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Product Description
Book Description
The carriage bounced over a rise beyond Uffington, and the undulating escarpment hove into view. Read the first page
Concordance
Front Cover | Copyright | Table of Contents | Excerpt | Back Cover
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Most helpful customer reviews
3 of 3 people found the following review helpful
5.0 out of 5 stars
unable to categorize,
By Paul Stilwell (Canada, B.C.) - See all my reviews
This review is from: Strangers and Sojourners (Hardcover)
I almost don't want to write a review for Strangers and Sojourners. Though I've taken O'Briens other books off the bookshelf to re-read them over and over again, I've only read Strangers and Sojourners once. This is not a sign to be taken that the book is bad. No, quite the contrary. I'm still digesting the deep pathos that have lodged themselves somewhere in my mind and heart, I'm scared to take the book back down(being more than a year) again for fear of disrupting the beauty and wisdom that is still growing within. The book is very strange indeed. I work part-time at a little grocery store where most of my work time is spent in the back of the store doing monotonous produce work. I spend the rest of my time as an artist/writer and re-emerging, struggling Catholic. I can give testimony that Strangers and Sojourners has helped me in ways that I do not understand. Events, moods, situations and characters from the book will just pop up in my mind from out of nowhere, while I'm in the middle of a hundred different chores at work or home. The most 'ordinary' things and people have gradually become more and more exciting and mysterious to me. I've come to cherish 'ordinary' things with a thankfulness that is quite alien to me. The sacrament of marriage(though i'm single)especially after reading this book is something so, so beautiful and heroic. This book in the future will emerge in families homes all over. There is no other place where it can emerge.
1 of 2 people found the following review helpful
2.0 out of 5 stars
Too slow for me,
By A Customer
This review is from: Strangers and Sojourners (Paperback)
I read and loved Father Elijah, Plague Journal and Eclipse of the Sun. They were wonderful, faith-filled, and action-packed Catholic novels. Then I bought Strangers and Sojourners, hoping to continue the action. It started out with a bang, at a satanic ceremony in the main character's childhood. I thought that it would continue from there with more God versus Satan action. No such luck. The story is very slow and just didn't hold my interest. Twice I took breaks to read more interesting novels before continuing with Strangers and Sojourners, then I finally just gave up. I was over 200 pages into the book and still there was very little happening in the woman;s faith and not much action to speak of. It was just too boring for me. I was disappointed with this novel.
5.0 out of 5 stars
An excellent Canadian novel,
By A Customer
This review is from: Strangers and Sojourners (Hardcover)
As an English major and general bookworm, I've read a lot of Canadian literature over the years. Unfortunately, a lot of it barely qualifies as "literature": the reader has to wade through page after page of self-indulgent, derivative meanderings, with a few snowbanks and hockey games thrown in for colour. On the other hand, there are excellent literary works that barely qualify as "Canadian". I'm thinking here of award-winning first-generation Canadian writers whose novels are mainly set in their countries of origin (Ondaatje, Rau Badami, Mistry, Moore, etc.) Even if these books live up to the praise they receive, they don't really form the foundation for a national literature.Of course, there are books that escape both these trends, and _Strangers and Sojourners_ is a wonderful example. I came across it by chance, and I'm glad I did. The plot is fairly simple: The main character has come from England at the turn of the century to teach school in the BC interior. Faced with harsh wilderness and an unfamiliar culture (or lack thereof), she has to adapt to her new surroundings. Her external struggles, triumphs and defeats - illness, raising children, public opinion - are accompanied by deep inner growth, in the love she shares with her husband and in her personal spiritual journey. O'Brien writes in the context of deep Christian faith, which is unfashionable in Canadian academia these days. This might explain why _Strangers and Sojourners_ hasn't received as much attention as it deserves. Still, there's no need to label this book "For Christians only". The book's deeper elements are relevant to people of any faith (or no faith) who are interested in the development of the soul, and the interplay between nature and spiritual life. A recent article in the _National Post_ criticized O'Brien, saying he's not as good a writer as Dostoyevsky (as some of his fans have claimed). Well, perhaps not. But is that really the criterion for judging whether or not a book is worth reading? _Strangers and Sojourners_ is beautifully written, and it makes us think about where we've been and where we might be going, both as individuals and as a nation. It's a profound book with an enjoyable story. Highly recommended!
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