The Gilly Salt Sisters [Hardcover]

Tiffany Baker (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: March 14, 2012

The author of the New York Times bestselling The Little Giant of Aberdeen County returns with a magic-tinged tale of dreams, family secrets, and betrayals on a New England salt farm.

In the isolated Cape Cod village of Prospect, the Gilly sisters are as different as can be. Jo, a fierce and quiet loner, is devoted to the mysteries of her family's salt farm, while Claire is popular, pretty, and yearns to flee the salt at any cost. But the Gilly land hides a dark legacy that proves impossible to escape. Although the community half-suspects the Gilly sisters might be witches, it doesn't stop Whit Turner, the town's wealthiest bachelor, from forcing his way into their lives. It's Jo who first steals Whit's heart, but it is Claire--heartbroken over her high school sweetheart--who marries him.

Years later, estranged from her family, Claire finds herself thrust back onto the farm with the last person she would have chosen: her husband's pregnant mistress. Suddenly, alliances change, old loves return, and new battle lines are drawn. What the Gilly sisters learn about each other, the land around them, and the power of the salt, will not only change each of their lives forever, it will also alter Gilly history for good.

Editorial Reviews

Review

"A heartfelt tale of family relationships, small-town drama, and new opportunities. Jo and Claire are well-drawn, finely crafted characters, and Baker adeptly describes the fractious and multilayered relationship the sisters have with one another. The imagery of Cape Cod is gorgeously rendered, leaving the reader with a fully immersive picture of the insular village. Loyal readers of Anita Shreve, Maeve Binchy, and Alice Hoffman should enjoy this poignant, lush, and well-written tale of family secrets, revenge, forgiveness, and connections not easily severed." (Stephanie Turza, Booklist )

"Fans of Baker's acclaimed The Little Giant of Aberdeen County won't be disappointed with this quirky, complex, and original tale. It is also sure to enchant readers who enjoy Alice Hoffman and other authors of magical realism." (Nancy Fontaine, Library Journal )

"Tiffany Baker's novel has grit and polish and some salt of its own. It's a beautifully written tale about the resourceful and determined connection of women. The Gilly Salt sisters are a brackish bunch-definitely my kind of people." (Brunonia Barry, author of The Lace Reader and The Map of True Places )

Praise for The Gilly Salt Sisters:

"Tiffany Baker has done it again: The Gilly Salt Sisters is both deliciously, magically, strange and heartrendingly familiar, a beautiful and bewitching story of the elements that bind us to each other-family, love, loss, and memory. I was pulled into its world on the very first page and wanted to stay forever." (Eleanor Brown, author of The Weird Sisters )

"Like a delicious meal, Tiffany Baker offers up a wonderful blend of devastating family secrets, loves lost and found, revenge, forgiveness, and more than a pinch of long-held family magic." (Kathleen Kent, author of The Heretic's Daughter and The Wolves of Andover )

"The Gilly Salt Sisters captivates from its opening paragraph-a story of rivalry, love, and unredeemable greed set against a Cape Cod salt marsh that demands hard work and gives luck (good and bad) in return. Baker's scenes and characters are rich and compelling, touched with a magical realism which, like salt, enhances their flavor. Fans of Alice Hoffman will rejoice at finding Tiffany Baker." (Erica Bauermeister, author of The School of Essential Ingredients )

About the Author

Tiffany Baker is the author of The Gilly Salt Sisters and The Little Giant of Aberdeen County, which was a New York Times and San Francisco Chronicle bestseller. She holds an MFA (creative writing) and a PhD (Victorian Literature) from UC Irvine, and lives in the San Francisco Bay Area with her husband and three children.

Product Details

• Hardcover: 384 pages
• Publisher: Grand Central Publishing; 1 edition (March 14, 2012)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0446194239
• ISBN-13: 978-0446194235
• Product Dimensions: 6.1 x 1.2 x 9.2 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.1 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.1 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (35 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #582,139 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Tiffany Baker is the New York Times bestselling author of The Little Giant of Aberdeen County. She lives in the San Francisco Bay Area with her husband and three children, and holds a PhD in Victorian Literature and an MFA from UC-Irvine.

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

16 of 20 people found the following review helpful

4.0 out of 5 stars "You have to root your feet to the earth and become one with the land." March 12, 2012

By Luan Gaines HALL OF FAMETOP 500 REVIEWERVINE™ VOICE

Format:Hardcover

Baker's novel is drawn directly from the land, a way of life as entrenched as the family history of Salt creek Farm on Cape Cod, secrets of the past dormant until the estrangement of sisters Joanna and Claire Gilly. While the salt marsh defines the parameters of their world, it is the sisters' differences that create a fault line through their relationship. Joanna understands the demands of the salt, accepts the hardships, even the superstitions that connect the Gillys to the town of Prospect. Claire, on the other hand, is constitutionally discontent, dreaming of escape from a grinding future with few rewards, appalled by her family's endless toil, the color leeched from her mother by years in the glare of the sun. Unlike the dark-haired Jo, Claire has white skin and flaming locks, her heart set on a local fisherman's son, Ethan Stone: "She didn't desire love, not until it caught her by surprise, opening up a greed in her so gaping and huge that she became a thief just to fill it."

Joanna's best friend since childhood is Whit Turner, son of Ida, Prospect's wealthiest maven and arbiter of town opinions. But there are years of enmity between the Turners and the Gillys, secrets buried in the bitter hearts of Ida Turner and Sarah Gilly rendering the territory between the families uninhabitable. Baker builds a provocative tale of familial division on the porous rocks of memory and desire, the misperception of circumstances, the weighty history of Salt Creek Farm, a family curse, a tragic fire, a vocation and an impulsive marriage tainted by greed. It is a cautionary tale beautifully rendered, with vivid images of salt, sky, love turned sour and beginnings forged of necessity. Two families bear the seeds of poisonous fruit from one generation to the next, the sun-scorched marsh contrasting with the dark grandeur of the Turner estate. But this is the story of the Gilly sisters, how they lost their way and how salt heals the most disfiguring of wounds. Luan Gaines/2012.

7 of 8 people found the following review helpful

3.0 out of 5 stars Could have been so much more, but it ended with 'almost' there. March 31, 2012

By Jaime H.

Format:Hardcover

The story of The Gilly Salt Sisters revolves around the belief of there being mystical powers from the salt that the family has produced for centuries. The stories and legends of the powers the salt holds and has over others has been shared for generations, and perpetuated by both the town and the Gillys themselves. Their salt is used to foretell the future of the town, as well as those that inhabit the town. However, even though the townspeople have accepted the power of the salt, it has caused the Gilly women to be outcast from the community.

The Gilly sisters, Claire and Jo must each live with the legacy of the salt in her own way. While Claire goes to great lengths to sever all connections with the salt and her family, Jo is forced to stay behind and keep the family business running, trapped in a life that happened to her. There is a great deal of family history to sort through, and when young newcomer Dee finds herself living in the town, the lives of all three women begin to unfold and unravel. It is through their stories and the discoveries of one another's secrets that they learn about themselves as well. The connections these women share cause them to be bound each other in ways they never imagined.

While the first part of the book was very reminiscent of Alice Hoffman's Practical Magic, and served to flush out the characters and bring the reader into their lives, the second half lagged behind. The history of how the Gilly sisters got to where they are today is very important to the storyline. However, Baker gets so tied up in the past that the present is lost in the telling of it all. By the end, none of the characters are particularly likeable, and one may feel as though too much was told without enough reason. There is a fine line between just enough information and too much information, and this seems to be a case of the latter.

The Gilly Salt Sisters is a good book. There is nothing really bad about, but nothing that grabs the reader either. By the time I finished it, I was glad I finished it, but upset at the same time, because it felt so rushed at the end. The slightly mysterious, almost witchy quality of the Gilly women that was set up in the beginning of the story was nearly forgotten by the middle. I thought I was really going to like this book, and I wanted to like it, but there was just too much extra storyline trying to explain away the mysterious qualities- and that was the best part of the book. Baker needs to learn to let her characters tell the story as it unfolds, instead of trying to lay it all out on the table. Because, sometimes, a mysterious, perhaps witchy, woman is just what we all need.

6 of 7 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Smart, Surprising, A Little Magical March 19, 2012

By J. Winn

Format:Kindle Edition

I love a book with complex, flawed characters, and so I know the sisters in this novel are going to stick with me for a long time. The story is richly textured and the writing is beautiful. I loved how Baker took the idea of salt getting into everything and intensifying already present flavors, and how that idea played out in the relationships....Definitely one for the "keeper" shelf.