, nuanced prose, Melanie Wallace-"a writer with a tender regard for the marginal, the missing and the lost"-explores the time-tested bonds of a small community, the healing power of friendship and love, and whether the wrongs of the past can ever be made right.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherHighbridge Company
    Release dateJan 31, 2017
    ISBN9781681683454
    Author

    Melanie Wallace

    MELANIE WALLACE is the author of The Housekeeper, which was long-listed for the Orange Prize, and Blue Horse Dreaming, which was long-listed (in translation, as Sauvages) for France's Prix Femina. Born and raised in New Hampshire, she now lives with her husband in Greece.

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    Reviews for The Girl in the Garden

    4/5

    24 ratings7 reviews

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    • 4/5
      I was interested in reading this story because it sounded like the kind of read where you can let yourself fall into the characters. The writing was beautifully descriptive. Almost poetic and filled with flowing prose. For some this writing style may be a turnoff, it just depends on what your tastes are. This story is not just about June and her abandonment. This novel is truly about the inhabitants of a community.June and her baby, Luke, were abandoned and she is young. She has no options but Mabel, the owner of the motel where June was stranded, already knew that. When she first spied June, Mabel had already decided that she could not turn away her and the baby. With the help of her friend Roland they allowed her to stay for a time at the motel. Winter was coming and for personal reasons Mabel cannot have June stay with her. She is owed a favor from her friend Iris which leads to June and her baby Luke moving into a cottage on her property. Iris has been a recluse for many years and her taking in this girl and her child comes as a surprise to some.June and Luke’s move to the cottage has a ripple effect on the cast of characters. For some it is June who affects them and brings up memories. For others, it is Luke who affects them and in some ways, brings them back to life. Through alternating narratives, you learn the stories of these characters. The author is very generous with background development on these characters. You truly cultivate an appreciation for where they came from and their struggles.This book has no true conflict. This is truly a story about people and how life has turned out for them. This is a book full of “feels.” There is a high emotional impact that is created with each character. You will either feel it personally or in a detached manner but no one can read this book without feeling something, well except happiness. This is not a “happy” book but one filled with bitter sweetness. This is about loss, isolation, grief and hope. There are layers of kindness and decency spread throughout this story. It is truly a beautiful story.This review is based on a complimentary book I received from NetGalley. It is an honest and voluntary review. The complimentary receipt of it in no way affected my review or rating.
    • 3/5
      I'm not quite sure how to rate this one. I started it as an audio book on hoopla but it returned before I had a chance to finish so I bought the ebook and that was a mistake. I was really enjoying it up until the physical copy. Why would an author not use quotation marks for dialogue? It made me so mad. 3 ⭐️ overall since I enjoyed the story but why? Why ruin a good thing?
    • 5/5
      Although I usually stop reading a book where the author refuses o use quotation marks but I swallowed and kept reading....and I loved this book. I DO want more---an epilogue would be lovely.
    • 4/5
      During the mid-seventies, a group of lonely individuals is brought together to help June, a young girl and her infant son, Luke. The mother and child had been abandoned at a motel run by Mabel who is grieving the loss of her husband. She convinces her friend Iris, who has been a recluse since the death of her own husband many years ago, to allow the pair to stay in a small cottage on her property. Iris takes them in reluctantly, turning their care over to Duncan, her lawyer, who, in turn, introduces them to Oldman, a kind older bachelor, who takes them under his wing.A few years later, Iris is terminally ill and her daughter, Claire, from who she has been estranged since her husband’s death, convinces Sam, a Vietnam vet severely wounded both physically and mentally, to drive her to visit with her mother, to help but also to learn about her father and why her mother abandoned her, like June, to the care of Duncan and Oldman when she was a teenager.In The Girl In the Garden, author Melanie Wallace, has created a beautifully written, quiet, and moving story about abandonment, loss, grief, and ultimately redemption; how dysfunction and secrets within families can damage and how a community of strangers can come together to provide the emotional and physical shelter needed to heal. Thanks to Netgalley and Houghton Mifflin Harcourt for the opportunity to read this book in exchange for an honest review
    • 5/5
      It’s the end of summer, and Mabel is about to shutter her guest cabins when a car drives up. Out come a teen aged girl with a tiny baby, and an angry, tired man who completely ignores them. Mabel rents them a cabin for a few days; she isn’t surprised when one day the man drives off and doesn’t come back. She allows the girl to stay on, then finds them a place to stay for the winter, in a cottage behind the house of a friend of hers, Iris. Iris wants no rent- in fact, she’ll give the girl money- she just wants a few chores done and she gets to spend a couple of hours a day with the baby. Three years later, June and Luke are still living in the cottage. She’s made a couple of friends, and has created a life for herself, working for Iris as Iris gradually declines. She’s formed relationships with others in the small town. It’s a pretty decent life, if strictly circumscribed. Then Iris’s daughter, Claire, returns. Not only has she been gone for years with no contact, but she moved out of the main house at 13 and lived in the cottage until she was 18 and could leave. During her teen years she was basically brought up by Duncan, a local lawyer, who signed her absence slips, took her to the doctor, and attended parent-teacher meetings- Iris was happy to turn over the raising of her child. She’s now a photojournalist- largely taught by Oldman, a photographer during WW 2- who has won awards and created a life that has nothing to do with the place she grew up in. Claire brings with her, as her driver, a badly battle scarred Viet Nam vet named Sam, a man who works at the soup kitchen that she also is associated with. Everyone in this novel is mourning something; a spouse lost, a spouse better forgotten and the life they ruined, a childhood lost, their own looks lost. Everyone deals with loss differently, but they all have one thing in common: they have all withdrawn from the world to some degree. Who will be able to get over their loss and move on into life again? I loved the writing; some reviewers have criticized the long sentences but I have no problem with them. I found it difficult to follow the dialog at times; the author doesn’t use quotation marks and frequently doesn’t identify who is speaking. But it’s not bad enough to be uncomfortable. I loved the descriptions of the area the story takes place in, and the mundane settings of everyday life. The narrative changes point of view with each chapter. It’s a rather lovely portrait of damaged people surviving as best they can, although some of the people seem almost too good to be true.
    • 4/5
      "Leaves resembling whorling flocks of small misshapen birds spiraled sideways through the dusk's graphite solidity, catching silently and stationary on the dark pasture grounds. Before long, night would press into being.This story delivers such prose and an exquisite evocation of the natural world surrounding the lives of broken people brought together through twists of fate. In their aloneness, each struggles to find purpose and experiences the pain of disconnection. Yet, together, there may be hope after all.Each chapter focuses on the existence, struggle and depth of character of each individual. The painterly descriptions of place are pure poetry. They're delivered as if a misty veil over the characters of the story. Although the back-story for the characters is not all rosy and calm, the latter part of the story reads like a gently falling snow in deep winter - a certain hush falls upon the land. Well done Ms. Wallace!I am grateful to publisher Houghton Mifflin and Goodreads First Reads for having provided a free advance reading copy of this book. Their generosity, however, did not influence this review, the words of which are mine alone.Synopsis (from book's back cover):When June arrives on the coast of New England, baby in arms, an untrustworthy man by her side, Mabel—who rents them a cabin—senses trouble. A few days later, the girl and her child are abandoned. June is soon placed with Mabel’s friend, Iris, in town, and her life becomes entwined with a number of locals who have known one another for decades: a wealthy recluse with a tragic past; a widow in mourning; a forsaken daughter returning for the first time in years, with a stranger in tow; a lawyer, whose longings he can never reveal; and a kindly World War II veteran who serves as the town's sage. Surrounded by the personal histories and secrets of others, June finds the way forward for herself and her son amid revelations of the others' pasts, including loves—and crimes—from years ago. In vivid, nuanced prose, Melanie Wallace—“a writer with a tender regard for the marginal, the missing and the lost”*—explores the time-tested bonds of a small community, the healing power of friendship and love, and whether the wrongs of the past can ever be made right. * Hilary Mantel
    • 5/5
      A gorgeously-written novel reminiscent of [[Marilynne Robinson]]'s best work ([Gilead], etc.)A teenage woman, her infant son, and a man who ignores them both arrive in a small town in coastal New England and encamp at a summer cabin resort which is soon closing for the winter. After a few days, the man disappears. The resort owner, a middle-age widow trying to recover from her husband's sudden death, decides to help the young woman, who rarely speaks and makes no demands on anyone. Another townsperson, a recluse suffering from her own marriage (long-ago ended but never forgiven), is recruited to reluctantly house the mother and child for the winter. Other people in town get involved. Each chapter focuses on a different character (with some duplicates), so that all the major story participants are made accessible to the reader as the story progresses. Love, loss, and redemption are explored in moving and sometimes haunting ways. Just about all these people will leave the reader wanting to know them personally, and certainly the reader will wish the book wouldn't end. Highly, highly recommended.