I probably won't finish the book for another week or two, but I thought I would kick off the discussion with some comments on the author's style without discussing any specifics of the story to avoid spoilers.

At first I found Proulx's staccato sentence fragments a little jarring, but before long I thoroughly enjoyed them. They conform well to how people actually think. Not in complete sentences. Images lashed together with prepositions and conjunctions. Gets you inside the characters' heads. The occasional headlines are hilarious, a special case that's tied in with the story's journalistic theme and reflective of Quoyle's dissociative personality. Author Captures Hero's Outlook, Delights Readers.

I love E. Annie Proulx, so I'm delighted to find you reading her, let alone enjoying her. I read Shipping News first (great book, aweful movie). I've also read Postcards and Accordian Crimes by her. Quite honestly, I'd be hard=pressed to name my favorite amoung the three.

Anyway, I haven't rean tSN in years, so I don't have a lot to say. Just wanted to gush over the author and her fine work.

i'm only on chapter 4, mostly because i've been very busy. i should get a lot of reading done this week, though, which i am out of town for training (with other people who just aren't very fun...no drinking at the bars for me, unless i want to go solo!).

anyway, i agree with keith, at least about her fragmentation being frustrating and alarming at first. it still is a little jarring, but at least i am getting used to it.

i'm looking forward to discussing.

I've read two chapters and so far the staccato sentence structure (or lack thereof) isn't bothering me as much as the matter of fact way she uses it to gloss over character introductions. I feel that if I hadn't seen the movie I'd be lost as to who these characters are.

Maybe I'll get used to it.

Personally I thought this was a blessing in disguise. It's true there's very little in the way of character introduction in this book and it's initially disconcerting, but that also allows the reader to gradually get to know the characters as they reveal themselves by their thoughts and actions as the story progresses. The author uses flashbacks by several characters judiciously to fill in critical parts of their personal histories.

I really don't know if this was a deliberate stylistic device or if Proulx was just developing her characters as she wrote the book, but it works for me.

I didn't realize why I was stumbling slowly into this book and realize that the lack of character introduction may be the answer, because I *am* enjoying her short sentence structure.

This is an interesting book so far. Depressing as shit though, considering it's 85 degrees and sunny here.

I am not familiar with that part of the world, and I found the following link interesting to help with some background info: http://www.newfoundlandandlabrador.com/

I am so far behind! However, a copy is in my hands so I will start reading it soon!! Why have I always wanted to read her, yet never opened a book of hers yet?? I think I saw the movie a few years back but don't really remember it...

Well, I read chapter five last night--my favorite so far. I like how each chapter is entitled with a knot and a quote. I really am a sucker for good chapter titles.

Otherwise, I'm only lukewarm about this book so far. Anyone else feeling the same?

I will finish it at about 35,000 feet tomorrow morning.

And it's sad to see your story end...

Yes. But I think a lot of it has to do with the setting and characters in the book. Our "hero" particularly is not one that is easy to relate with. Most of the scenes just seem very bleak.

But it's all still interesting to read.

Agreed. I think one thing that's keeping me going is the fact that I've seen the movie. I remember when I first saw it, I was ready to get up and move to New Foundland too! I loved the cold and snowy crags, and the sea and the thought of simplifying my life. It really appealed to me in a very raw and base way. I'm starting to get that feeling now and that's exciting.

I'm a few pages into chapter six and it does seem to get better and better. I'm hoping it will get really good a little later on.

Well, I finally started reading it. I read the first chapter and really like it so far. Poor Quoyle- I feel so sad for him. I liked two quotes from Chapter 1. I think I am the furthest behind so am safe in talking about this first chapter.

"Everything that counts is for love, Quoyle. It's the engine of life." How true. I need reminding of that on a daily basis it seems.

Also, I liked the end of the chapter. Quoyle is walking around asking aloud "Who knows?"
"For no one knew. He meant, anything could happen. A spinning coin, still balanced on its rim, may fall in either direction."

I tend to relate to all characters in some way or degree and I have to say I often feel like a spinning coin Who knows what direction I will fall on any given day? I relate to his bleakness and sadness. Not all the time but sometimes.

I like this book for November. It fits the season somehow.

I've read through the whole book and I am now about half-way through it for the second time, since I've been spending a lot of time on planes and trains the past few weeks. It has been a wonderful travelling companion.

When does everyone think they'll be ready to discuss the story in its entirety?

I'm working on it... (courtesy of Keith).

I'm finished and may re-read parts of it, but otherwise can discuss it any time.

I feel like I am moving rather slowly through this book. I'm not so excited to read it that I can't put it down. After a chapter or two I do put it down and I'm fine. Usually I swallow a book in a few days. Still, I do like the book and I am glad we are going to talk about it.

The beginning of Chapter 8 hit me. She comes up with great lines in the middle of everything going on. When the Aunt started talking to Quoyle about the fact that he can do his job. She says,

"Of course you can do this job. We face up to awful things b/c we can't go around them, or forget them. The sooner you get it over with, the sooner you say 'Yes, it happened, and there's nothing I can do about it,' the sooner you get on with your own life.....what we have to get over, somehow we do. Even the worst things."

Wow. How deep and true that really is. That might possibly be the best line in the whole book. However, I wouldn't know yet, b/c I am only on Chapter 9.

Feel free to chat though if I'm the only one not finished yet. I'll catch up. I have 5 days off after tomorrow!!

Keith, how was the second time through??

It was great, I finished it (again) on a bus ride home from Northampton Saturday. The second read through really gave me a chance to appreciate Proulx's unique use of language and terse but effective images. And it's just a great story about second chances and how even the most damaged among us can learn to be happy with some nurturing and luck.

Then it is the right book for me at this time. It always amazes me how books find us at the perfect moments in life.

I am looking forward to reading the rest of it over the long weekend.

A couple of thoughts:

One of the beauties of this novel for me is how it makes the inhabitants of rural Newfoundland come alive for the reader. It is such an unlikely place for a New Yorker to find himself (in both the geographical and the spiritual sense), and the dependence the locals who elected to stay in that harsh environment have on each other plays a central role in Quoyle's awakening to the possibility of a better life. While a devoted father, he is someone who lacked any real sense of community in his former life, and the generosity of his adopted townsfolk despite their struggles for subsistence eventually helps Quoyle to move beyond his habitual and unfulfilling self-absorption.

The insistent undertone of sexual abuse in the book (often reported on as feature stories in the Gammy Bird and recollected first-hand by the lesbian aunt as a victim of Quoyle's father) is intriguing and disturbing. I get the sense there is something very personal in this for the author, although I know little about her except she is gay herself.

I love your thoughts Keith.

I have become drawn into the world of Newfoundland. I have two chapters to go and am sad to see it coming to an end. I am enjoying the small town feel and the rhythm of their days. I love the characters and the community life they have developed. This book has grown on me tremendously.

More thoughts cometh...

Noting again that it's been years since I read this book, I just wanted to interject that this is a lovely way to say this Keith. I agree. And I'll add that, as person steeped in Southern culture, I was struck by some of the similarities, as well as surprised by some of the difference, between Newfoundland rural culture and Southern rural culture. The sexual abuse struck me as one of the threads they have in common, as well as the incredibly beautiful way Proux has juxtaposed the depravity of something like that with the morality of community that instinctually arises in times of crisis in such rural atmospheres. Is the depth of one's life truly that much a reflection of one's environment? Of course I see a touch of Flannery O'Connor inspiration here, though I think Proux is much more exquisite in her flow.

I'll say this, watching y'all discuss this has my mouth watering to reread this book. I may just have to go find a copy.

I just finished. Wow. The ending is truly beautiful. I ended up LOVING this book. Looking forward to talking about it a bit when I'm not so sleepy...

it's been a slow read for me....

her writing style is different, but kinda cool.

So it has been a week since I finished the book and I am still thinking about it. I want to visit the Newfoundland area and be lost in that world for a while. Somehow the snows and cold that have arrived in the area are not so bad b/c it reminds me of the book. So grateful for the Orchard here that kept it alive for me. I found being in a book club helped me to keep moving on the book. I read so much during the year, but this is just one more way to enjoy good literature. I liked knowing there were others experiencing it at the same time.

Any favorite quotes? Inner connections?

I feel a definite inner connection with Quoyle myself, in that I spent a lot of my life putting up with crap from other people and feeling inadequate and not understanding why. The events that changed me were nothing like relocating to a cold rural community, but reading the book I often felt a sense of kinship as Quoyle gradually came to understand there are alternatives to the life of misery he considered his lot.

There are plenty of specific passages I loved, but that'll have to wait until I have the book in front of me.

Okay, the discussion has been a little slow (understandable with the hoilidays approaching and OtR on tour), so maybe we'll just take it chapter by chapter:

Acknowledgments

(just kidding)

1 Quoyle

Here at the outset, the author introduces the thematic device of her chapter headings, mostly taken from the Ashley Book of Knots. Quoyle, the name of the novel's protagonist, is said to mean "A coil of rope". This suggests a passive heap of woven hemp waiting to become something more functional. The description from Ashley specifically describes something that may be walked on: Ecce Quoyle (interestingly, we never find out his first name).

Remarkably, Proulx sketches Quoyle's first thirty years in a few brief paragraphs, from his unattractive bulk and inability to swim as a young child to his later failures at college and an assortment of jobs. His jutting chin is a physical embarrassment he feels compelled to conceal through much of the book. Quoyle's father figures heavily into his unhappy progression, burdening Quoyle with the full weight of his disappointment.

I'll stop here because it's late and I want to hear what y'all have to say.

Well, I'm finally on my holiday break. I don't go back to work until Jan. 3rd!! I spent my morning getting obsessed with Sudoku puzzles. I had to pull myself away and take myself back to The Shipping News. I have been meaning to sit down and think about it for weeks.

Chapter two had an appropriate title for the content. Love Knot. Quoyle was deeply in love with Petal. (or at least he thought he was). Petal couldn't love Quoyle and only had disdain for him. "There was a month of fiery happiness. Then six kinked years of suffering."

The line "What had he expected when he married? Not his parents' discount-store life, but something like Partridge's backyard- friends, grill smoke, affection and its unspoken language....What he had was what he pretended." Two children later and they were still pretending.

How often marriages turn into pretending. As can relationships in general if not cared for, nurtured and based in substance. Petal and Quoyle began a relationship with no foundation. They were each playing the roles of villian and victim after that and there seemed no way to break the patterns in their "relationship". Neither could change as is often the case in disfunctional relationships. It is a chapter that still breaks my heart when I browse through it. Quoyle was pathetic looking from the outside, but he was trapped inside by his belief in "silent suffering" and the belief that everything would turn out ok if he just endured the pain. How many of us want circumstances in our lives to change but just sit by and expect it to happen by osmosis?

Unfortunately, it sometimes takes a tragedy to finally lead us towards change, similar to what happens to Quoyle in Chapter 3- Strangle Knot.