Customer Reviews

Abandonings: Photographs of Otter Tail County, Minnesota

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This is an absolutely amazing book..... MacKenzie flies around his birthplace regions, and then finds these places, that once he photographs, become temples of the ravages of time. These are photos that make one sense's shudder at the visual touch of the moment when something went awry with a schoolhouse, or a barn or a house. He has frozen, via huge, elegant landscapes, a moment in time, an uncomfortable, but spectacular moment. I was stunned by these photographs and by the senseless beauty and brooding quality of them.

The Midwestern Prairies are dramatic settings that are often underrated in terms of their scenic beauty. This pictorial does a great job a capturing the beauty of the Prairie landscape and the early houses and barns. The wide shots are very well suited to the wide expanses of Prairie and do a great job of showing the oceanic expanses of Prairie that that a standard photo can't capture. The design of the pages and the book are very well done. A number a Prairie pictorials I've scene have some great shots but don't have world class design. This one has both. The text that accompanies the photos is well chosen and interesting.

This is a beautiful tribute to rural Minnesota! I grew up and still live in Otter Tail County. I have many beautiful pictures myself of the same schoolhouse and the small shed from the cover, and treasure the fact that these familiar scenes are preserved in such a beautiful book. Another barn in the book sits on my friend's farm, so it is particularly sentimental. I just feel it is a shame that this beautiful and charming schoolhouse, which survived not only the elements and the test of time, but also the development of modern civilization all around its walls...which sat for so many generations on its desolate perch on the prairie has been moved a different location to make a summer cabin for the author. What a tragedy. Exactly why capturing these pictures is so important, before they are gone forever!

Because I've spent lots of time in Minnesota and the Dakotas, I was interested in this book, especially since I, too, am a photographer. While the photographs were wonderful, the choice of book excepts turned these still images into life. Absolutely fantastic. The winter scene and text on pages 20 and 21 still haunts me.

ABANDONINGS has turned out to be one of my favorite books. Thank you Maxwell MacKenzie.

I grew up in Otter Tail County, and a good number of the pictures are places that I have probably seen over the years. The photographs capture the beauty of the place, the words the beauty, heartbreak, and tragedy. Wonderful book.

Photographic quality and angle of pictures is superb. They lent a poignant yearning of this time period - how nice it would be to see the people and hear their voices at these sites. The accompanying text made the pictures more vivid. Wonderful book - when it is back in print, I'm going to buy it.

i found this book by ordering country barns notecards from amazon.com. Which where from this book i just look at the pictures and go ahh. Wonderful color really touched me