Year of Wonders: A Novel of the Plague (Paperback)

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Amazon.co.uk Review
Geraldine Brooks's Year of Wonders describes the 17th-century plague that is carried from London to a small Derbyshire village by an itinerant tailor. As villagers begin, one by one, to die, the rest face a choice. Do they flee their village in the hope of outrunning the plague or do they stay? The lord of the manor and his family pack and leave. The rector, Michael Mompellion, argues forcefully that the villagers should stay put, isolate themselves from neighbouring towns and villages and prevent the contagion from spreading. His oratory wins the day and the village turns in on itself. Cocooned from the outside world and ravaged by the disease, its inhabitants struggle to retain their humanity in the face of the disaster. The narrator, a young widow called Anna Frith, is one of the few who succeeds. Together with Mompellion and his wife Elinor, she tends the dying and battles to prevent her fellow villagers from descending into drink, violence and superstition. All is complicated by the intense, unacknowledgeable feelings she develops for both the rector and his wife. Year of Wonderssometimes seems anachronistic as historical fiction. Anna and Mompellion can occasionally appear to be modern sensibilities unaccountably transferred to 17th-century Derbyshire. However there is no mistaking the power of Brooks's imagination or the skill with which she constructs her story of ordinary people struggling to cope with extraordinary circumstances.--Nick Rennison --This text refers to the Paperback edition.

Review
Praise for Foreign Correspondence: 'An evocative, superbly written tale of a woman's journey to self-understanding.' Kirkus Reviews

A Year of Wonder may seem a strange title for a book set in the plague year of 1666; but it was the poet Dryden's phrase, and Brooks has selected it for the most touching and intelligent historical novel to come my way lately. Her novel is set in the Derbyshire village of Eyam, and (since I was born in Derbyshire) she is telling a story I have grown up with : a story of a whole villages heroism, which is still commemorated today. When the plague came to Eyam - brought, some people thought, in a bolt of cloth from London - the villagers made the extraordinary decision to put themselves into quarantine, to try to prevent the spread of the infection to their neighbours. Two-thirds of them died, and the small mining and farming community was devastated. The leader of the villagers was the rector of the parish church, William Mompesson. He and his wife Catherine had two children, whom they said sent away before the quarantine was declared. Catherine herself stayed to help the villagers and the plague killed her. In a letter written after his death, the rector mentioned the support given him by his maid - a nameless woman who has vanished from history. Brooks has taken her as the central character of an immensely moving story, which does not spare her readers' feelings. She is an American, a former Middle East correspondent for the Wall Street Journal, and well used to the world's trouble spots; she was looking for peace in Derbyshire's beautiful countryside when she stumbled upon the story of the plague in Eyam, and has recreated those ghastly times in a way that rings absolutely true. Not everyone in Eyam was a hero, as she shows; but in the end, in this harrowing story, love drives out fear. And how does she write? Not like a journalist, but like a poet. Review by: HILARY MANTEL. (Kirkus UK)

Painstaking re-creation of 17th-century England, swallowed by over-the-top melodramatics: a wildly uneven first novel by an Australian-born journalist. The "Year "of the title is 1665: the date of the devastating bubonic epidemic chronicled in Daniel Defoe's "A Journal of the Plague Year". Brooks's tale, framed by reveries set a year and a half after the plague burns itself out (in "Leaf-Fall, 1666"), is narrated by Anna Frith, an earnest and highly intelligent young widow who buries her own multiple bereavements (first her gentle husband, later their two small sons) in work, aiding her (unnamed) village rector's wife in treating the sick with medicinal herbs and traditional cures. Brooks is at her best in lyrical, precise descriptions of country landscapes and village customs, and makes something very appealing and (initially) quite credible out of Anna's wary hunger for learning and innate charitable kindness. But the novel goes awry when the panic of contagion isolates her village from neighboring hamlets, a forthright young woman and her distracted aunt are accused of witchcraft and hunted down, and Anna's drunken, violent father, who profits as a gravedigger for hire, resorts to "providing "corpses that will require his services. The excesses continue, as Anna's stepmother, crazed with grief, seeks vengeance against rector Michael Mompellion and his saintly wife (and Anna's mentor and soulmate) Elinor, and rise to a feverish pitch when Anna, having found a new innocent victim to nurture and raise, offends the powerful Bradford family and must flee to safety-ending up (in a borderline-risible Epilogue) in North Africa in the sanctuary of a kindly "Bey's" harem. It's all more than a bit much: Thomas Hardy crossed with Erskine Caldwell, with more than a whiff of "Jane Eyre "in Anna's conflicted devotion to the brooding, Mr. Rochester-like Mompellion. In between the more hysterical moments, Brooks writes quite beautifully. But "Year of Wonders "was a mistake. (Kirkus Reviews) --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

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33 Reviews 5 star:  (15) 4 star:  (14) 3 star:  (2) 2 star:    (0) 1 star:  (2)           Average Customer Review 4.2 out of 5 stars (33 customer reviews)		Share your thoughts with other customers: Create your own review
Most Helpful Customer Reviews   16 of 16 people found the following review helpful: 4.0 out of 5 stars "Oh, yes, the Devil has been here this night!", 29 Sep 2003 By  S. Calhoun "rhymeswithorange" (Chicago, IL United States) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)    This review is from: Year of Wonders (Paperback) Set in the Derbyshire countryside in 1666, THE YEAR OF WONDERS details the accounts of a small village ravaged by the Plague. Told exclusively from the first-person account of Anna Firth, a young hardworking widow and mother of two young children, who is employed in the residence of Michael Mompellion, the rector, and his wife, Elinor. After the Plague was incidentally transported to the village inside a bolt of fabric the disease spreads fast and eventually kills one third of the population of the village. The village voluntarily quarantines themselves from any outside contact in a hope to contain the infection. During these desperate months Anna takes it upon herself to help ease the pain of others. In her efforts she forges a strong friendship with Elinor while learning and studying natural remedies and therapies. Helping others aids her in helping ease the pain of her own loss to the Plague. THE YEAR OF WONDERS is not a typical work of historical fiction. According to the book's Afterword this story was inspired by the true story of the villagers of Eyam, Derbyshire and their own historical account of the Plague. While hiking through the English countryside Geraldine Brooks encountered a finger post pointing the way to the 'Plague Village'. Months of painful research concluded in the writing of this book, and a recreation of how a village struggled against a deadly disease while trying to maintain social order. While Brooks took some liberties in the development of the plot, but some aspects are rooted in truth including several true identities and names. The title of the book reflects worldly events and the strong belief that God works in mysterious ways. I only wish that Brooks included more social and historical background to the events that were simply alluded to. This would strengthen the plot and make reading more beneficial. Otherwise, I felt left in the dark when events such as the war with the Dutch were briefly mentioned. A very brief summary was included in the Afterword but it seemed too little too late. Otherwise, Brooks did a good job recreating the events occurring in Eyam during the Plague year of 1666. Comment Comment | Permalink | Was this review helpful to you? Yes No (Report this)   12 of 13 people found the following review helpful: 5.0 out of 5 stars A true story of the plague years brilliantly fictionalised, 4 Sep 2001 By A Customer This review is from: A Year of Wonders (Hardcover) I found this book a great read and a revelation. It is a fictionalised account of the true story of a Derbyshire village struck down by the plague in 1666. The details of speech and local customs -right down to animal husbandry and the arcane rules of lead mining - are so well rendered it's hard to believe the author wasn't there. Yet despite these historical details the imprint of hours in the library does not hang heavy on the story. It is a gripping read, quite dark in places, sexy in others and gripping throughout. I learned a lot from it while being swept along by the suspense and the totally believable characters. There is an air of Bronte about it at times (although it is of a much earlier period)- and I mean that as the highest compliment. Comment Comment | Permalink | Was this review helpful to you? Yes No (Report this)   9 of 10 people found the following review helpful: 4.0 out of 5 stars a book of wonders, 16 Oct 2002 By A Customer This review is from: Year of Wonders (Paperback) This book was fascinating and compelling reading. Full with so many starling illustrations of the horror of life in the most difficult of times - offset by the caring, gentle and all too human nature of its principal character. One was transported into the heart of England and the simple joys and harsh perils of some of its darkest days. As a previous reviewer suggested, it would indeed make a wonderful film i the hands of an enlightened director - but it must dispense first with that apalling epilogue. Comment Comment | Permalink | Was this review helpful to you? Yes No (Report this) Share your thoughts with other customers: Create your own review › See all 33 customer reviews...		Ad feedback   Most Recent Customer Reviews 4.0 out of 5 stars Wondeful, highly recommended This was a charity shop buy and a real surprise - she writes brilliantly and this is a real "page turner". Read more Published 20 days ago by D. M. Hardcastle 5.0 out of 5 stars FANTASTIC novel!!! Year of Wonders is a novel inspired by the true story of the little town of Eyam in Derbyshire, known as the Plague Village, during the years 1665 - 1666. Read more Published 2 months ago by Amy M. Bruno 5.0 out of 5 stars Utterly superb This is an enthralling tale beautifully written. I can hardly believe that this is the author's first published work: Her scholarship and use of language are awe inspiring, her... Read more Published 9 months ago by Dr. W. H. Konarzewski 5.0 out of 5 stars Wonderful and tragic A marvellous book, describing the sufferings of this plague-ravaged village, based on the experience of the real village of Eyam in Derbyshire in cutting itself off from the... Read more Published 13 months ago by John Hopper 4.0 out of 5 stars What a book! I will be brutally honest and say that my first thoughts as I began reading this book, was shear horror! Read more Published 16 months ago by Mr. P. A. Heywood 4.0 out of 5 stars beautfully evoked and intense Geraldine Brooks copes with great assurance (considering it is a first novel) with the difficult challenge of making an attractive novel out of such an apparently gloomy theme... Read more Published 16 months ago by allwillbewell 4.0 out of 5 stars Great book, odd ending. I picked this straight up after having read People of the Book also by Brooks and having loved it. I then read Year of Wonders in a day as I couldn't put it down, and was all set... Read more Published 19 months ago by Boof 5.0 out of 5 stars A wonderful, entertaining and enlightening read The Great Plague devastated England in 1666, the villagers of Eyam in Derbyshire decided to close themselves off from the rest of the country to try and stop the contagious... Read more Published 19 months ago by Lincs Reader 5.0 out of 5 stars Captivating, but not for the faint-hearted I saw a review of this book in Writing Magazine and instantly I wanted to read it. It would have been irrelevant what the review actually said (although it was positive) because... Read more Published 21 months ago by L. Felthouse 4.0 out of 5 stars Good Book Good book. A first novel. When she's not writing stories, Geraldine Brooks is a war correspondent/journalist and when she's not filming the aftermath of car bombs in Palestine she... Read more Published 21 months ago by R. L. Barker Search Customer Reviews Only search this product's reviews › See all 33 customer reviews...

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