Home: A Novel
by Marilynne Robinson
- Used
- Fine
- Hardcover
- Signed
- first
- Condition
- Fine/Fine
- ISBN 10
- 0374299102
- ISBN 13
- 9780374299101
- Seller
-
Seattle, Washington, United States
Payment Methods Accepted
About This Item
Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2008-09-02. First Edition. Hardcover. Fine/Fine. Signed. New York: FSG, 2008. First edition, first printing. Signed. A pristine copy of Robinson's acclaimed novel. Fine in like dust jacket.
Reviews
On Nov 11 2014, CloggieDownunder said:
Home is the second book in the Gilead series by Pulitzer Prize-winning author, Marilynne Robinson, and is set in Gilead, Iowa at the same time as the first book. This book focusses on Reverend Robert Boughton (closest friend of Reverend John Ames), and his family. Thirty-eight-year-old Glory Boughton, with a failed engagement behind her, returns to Gilead to look after her ailing father, Robert. A letter arrives, and Glory worries about the effect it will have on her father: “…the note might really be from Jack, but upsetting somehow, written from a ward for the chronically vexatious, the terminally remiss”.
Eventually, her disreputable brother Jack, an unemployed alcoholic, returns home after twenty years of virtual silence. Her father is pleased to see this favoured child again, one who went from “a restless, distant, difficult boy” to what Jack himself admits: “….nothing but trouble…….I create a kind of displacement around myself as I pass through the world, which can fairly be called trouble”. Jack is not the only one with secrets in his past, and he and Glory form a bond. His reconnection with his godfather and namesake, Reverend John Ames does not proceed smoothly.
They think back on their youth in the family home: “Experience had taught them that truth has sharp edges and hard corners, and could be seriously at odds with kindness” and “…lying in that family meant only that the liar would appreciate discretion…..as a matter of courtesy they treated one another’s deceptions like truth, which was a different thing from deceiving, or being deceived”. Glory is less than pleased to be in Gilead and dreads the thought of spending the rest of her days there: “To have [the past] overrun its bounds this way and become present and possibly future, too – they all knew this was a thing to be regretted”
Robinson treats the reader to some marvellous descriptive prose: “Their father said if they could see as God can, in geological time, they would see it leap out of the ground and turn in the sun and spread it arms and bask in the joys of being an oak tree in Iowa”. She touches on the question of racial prejudice and also includes some hints about the life Lila led before Gilead, a subject expanded on in the third book in this series. While this novel is somewhat slow in places, it is a stirring read and the final pages will move many readers to tears.
4.5★s
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Details
- Bookseller
- Vandello Books, Member IOBA (US)
- Bookseller's Inventory #
- 100322003
- Title
- Home: A Novel
- Author
- Marilynne Robinson
- Format/Binding
- Hardcover
- Book Condition
- Used - Fine
- Jacket Condition
- Fine
- Quantity Available
- 1
- Edition
- First Edition
- ISBN 10
- 0374299102
- ISBN 13
- 9780374299101
- Publisher
- Farrar, Straus and Giroux
- Place of Publication
- New York
- Date Published
- 2008-09-02
- Keywords
- Women Writers|Signed Books|SABF 2022|Rose City
- Bookseller catalogs
- Literature;
Terms of Sale
Vandello Books, Member IOBA
Returns accepted within 30 days of purchase.
About the Seller
Vandello Books, Member IOBA
Biblio member since 2005
Seattle, Washington
About Vandello Books, Member IOBA
Vandello Books is an online bookstore in Seattle, Washington. Our areas of strength include Modern Firsts, Textiles, Craft and the Arts. We carry inventory in numerous subject areas and are happy to advise our customers on building collections. We consider ourselves to be custodians of your books and treat each item with this philosophy in mind.
Glossary
Some terminology that may be used in this description includes:
- Jacket
- Sometimes used as another term for dust jacket, a protective and often decorative wrapper, usually made of paper which wraps...
- Fine
- A book in fine condition exhibits no flaws. A fine condition book closely approaches As New condition, but may lack the...
- First Edition
- In book collecting, the first edition is the earliest published form of a book. A book may have more than one first edition in...
- New
- A new book is a book previously not circulated to a buyer. Although a new book is typically free of any faults or defects, "new"...