Customer Reviews

The Quilter's Legacy (Elm Creek Quilts Series #5)

5 star:		(20)
4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Like a beautiful old quilt, this books builds bit by bit into a fascinating tapestry of family history. There are actually two stories, told in parallel fashion about Sylvia Bergstrom Compson and her mother Eleanor. Sylvia is about to be married to her beau Andrew and before this momentous event, she has some unfinished business. She decides to look for five quilts which her mother Eleanor made when she was a young child. Her mother died when she was young, so she had never had time to get to know her well, but she wanted the quilts as her mother's legacy. Eleanor's story revolves around her delicate health and the difficult relationship she had with her critical, overbearing mother. Eleanor and her sister both defied their mother's wishes when choosing husbands, and her mother never forgave them for what she viewed as rebellion. These stories weave in and out as Sylvia pursues her mother's quilts and the end product is a very satisfying read. This book can stand alone, but it will probably make more sense, particularly with regard to the minor characters, if you read the other 4 books in the series first.

Jennifer Chiaverini's storytelling gift is surpassed only by her knowledge of the art of quilting. She ably entwines the craft with the lore in the sixth of a series beloved by fans of the Elm Creek Quilts series.

Sylvia Bergstrom Compton, director of the Elm Creek Manor, is preparing for her late-in-life wedding to her longtime friend, Andrew. She decides that, instead of making a new wedding quilt, she will use the beautiful masterpiece quilt pieced by her mother, Eleanor. Sylvia's mother died at age 30 and Sylvia barely remembers her, but she does remember the beautiful quilts that adorned the beds of her childhood home. She climbs to the attic of the Manor to rummage through crates and trunks and discovers to her dismay that not a single quilt remains. Sylvia left home at an early age and her sister had sold the valuable quilts decades earlier when the family fell on hard times.

Sylvia's younger Manor employees help her launch an Internet search. Through emails and phone calls, Sylvia learns of quilts in homes, museums and shops that match the descriptions of those she most vividly remembers from her childhood. Sylvia and Andrew set out on a nationwide tour in Andrew's motor home to follow the scraps of information.

THE QUILTER'S LEGACY chronicles the search for her mother's masterpiece quilts and, thus, the history of Eleanor's life in Manhattan and Pennsylvania at the turn of the 20th century. Sylvia learns that her mother defied her parent's Victorian dictum to marry to enhance the family fortune by eloping with the man she loves. The hardships and glories of the early years, from the 1918 Spanish Flu epidemic to the sinking of the Titanic weigh upon Eleanor's family. Sylvia and Andrew ramble through museums, antiques and crafts stores from California to Iowa to Pennsylvania in search, not only of the quilts, but of her mother's past.

As Sylvia recovers some of the lost quilts and resigns herself to the loss of those that can never be found, she rejoices in discovering her own legacy. Women who quilt will revel in the detail and history of famous patterns and the stories they tell. For non-quilters, a door may be opened to tempt one to delve into this intriguing craft.

--- Reviewed by Roz Shea

I finally got the book and couldnt put it down!
I was saving it for vacation; read it in two days! two days before vacation and had to go on vacation without a book!
I love to quilt and I love to read and this book series has filled both things I Love!! Cant wait for the next book in the series!!!awesome book!!

This is another Chiaverini book you can't put down. I read it in one day, and felt lost when I finished. I need another Chiaverini quilting novel, and I'm not even a quilter. I have really become inerested in quilting and even went to a quilting show today. I could identify some of the quilts and see the beauty of them first-hand...it was an Amish Quilt art exhibit. I just say that Jenifer has got to keep those books coming as I am now addicted.

There are two plots to this story: Sylvia Compson's search for her mother's quilts, which Sylvia's sister had sold; and the story of Eleanor, Sylvia's mother.

It needs to be remembered that the audience gets to learn about Eleanor, but Sylvia is not reading a journal by her mother, or in any way learning what we as the readers now know about her mother's life. Some of it Sylvia is able to piece together in the book, but the majority of it, only we as the readers know.
It gives us insight and understanding that Sylvia does not have. It also gave me more understanding of the rift between Sylvia and her sister Claudia.

I think this was a very good writing device. One thing I've noticed about Chiaverini's writing is that she is not afraid to introduce new characters, or change our opinions, even slightly, about existing and continuing characters. She is not afraid to let some characters move on, as they would in real life. For me, that is what makes these books so interesting, so valid and so real. People move on. People change careers, divorce, marry, move away, try new things, and sometimes stay in the same job and the same area. It's life. I think Chiaverini's books mirror life.

The hunt for the quilts was painful in a way for me. My own family has been searching for family quilts that disappeared during the funeral of my great-grandmother. I think this is a very truthful portrayal of how disheartening it is, too, to work so hard on any needlework craft, including quilting, and those who don't appreciate or understand the enormous amount of time, patience, creativiity, and work that goes into it, just letting the dog lie on it, or giving it away, or selling it. Yep, I've seen all of those in real life happen and it breaks the heart. It also makes me decide nope, I am not giving that person any more of my needlework. Too bad for them.

The adult children of Andrew seemed like an accurate and possible portrayal to me. I'm sorry to say it, but weddings and funerals bring out the worst at times in a saint. I've seen people who are normally rational, kind-hearted, dear people go into anger and say and do things that are shocking. You realize that you didn't really know that person after all. For those who say the reaction of the adult children was not creditable, I can only say that for me, it sure was. I've seen really decent, kind people who go to church and do the right things in life and are law-abiding citizens do and say some really crazy, out-of-character, nutty things when it comes to marriage or funerals or more to the point, who is getting what in a will. If you haven't experienced it, my bet is that someday, unfortunately, you'll find that you will. "It'll never happen in MY family!" are famous last words.

And that's what this book is, and what all of Chiaverini's books are for me: honest. Honesty doesn't mean a perfectly happy ending. If it was perfectly happy, all of the quilts would never have been sold in the first place, or if they had been, all of them would have been found and in pristine condition.

I really enjoyed this book.

Sylvia Compson, the owner of Elm Creek Quilts, is anticipating remarrying a man from her childhood. Sarah her good friend suggests making a wedding quilt for her but Sylvia has a better idea. She's going to look through the attic in her family home and try to find the quilts her mother made over 50 years ago. The book now becomes two paralleling stories with part of the story taking place at the turn of the century in New York State and the other part taking place in present day Pennsylvania.

As we go back in time we learn about Sylvia's mother Eleanor and her family. We also learn the reasons and occasions why Eleanor made the quilts that Sylvia is looking. On her part Sylvia is helped by some of he coworkers using both the Internet and also visiting locations where the quilts were last seen. But the storyline I most enjoyed was about Eleanor's nanny, Amelia, and her role in the rise of the suffragette and union movement and her role in purchasing one of Eleanor's quilts when it was being sold.

This is the 5th book in the Elm Creek Quilts books and almost every book touches on some history of the Compson Bergstrom family in the past along with a modern day tale. While I have enjoyed these books and the paralleling stories, this time I enjoyed Eleanor's story much more than the present day story which concerned itself with Sylvia's marriage to a widower and the disapproval of his children. Now I look forward to the 6th book, The Master Quilter, and the new book coming out in the spring.

In 1899, New York Eleanor Lockwood knew she had a bad heart from the Scarlet Fever she contracted as an infant and her parents did not expect her to live much longer. They both kept their distance and her only adult loving came from her nanny Amelia Langley who genuinely adored her charge. The Lockwoods hoped their family fortunes would be reversed when their elder daughter married a rich man's son who would pump money into the family business. Abigail had plans of her own and eloped with her father's rival leaving Eleanor to marry the jilted groom. Eleanor couldn't go through with it and eloped with Fred Bergstrom and went to live with him in his home at Elm Creek Manor in Pennsylvania.

Years later, Eleanor's daughter Sylvia is dismayed that her sister sold her mother's five beautiful quilts. One of the Elm Creek Quilters locates a website whose purpose is to reunite quilter and quilt. From the replies she gets on the Internet, Sylvia accompanied by her fiancée Andrew set off on an odyssey to find out the history of each of the quilts once they left the family.

Past and present are played out in alternating chapters so that readers get a feel for what Eleanor's life was like and how Sylvia reconnects with her mother who has been gone for more than half a century. Jennifer Chiaverini's fascinating family saga, rich in period detail and showcasing characters who though elderly continue to live life to the utmost. This is a superb novel in a heartwarming series.

Harriet Klausner

I liked it. The book continues the story of Sylvia, this time as she tries to locate her mother's quilts. As the quilts were sold off by her sister, this involves internet research and travel. Her mother's story is interspersed with Sylvia's quest, which is nice, but the reader learns Eleanor's story, Sylvia doesn't. I wish the author had worked it so that Sylvia learned her mother's history, because that knowledge is something she craves. Overall, I enjoyed it: not quite as much as the others, but it was still good.

Content of the book was good- however, some of the language of all this series could have been improved. It ISN'T necessary to have swearing in order to write a book! I enjoyed all except for that!
Elaine Willard

Very quick read but now waiting to see what happens next. The character have become friends thru these books, or family. Hopefully those of us with QUILTS from another generation will now look at them differently!