Customer Reviews

The Canning Season

5 star:		(14)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(6)

 

 

When Ratchet's neglectful mother ships her off to her great aunts' house for the summer, she isn't sure what to expect. Especially when the great aunts, PenPen and Tilly, are twins who haven't gone farther than the post office from their mansion in the boonies of Maine since they were teenagers.

When Harper, an obnoxious but lovable teen, is accidentally dropped off because her guardian thought their house was an orphanage, yet another humorous and heart warming twist.

Rich with dry humour and sparkling wit, full of eccentric characters, The Canning Season will make you laugh out loud, or chuckle quietly to yourself at the absurdity of the situations in the book. The characters take silly things completely seriously and the combination of events throughout the course of the novel are guaranteed to make you smile.

Don't be turned off by the childish looking cover. This is a hilarious novel that everyone will enjoy, from old ladies just like PenPen and Tilly to their teenage grandchildren.

I loved Polly Horvath's newest novel The Canning Season. For the short-attention-span reader, Horvath may be a bit too thoughtful,a bit too cerebral, but for those of us who love a creative inventive writer whose words and images are always wholly original and surprising, this is a great book.

Pen-Pen and Tilly are characters in the best Roald Dahl sense, carved a bit from reality and even more from fantasy. Still, I find a bit of many people in both of Ratchet's lovable aunts and am grateful that in a time when many kids have nowhere to turn, the aunts seem to be there for all of us.

And Ratchet! How can anyone not love and admire a girl so sturdy she can withstand the winds of a horrendous mother and still have some affection for her. Polly Horvath knows that kids are stronger and more resilient than we give them credit for being, and they can weather crises without teams of people intervening.

I had great fun reading The Canning Season and am having an even better time remembering it. That, it seems to me, is the true test of a great book.

" 'How can we have opinions if we have no idea what you're talking about?' asked Penpen gently.
" 'You gals ought to keep abreast of things,' said Mr. Feebles.
" 'Why?' asked Tilly grumpily. 'What good does it do you? It seems to me, from what you've been telling us, that everyone these days knows everything about everyone and the split second it happens, too. What do they do with all this information? What does it get them? It just clutters up their peaceful quiet time. It seems to me from what you've been describing, nobody has peaceful quiet time anymore. Television, bah! Radio, bah! Newspapers, magazines, bah, bah! Sounds like the world is running off half-cocked, people getting zapped with their little hits of information. Needing it every day. Zap, zap, zap. Well, deliver me. Contagious. Like hoof-and-mouth disease. I hope you're not contaminated. Don't go trekking it all over our property.'
" 'Very funny,' said Mr. Feebles. 'You're a queer couple of ladies, is what you are.'
" 'Yes, yes,' said Tilly, 'those queer Menuto women. I know all about it. Now, you drive gently on those rutted roads and don't go breaking those blueberry jars.' "

Changes just keep creeping up on us.

"And Penpen's eyes welled up as she realized that Tilly was no longer a young girl, as if seeing her white kinked hair and wrinkles and suddenly realizing what they meant. That old age had come and what had seemed like an interesting diversion--the first few gray hairs, the stooping body--wasn't just a pleasant novelty. They weren't going back; they weren't ever going back. Their youth, their youth, was gone. It was as if, unwitnessed, out here, safe in the woods, they should have been out of time as well. If no one had seen their passing, they shouldn't have passed. She wondered if Tilly, lying upstairs alone, was suddenly as aware of it as she was."

THE CANNING SEASON is a complex dichotomy of age and youth, of selfish and nurturing adults, of world-shrinking technology and isolation, and of two teenage girls, Rachet and Harper, who are fortunate enough to land on the doorstep of "those queer Menuto women." What is so fascinating is seeing how Penpen and Tilly--twin nonagenarians--share a renaissance, despite their failing health, while the two teenage girls come of age in the unusual household, the old mansion on an isolated coast in Maine where Tilly and Penpen have spent their entire lives. Aside from the story's motherhood theme, the book is nonjudgmental in its approach to human existence and different lifestyles.

"Penpen said that living things were all critical mass, the definition of critical mass being the amount of fissionable material required to sustain a chain reaction. She tossed some weeds on the compost and said that people didn't like to see things rotting in the garden but there had to be all things to be growth. She told Rachet this over and over, and the things that someone repeats to you over and over you tend to remember."

Rachet, the first adolescent character we meet in the story, is a rather passive girl who has been long neglected by the mother who ships her off to Maine for the summer. She needs to grow. One of Rachet's catalysts for growth is the blunt, computer-saavy Harper, who also shows up at the end of that rutted, bear-plagued road. Harper, who has been rejected--first by her mother and then by a mother-figure--is a real piece of work:

" 'I can't eat these raspberries, they're moldy,' Harper said loudly, picking them off and putting them on the tablecloth.
" 'Please use a saucer,' said Penpen. 'You'll stain dear Mother's tablecloth.'
" 'I thought dear Mother stained her own tablecloth,' said Harper sourly, because Tilly had told her part of the story.
" 'Not this one,' said Penpen.
"Rachet breathed a sigh of relief and began to pick off her own moldy ones. She had been worrying quite a bit that they might make her sick. She didn't think they would kill her unless she was allergic to penicillin, which as far as she knew she was not, but she didn't like the idea of them whizzing around her system, and although in the end she had suffered no ill effects, she was glad she no longer had to shovel them down. This was the good thing about Harper. She did things which at first seemed unbelievably rude and obnoxious but which you secretly wished you could do yourself. Her remarks were less offensive once they realized that she was simply determined to speak the truth and be done with it. There didn't seem to be any hidden corners in Harper's soul, and she wasn't interested in allowing other people theirs. Often, as in the case of the raspberries, this alleviated delicate problems."

It is wonderful how the elderly characters act in a manner that young adults can totally relate to: Penpen trying on Zen philosophy and having a schoolgirl crush on Dr. Richardson; Tilly's self-absorption that often leaves everyone waiting all day for a meal. As a forty-eight year-old who identifies with being part of the younger generation, I can similarly identify with that shock of Penpen's in discovering that old age has arrived.

THE CANNING SEASON moves back and forth freely between Tilly and Penpen's younger years and the present. It hosts a series of hilarious, bizarre and horrific incidents and circumstances that keep readers (heads) rolling and wondering what will happen next. But for me, the multigenerational aspects to the story are what make this a uniquely exceptional tale with so much to ponder and discuss.

My 9 year-old and I read this book together. It is wonderful, touching, funny, and fairly sophisticated. I must warn you that if you are upset by curse words and unplanned pregnancy, then this book will upset you. However, it is a great story about Ratchet's summer with her elderly aunts in Maine. There is no sugar-coating of adult subjects, but rather honest treatment of them from a child's perspective.

I am a librarian in an elementary school. I loved this book, but I would not have purchased it if I had known in advance that it had the grandaddy of all the swear words in it, not once, but twice. The story is great, Horvath makes you care about the very realistic characters, but....it's just not appropriate for K-6. I bought it because of the awards it won and on Peggy Sharp's recommendation, and also because I really enjoy Horvath's The Trolls and Everything on a Waffle. Middle school students would also enjoy the book (the characters are 13 and 14, respectively) and I would recommend the book to mature students at that level.

I'm a librarian in a small rural library always looking for books that will grab reluctant teen readers. I just discovered this gem.
Yes, it has some profanity. Yes,it can be a bit grizzley but the characters and their stories are so endearing and fascinating it doesn't matter. I understand why It won The National Book Award. This is a unique book for intelligent young adults with a sense of humor. I will be recomending it often.

I have to agree with the person who spoke of the profanity. I am also a Polly Horvath fan. I loved the characters and the plot, but the language and topics of some of the conversations shocked me. I kept thinking I was misreading the text. I was relieved when a librarian friend of mine shared her thoughts on the book with me. She could not believe the rave reviews the book had received, based on the content and language. Thank goodness I read it so I knew not to place it on my classroom bookshelf.

If the premise of the book sounds good to you, then I guarantee you will enjoy it. The tale is whimsical and meaningful, a rare combination. Though, I am not really certain the appropriate age group for the book, as an adult I thoroughly enjoyed it. Ignore the negative reviews unless you, like the nay-sayers, are prudish and uninspired, then simply skip this little gem.

I really enjoyed "Everything on a Waffle" and "The Trolls." This seemed to be a varation on those themes; however, there were long-winded, uninteresting stories told by the aunts and the characters were way too annoyingly quirky to be believable. I have to admit: I skimmed a lot of the book, in hopes of finding an interesting hook in order to enjoy the story - couldn't find one.

This is a tedious read. While I know that themes of adolescence, and life and death go over especially well with the book-award panels for any reading level, 1) I wouldn't tout this as a juvenile fiction, and 2) I was surprised it won the National Book Award.

I love the wit and the heart of Polly Horvath's work. The author is fascinated by how people can blossom into true individuals, free from the expectations and demands of family, friends, and society in general. She celebrates the unique people we meet in life who help us become who we really are. In The Canning Season, those unique characters are so vividly drawn that they feel like old (and very eccentric) friends. You will remember them long after you turn the final page.