Nectar [Hardcover]

David C. Fickett (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: May 17, 2002

From the unforgiving farmland of rural Maine comes a story of love and sacrifice, of family tragedies and obligations, and of the mysterious healing power of bees.

David Fickett's Nectar crosses three generations of beekeepers to tell the story of Regina Merritt, a determined woman who is forced at a young age to choose between happiness and survival. Her remarkable life is recounted with the help of the many people affected by that decision: a husband, who fails in every attempt to win her love, and loses everything in the process; a daughter, uncomfortably aware of her mother's weaknesses, who is forced, in her darkest moment, to rely on the empathy of the woman she sought to hurt; a lover, denied in near-childhood, who never fails to provide protection and hope to the woman who denied him; and a son, left to his own devices by a mother with little love left, who yearns to solve the mysteries of his childhood and of the woman who is both his deepest connection and his worst enemy. Haunting and poignant, Nectar is a novel that will stay with you long after the last page is read.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

A backwoods Maine family is ravaged by the fallout from deception and infidelity in Fickett's debut novel, a poignant but overplotted multigenerational saga that begins when young Caleb Gilley returns to the family homestead to bury his mother's lover and his beloved surrogate father, Duffy Pendleton, after the older man dies. Caleb's mother, Regina Merritt, has spent most of her life trying to deal with the mistake she made by not marrying Duffy, her childhood sweetheart. Ginny paid for her error in blood, sweat and tears when she chose instead to cast her lot with Henry Gilley, a high-minded but ineffectual farmer with big dreams who collapsed into alcoholism and deserted his family before Caleb's birth. Fiercely determined to achieve her dreams of prosperity, Ginny scratched out a living by keeping bees, farming and opening a cafe in her small village, but the libidinous arrangement she makes to get the money for the cafe has tragic consequences for her oldest daughter, Edith, who spitefully uses her knowledge of Ginny's sexual bargain to gain the upper hand in a running battle with her mother. Meanwhile, Caleb keeps hoping that Duffy is his real father, and his eventual discovery makes a dramatic climax. Fickett is a fine craftsman whose strength is his character writing and the compassion he displays for his decidedly flawed cast, but the scope of his narrative and the number of subplots he chronicles sometimes makes this book seem a bit like a backwoods soap opera. Despite that busyness, there are stretches that recall the early work of Carolyn Chute (minus the grotesque humor), a reference that bodes well for Fickett's future as a novelist. Agent, Jean Grosjean.
Copyright 2002 Cahners Business Information, Inc.

From Library Journal

Fickett's bittersweet novel belies its title. Set on a hardscrabble Maine farm in 1907, it's the story of Regina (Ginny) Gilley, a determined girl who becomes a strong woman, destroying the men in her path much as a queen bee does the males in her hive. Smart, worldly, uneducated, but driven, she manipulates first her despicable father and then her true love, the steadfast Duffy, by marrying outsider Henry for his money money to save her beloved farm and hives. But Henry deserts the family, and Ginny is forced to make a devilish deal with discarded suitor Gunnar, while Duffy marries on the rebound. The bargain with Gunnar has far-reaching implications in this disturbing but beautifully told tale, which is sometimes reminiscent of Ethan Frome. Throughout, the bee motif holds; Ginny's restaurant is the Queen Bee, and she bottles honey for the wholesale market. It's up to Caleb, Ginny's youngest child, who is searching for the true identity of his father, to unravel the complex relationships among these farm folk and beekeepers in a dramatic and surprising denouement. This wonderful debut is recommended for all collections. Jo Manning, Barry Univ. Lib., Miami Shores, FL
Copyright 2002 Cahners Business Information, Inc.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover: 320 pages
• Publisher: Forge Books; 1st edition (May 17, 2002)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0765301741
• ISBN-13: 978-0765301741
• Product Dimensions: 8.6 x 5.8 x 1.1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.1 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (8 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,352,516 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars rocky mountain news, February 7, 2003

By A Customer

This review is from: Nectar (Hardcover)

Nectar is wrapped in the metaphor of the honey bee, the Queen, and all who wait upon her. The story is comprised of flashbacks as the tragedy of Ginny's life in the early 1900s in the backwoods of Maine is recounted.

Ginny is cold, calculating and driven to bring the world around her into submission. Her youngest child, Caleb, returns home to bury his surrogate father and, due to his mother's complicated relationships with three men, tries to determine his own paternity and sort out the truth of his family.

Sample of prose: "I ain't one who's big on sentimental stuff. The belongins of those who've passed on are only things that get in the way and surprise you with thoughts about the past. I never had the time to sit around and mope about the dead. After Mama died I packed up most of her things and give them to the church in town. I just couldn't see holdin onto things I'd never use. Like her weddin dress. It was just a plain gray dress with a lace collar that her mama made. I knew I'd never wear it and it was just collectin dust and feedin the moths."

Author reminds me of: Jane Hamilton in Map of the World, for its depiction of a rural life that may seem simple on its face, but bubbles under the surface with drama as thick as honey.

Best reason to read: A well told story, with all of the elements of love, hate, tragedy, suspense and raw human experience. - Justin Matott

5.0 out of 5 stars booksense, February 6, 2003

By A Customer

This review is from: Nectar (Hardcover)

NECTAR, by David Fickett "This novel traces a New England farm family through several generations, uncovering unsettling family secrets. Closer to Carolyn Chute than Richard Russo, I found Nectar almost addictive in the way it held my interest. Fickett truly captures the time, place, and people."--Rita Moran, Apple Valley Books, Winthrop, ME

5.0 out of 5 stars wolf moon, February 6, 2003

By A Customer

This review is from: Nectar (Hardcover)

By Laurie Meunier Graves

In today's hectic world, there is often a yearning to return to the rural past. Somehow, life seemed less complicated when men worked in the fields and women worked in the kitchen. Because of this, the feeling goes, there was less confusion, and there was more contentment. People may have been poor, but they were happy.

In Nectar, which is set in rural Maine, David C. Fickett dispels this notion in the first chapter. As soon as Regina Merritt Gilley, in a fit of anger, forces her son Caleb to empty his insect collection into his oatmeal and then threatens to make him eat it, we know we are not in the land of the Waltons. Instead, we are in Carolyn Chute territory, where the poor have become hard in their struggles with the land and with each other.

Nectar is a lurid, melodramatic novel, unleavened by either humor or ideas, and the lives of the characters lurch from incident to incident. There are rape, incest, sexual obsession, betrayal, and even murder. It has the feel of a miniseries, yet it is not without merit. Robertson Davies wrote that melodrama "is not a form of drama that appeals only to simple people." The same is true of melodramatic fiction. At its best, it is vivid and full of emotion and draws the reader into the story. On this level, Nectar is a complete success. In addition, Mr. Fickett does a skillful job of portraying the various characters, and the reader really does come to care about them, despite all the nasty things they have done.

At the center of the book is Regina Gilley, who is beautiful and quick-tempered. All the action and all the men swirl around her like, yes, bees to honey. Each chapter starts with a quotation concerning bees, and Regina keeps bees on her farm. The bee metaphors, while hardly subtle, work moderately well to reinforce the dronish characters of the men and the imperiousness of Regina.

Regina's kingdom is a hardscrabble farm in Down East Maine. From the time she is a child, in the early 1900s, Regina has a fierce love of the land, the bees, and the animals, and it's not long before she's plotting to take the farm away from her abusive father. With little money and few prospects, Regina does what women have done for centuries to get ahead-she finds a wealthy man. When college educated, refined Henry Gilley wanders into her orbit, she snaps him up, thinking his money will make the farm a success. In doing so, she rejects the true love of her life, Duffy Pendleton. And because Regina has married the wrong man, Duffy has no choice but to marry the wrong woman.

Regina's scheming initially pays off, and her father more or less leaves the farm to her. (Actually, he leaves it to her first son who turns out to be a daughter, but never mind.) Regina gets both less and more than she expects from her husband Henry, and the same can be said for all the other characters and their relationships with each other. Mr. Fickett does an excellent job of showing how people are blinded by their needs and desires. They see what they want in other people, not what's really there. Then, when the truth slowly becomes apparent, there is disillusionment or worse.

Mr. Fickett also does a good job of presenting Regina's difficult character in a way that is completely believable. Regina is a blend of extremes-hateful and loving, self-centered yet concerned about her children, angry but empathetic. As he charts her troubled relationships with her husband, her children, and with Duffy, there is never a false moment. By the end, we understand who Regina is. Although we certainly don't approve of all she has done, we don't judge her too harshly because we find, much to our surprise, that we actually like her.