Customer Reviews

A Gathering Light

5 star:		(101)
4 star:		(50)
3 star:		(20)
2 star:		(9)
1 star:		(4)

 

 

Sometimes when authors place fictional characters in the company of real historical figures the result is laughable or strained. Too often a child figure will suddenly find his or herself in the presence of (oh say) Abraham Lincoln and will teach the great man about following his childlike instincts or some other such goo. This is not to say that historical figures and situations are at odds with children's literature. I just want to make it clear that it's rare to find a really clever and believable situation in which the real and the unreal mix. "A Northern Light" is one such rarity.

In this book, heroine Mattie Gorkey lives two different narratives. In one story, she's working at a fancy hotel in the Northern Woods in 1906. A young woman vacationing at the hotel was recently discovered drowned in a nearby lake. Weighing on Mattie's conscience is the fact that just the day before the girl had entrusted her letters to our heroine with strict instructions that they be burned. Mattie has not burned them yet. The second narrative takes place several months before the exciting events at the hotel. Here we learn far more about Mattie's background and her love of literature and writing. With a mother recently dead and a family of five to care for, Mattie's great dream is to attend Barnard College in New York. Unfortunately, her pa is anything but receptive to the idea and there's a cute boy hanging around who seems to be giving Mattie quite a bit of attention. Focusing on her own dilemmas with the caring but somewhat close minded society in which she lives, Mat must figure out who she is and what is most important to her in the end. Mixing fiction with the historical events surrounding the 1906 Grace Brown murder case, the book effortlessly combines the two stories without so much as a hitch.

Author Jennifer Donnelly has given herself a surprisingly difficult task. How do you write a historical figure, particularly a female, and make her independent without making her seem like a 21st century girl in an early 20th century world? How, in other words, do you make her believable? Make no mistake, Mattie is a very believable character. So believable, in fact, that I found myself wanting to throttle her from time to time. I mean, she's a teenager, so we have to make allowances for her behavior. If she goes all doe-eyed over the local brick-headed swain, that's only partly her fault. Just the same, I suspect readers everywhere will be sometimes screaming in their heads at this character when she tries to decide what to do with Grace's letters or her own life. As for the melding of Mattie's story with that of Grace Brown's, it's seamless. Almost as if the events told here are the hard boiled truth. Still, it's a pity that the details of Grace's life don't parallel perfectly with Mattie's. The final decision made at the book's end would make a little more sense had Grace been similar to Mattie in personality or living situation. As it is, it's not entirely clear where Mat draws her final conclusions about living and life from. But these are small potatoes. There is no doubt left in the reader's mind at the end that the book is effortlessly written.

Fans of Elizabeth Taylor's great film, "A Place In the Sun", will see definite similarities between the murder in this book and that movie. That's because both works were based on an actual trial that inspired such works as Theodore Dreiser's, "An American Tragedy". But this isn't just a younger version of an already existing tale. "A Northern Light" stands on its own as a remarkable and well-told tale of one girl and her search for (for lack of a better word) fulfillment. It's a gripping story as you read through, not certain in the least that Mattie will do the right thing at the right moment. Bound to raise a fair amount of discussion and debate. A nice new novel.

This is one of those books where about a third of the way through, you anxiously thumb the remaining pages, knowing that despite your best efforts to savor it, the book will be over all too soon. When A NORTHERN LIGHT falls open, you,the reader, will fall in. Descriptions of this book by previous reviewers, while excellent and accurate, still do not prepare you for the sheer delight and pleasure of reading this story. While it has been classified as a Young Adult novel, as it does contain some language and situations, every word is absolutely true to the character who is speaking or being spoken of. I urge every teenage girl to read this, then pass it on to her mother, all of her girlfriends, aunts, a favorite teacher--in short, anyone who has a love of words, of learning, of mysteries, and a belief in the power of young women. A NORTHERN LIGHT is a most extraordinary book. Don't miss it!

Jennifer Donnelly's 'A Northern Light' (as it was released in the USA) is the very same book. Don't make the same mistake I did and order the UK version which is titled 'A Gathering Light' instead.

Either way though, it's one of the best books I have ever read. I am not a fan of novels set in the past but this was one exception that blew my mind! Mattie is the most endearing character, and the level of mystery is just enough to keep one fully entrenched in this novel to its finale. This is a true weekend escape in novel form!

I finished A Northern Light in a weekend; what a pleasure! I don't fit the intended young adult demographic, but I've always had an interest in children's and young adult literature as a result of my many careers.

Ms. Donnelly brilliantly captures the boom era of the 1900s New York Adirondack Mountain region. The story of Mattie Gokey, a young woman coming of age and struggling with difficult life choices, is a familiar story to most female readers. Her determination to become a writer reminded me of my own career aspirations. I found myself holding my breath and sighing with relief when Maddie finally decided her fate.

A Northern Light will stir passion, and even raise ire, among the young women who are fortunate to discover this beautiful book. Many readers will recognize themselves in Mattie, her teacher, Miss Wilcox, or even Weaver, her friend and fellow wordsmith. Most importantly, A Northern Light can be appreciated by readers of all ages, not just young adults, who appreciate great writing. A truly enjoyable read; I hope there's a sequel on the way.

Also recommended: The Lightkeeper's Daughter, Witch Child

This book is full of heart and wit. Though packed with details from a fascinating period and place, it follows a dramatic story that has contemporary resonance. In the context of a mystery story, A Northern Light captures that difficult moment in growing up when one is presented with choices that have broad consequences and no easy solutions. I found the book impossible to put down. I read it in one sitting - until two in the morning. Then I bought more copies (wanted to keep mine!) and gave them to my daughter (age 15) and my brother (age 35). Both of them found it compelling as well. I saw my daughter reading it as she walked home from school, and it was with many protests that she stopped reading long enough to finish her homework that evening. We have since had several interesting discussions about growing up, falling in love, doing the right thing, and finding the moxie to pursue a dream. Highest recommendation!

Jennifer Donelly writes a compelling, lively and interesting story with wonderful characters and a fascinating setting - 1906 in the Adirondacks (or as the protagonist, poor farm girl Mattie Gokey calls it, the North Woods).

Since Mattie's mother died, she's had to juggle roles as sister, housekeeper, student, breadwinner; and now that her handsome neighbour Royal seems to be showing puzzling interest in her - future wife. Mattie loves nothing more than reading, writing poems and stories and picking out a new word every day from the dictionary her mother bought with hard earned money before she died. But Mattie is tied down by the need to take care of her sisters, father and a promise she made, but desperately wants to break.

This story is told in flashbacks from Mattie's current job as hired help at the Glenmore Resort for wealthy tourists, where the entire town is caught up in the intrigue that follows the drowning death of a guest. Mattie knows something no else does, but is torn between loyalties to old promises and what others want her to do, and what she knows is right and she owes to herself.

You will not be able to put down this fantastic and well crafted read.

Matty Gokey is the sixteen year old narrator of this novel. With the 1906 murder of Grace Brown (also covered in Dreiser's "An American Tragedy) setting the stage for this tale that ultimately explores not only Graces murder, but the issues of poverty, racism, pregnancy, the perceived station of women in society, and the effects of death/loss on the human spirit.

Matty's possesses a love of words, a discerning eye, and a compulsion to write. Her hunger for more education and a life away from the rural North Woods area where she lives is weighed against her conscience and the question of whether she is obligated to fulfill two promises she made.

An excellent story that interweaves Mattys story with Graces story and gives us a picture of life in an era alien to our modern one, yet brimming with characters and events we can all relate to.

A definite winner!!!

A NORTHERN LIGHT is a great coming of age story that provides serious fodder for discussing women's history in America, and which wraps itself around the sensational, true murder mystery that rocked the Adirondacks just months after San Francisco was rocked by the big quake of 1906.

"The main house has four stories plus an attic. Forty rooms in all. When the hotel is fully booked, as it is this week, there are often over a hundred people in the building. All strangers to one another, coming and going. Eating and laughing and breathing and sleeping and dreaming under the same roof.
"They leave things behind sometimes, the guests. A bottle of scent. A crumpled handkerchief. A pearl button that fell off a dress and rolled under a bed. And sometimes they leave other sorts of things. Things you can't see. A sigh trapped in a corner. Memories tangled in the curtains. A sob fluttering against a windowpane like a bird that flew in and can't get back out. I can feel these things. They dart and crouch and whisper.
"I get to the bottom of the staircase and listen. The only sound is the ticking of the clock. To my right is the dining room. It's dark and empty. Straight ahead, through the porch windows, I can see the boathouse and the lake, calm and still, its black surface silvered by the moon. I pray I don't run into anyone. Not Mrs. Morrison waiting up for her husband. Or Mr. Sperry doing the accounts as he does when he can't sleep. Or, God forbid, table six lurking in a corner like some horrible spider.
"I walk under the antler chandelier in the foyer, and by the coat tree made of branches and deer hooves. I pass the hallway that leads to the parlor and get a fright when I see light spilling out of the room onto the hall carpet, but then I remember: That's where Grace Brown is laid out. Mrs. Morrison left a lamp burning because it's unkind to leave the dead all alone in the dark. They have darkness enough ahead of them."

Our narrator is sixteen-year-old Mattie (Mathilda) Gokey, who has just snuck out of the attic where the young female employees sleep. Grace Brown is the unfortunate, young, dead woman who is about to cause a sensation. She was just discovered, along with an overturned canoe, after she and her male companion failed to return to the resort hotel for supper.

Shortly before the events that befell her, Grace had slipped a packet of letters to Mattie, and had instructed her to burn them.

Like Mattie doesn't have enough problems already! After her mother died and her brother split town following an altercation with their angry father, unpleasant Pa makes it clear that Mattie's priority is to help run the farm and raise her three younger sisters. But Mattie is a gifted writer and passionate scholar who is determined to earn her high school diploma and surreptitiously longs to hoard sufficient money to leave town herself--for a college education in turn of the century New York City. Her accomplice is a neighbor, a black kid named Weaver, who is also a brilliant scholar and whose own dream is to somehow make it through law school and avenge some of the really bad stuff he's seen go down.

It's hard enough trying to battle ignorance in 2002! It'll drive you crazy watching and listening to several of these bossy (dare I say stupid) white men from a hundred years ago. And then to also watch Mattie in her weaker moments, battling her raging hormones, is almost too much to bear.

Author Jennifer Donnelly deftly juggles all of these issues, along with the murder of Grace Brown, as we nervously root for Mattie to somehow make it through those minefields without detonating another foolish male character or her equally foolish Aunt Josie. Young adult readers will so easily relate to Mattie and Weaver despite their having lived a hundred years ago. That Ms. Donnelly is able to achieve this while staying so consistent to the historic fictional setting makes A NORTHERN LIGHT a story that will be enjoyed by historic and contemporary fiction aficionados alike.

Richie Partington<BR....

The year is 1906, and sixteen-year-old Mattie Gokey has just escaped the lonely, hard work, of running her Father's farm, and taking care of her younger sisters, for her job as a waitress (serving girl) at a fancy hotel in the Adirondacks in New York state. Mattie is sockng away most her money, trying to decide what to do with it. She has two options. She has been accepted to the wonderful Barnard College in New York City, where she would be able to pursue her love of writing, but she has also been asked to marry Royal Loomis, a handsome boy who awakens many new emotions in Mattie. However, at the hotel, Mattie gets caught up in the disappearance of a young couple, and the death of the girl, Grace Brown, who had a conversation with Mattie right before her disappearance, and gave her a packet of love letters to burn for her. Now Mattie is trying to decide whether reading the letters is write or wrong, now that Grace Brown is dead.

Jennifer Donnelly has done a wonderful job in writing a coming-of-age story about a teenage girl in the early 1900's, who must decide between many things: staying with her family or working; marrying the boy she loves or going to college to pursue writing. The mystery contained within A NORTHERN LIGHT is fairly small, and is overshadowed by Mattie's talk of growing up, yet it features enough mystery to satisfy the average reader. All in all this was an enjoyable book that is more geared towards someone who enjoys historical fiction, than someone who is looking for an in-depth mystery novel.

Erika Sorocco
Book Review Columnist for The Community Bugle Newspaper

I've just finished this book and was totally absorbed by it. Two stories run on parallel grounds.
Set in the early 1900's, Mattie is a young lady very torn between her dreams of becoming a writer and family related responsibilities. To add to her dilemmas, she falls in love, feeling more and more confused.
Grace is another young lady whose body is found lifeless in the lake by the Glenmore Hotel, where Mattie works.
Both girls' tales entwine and merge in a clever and entertaining combination.

The prose is pictorial and detailed, conveying the surroundings, the characters and their feelings so nicely.
There's a little gem embedded in the beginning of each chapter, which is not numbered but starts off with the introduction of a new word, as part of a game that Mattie and her friend Weaver play daily to strengthen their vocabulary. Each word is irrelevant to the core of the story, but there's always the appropriate space for it, a clever touch. I found myself playing along and testing my own vocabulary!

There are many themes in this book: poverty, racism, love, compassion, hope are but a few. The narrative is creative and clever, with very sad and very funny situations too. The sense of humour conveyed by Mattie is remarkable.

When I started it, I had avoided reading the summary on the back cover (a bit revealing I later realised), but I was glad I did, so that the last part of the book took me completely by surprise.
Definitely a timeless novel, I would suggest it for young readers too (15+).