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The Autobiography of Henry VIII: With Notes by His Fool, Will Somers

Margaret George

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Book

This is the story of England's most famous, and notorious, king. Henry was a charismatic, ardent...

The Campout: Recipes to Enjoy by the Fire

Marnie Hanel and Jen Stevenson

10.0 (1 Ratings) Rate It

Book

A campout is a concentrated delight: sitting around the fire, surrounded by friends, toasting...

Blacktail Hunter

Sports and Reference

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App

Hunting knowledge has been passed down generation after generation through out the history of man...

Fugawi Topo

Travel and Navigation

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App

Fugawi Topo Fugawi Topo is a topo map app for iPhone and iPad which includes coverage of all of the...

Suswatibasu (1701 KP) rated Housekeeping: Faber Modern Classics in Books

Sep 7, 2017

Haunting imagery, tremendous classic American literature

There was something deeply unsettling yet moving about this book exploring abandonment, solitude and loss over the span of three generations of women in a family.

Ruth, who is our main narrator, is speaking about her childhood in which her sister Lucille and her were continually abandoned by one family or another. Eventually they end up with their deeply eccentric aunt Sylvie, and she seems completely incapable in many ways of being a responsible parent, but rather a sister instead. She leads a transcient life, having deserted her husband, jumping on trains to get from place to place. She's a spirited wanderer, and sees Ruth as an ally and her own sister, Helen, who killed herself at the start of the book.

Their solitary life of never mixing, but staying in the great outdoors both seems idyllic and claustrophobic. There are images of the lake where the children's mother committed suicide, that seem to draw the women to this area. The metaphors are cold and quiet hence it feels unnerving.

It's a classic American tale about real women, which makes this different to the old books talking only about marriage and fidelity.