Our August selection is North Woods by Daniel Mason, a national bestseller about a house in the woods of New England and the lives of those who inhabit it across the centuries. The novel blends forms and genres, using letters, poems, diary entries, medical notes, real-estate listings, botanical illustrations and more as it tells each individual story. As for the house itself, "it thrives, lapses into disrepair, is abandoned and revived, all the while serving as a not-quite-silent witness to the lives — and deaths — of its occupants” (The New York Times).
Author Maggie O’Farrell called the book a magnificent “polyphony,” which I confess I had to look up: "the style of simultaneously combining a number of parts, each forming an individual melody and harmonizing with each other.”
A time-spanning, genre-blurring work of storytelling magic . . . Each chapter germinates its own form while sending out tendrils that entwine beneath the surface of the novel. - The Washington Post
This is fiction that deals in minutes and in centuries, that captures the glory and the triviality of human lives. The forest and the trees: Mason keeps both in clear view in his eccentric and exhilarating novel. - The New York Times
I’ve never joined one of the CC book discussions. Mostly because I’ve never read the books before the discussion. But I just finished North Woods a couple of weeks ago. Interested to hear others’ thoughts because it didn’t turn out to be the book I thought it was going to be but it kept me reading to the end.
Yay—to my shock my copy of North Woods is currently on hold for me at the nearby local library. I was #19 on reserve list and gradually up to 12 and suddenly I was notified I can pick up the book! I’m going to wait until a little later so I can still have it in hand when we start Aug discussions. They’ll hold it did me until 7/18.
I have 2 other books to get through in the meantime. “Enrich Your Future” by Larry Swedroe and “ Mad Honey” by Jodi Picpult et al.
I just put a hold on this book. Only four people ahead of me and the library has three copies, so hoping I will get it in good time. Last time I got the book too early and had to return it, and by the time our discussion time came, I was fuzzy on the details!
It’s August 1st! Welcome to our discussion of North Woods by Daniel Mason. Okay, it’s actually the waning hours of July 31st, but I’m about to have no internet for three days, so I’m posting this now while I have the chance. I will be back on Saturday, but you all can get the ball rolling.
I know this novel was considered a literary tour de force and I understand that. It was certainly riveting and complex, and had some beautifully written passages. That said, I can’t exactly say I enjoyed the book. I didn’t expect it to be so dark. I liked the concept of following a house through the generations, but would have preferred a few inhabitants who weren’t grappling with madness, murder, depression, abuse and infidelity. The first chapter held such promise: The house was built on love, by a young couple fleeing Puritanical restraint and rejoicing in their newfound Eden — “It was all so clear, so pure” (p. 8). But then from chapter two onward, it’s mostly one horror after another.
I did appreciate the way the stories were woven together, with interconnecting themes and motifs. Each successive chapter was a bit like solving a puzzle. But I didn’t quite understand why the creepiness was so relentless. Was the house malevolent? If so, why? Or was it simply a reflection of the natural world outside its doors — neither good nor evil, just a space that is both utterly entrancing and extremely treacherous?
Which era of the yellow house would you most like to visit?
Which of its residents (permanent or temporary) would you have liked to spend more time with?
Novels often follow the same characters through different settings; North Woods follows the same setting through different characters. What was this reading experience like for you?
For some characters, the yellow house is a place of refuge and inspiration, for others, an isolated site of captivity. Discuss how the house and its remoteness affected its residents.
Daniel Mason employs myriad points of view, writing styles, and genres to tell this story across the centuries. How did these shifting voices affect the narrative?
What is the significance of the catamount?
The best and worst of human behaviors and experiences are on display in North Woods: love, murder, betrayal, yearning, generosity, madness, envy. What did you make of this?
What role do the ghosts play throughout the novel? Does this role change? Discuss.
How does Mason bring the local flora and fauna into the novel? What did you make of beetles and spores and seeds sharing the stage with human characters?
I made it through several chapters but couldn’t go further - agree that it was quite dark. There have been a few books that I didn’t really like reading in this book club, but I think this might be the first I just couldn’t continue? It is nothing at all like The Source as I had hoped.
It will be interesting to see everyone’s opinions!
I had to take breaks reading this book and honestly I would likely have stopped reading this book except I wanted to be a good sport and finish. It was too dark for me to read as quickly as I otherwise would have wanted to.
It was much bloodier than most books I would have chosen. I liked the woman that sadly seemed to have died from diabetic complications or the auto accident at the end. It seemed to have allowed her to live in a prior forest.
It was weird how ghosts appeared to have killed some bad characters—the twin with the hatchet killing the bounty hunter and the Catamount who killed the con man that probably would have hurt/killed the poor mom yearning for her son.
It was confusing about what was going on with the young man who may have been psychic rather than mentally ill or maybe some combo?
The stories kind or ran into one another and are somewhat a bit hard to sort out.
I also struggled with this book. Beautifully written prose, very interesting concept, but there wasn’t enough time with the characters for me to really care enough about anyone to feel a connection. I need connection with fictional characters to make a book enjoyable and come to life.
The only thing that made me feel anything was the loss of the apple orchard over time.
(I know the 120 year old history of my house and all the previous owners and I was thinking about that as I was reading. In relation though, a drop in the bucket of time).
It took several weeks for me to finish this book. Some chapters were very engaging, others dragged. I thought the last quarter was the best part of the book, but still feel I most likely missed something.
As others have posted, I too struggled with this book. Almost the entire time I was reading it, I kept thinking it was “meh,” complicated, confusing and just plain weird. That said, when I finished, I sat back and thought, “Holy smokes, what a wild ride!” I’ll never say it was my favorite book, but I did like it in an odd way. For me personally, the setting is literally “close to home.” My hometown is in western Mass; my (96 year old) father and my 2 brothers still live there. At one point in the story a character arrives from Greenfield – my hometown.
When I finish a book I don’t often feel as if I’d gain a lot if I read it again – but in this case I do. (I’m not sure I will actually reread it, but it would be worthwhile.)
I didn’t love North Woods. I started the book on audible and I couldn’t wrap my head around what was going on in the story. I stepped back and picked up a written copy and was better able to understand and follow the story. I felt I was reading a bunch of short stories, some tied together more than others, rather than a novel. It got better after Lilian and Robert died and Helen visited the house. It felt like it was going to be a good tie together. Then the chapter with Morris, planning and then looking for the fourth body, lost me. Too much unnecessary information. I kept falling asleep. The last chapter with Nora saved the book for me a little. I thought it was the best chapter in the book. Overall, the book got my attention at times and lost it other times. Aside from the last chapter, and maybe the catamount chapter, I wasn’t thrilled with the story. The supernatural aspect felt like a reach. I’m usually good with taking a leap of faith with an unbelievable storyline, but this one didn’t capture me.
I was hoping this discussion would change my mind about the book, but so far it looks like we all have similar views on it. Since it has so many great online reviews, I was assuming I missed something in my interpretation.
I too had a bit of a struggle. I am not fond of short stories, you just start to get to know a character and poof! the story is over. It took me forever to read, because not only was I not invested in the characters they were unlikable.
I thought the scene where the slave catcher finds the body under the floor boards was weirdly written and only after the Robert’s sister finds the tapes and we (but not she) realize he’s been seeing ghosts did that scene begin to make sense. I found the first 2/3 of the book very hard going, while I could admire the mix of styles, then things picked up (about where we get the potboiler detective account) and I really enjoyed it, until I felt like it went off the deep end with the last chapter. We finally get a pleasant character and we kill her off?!
Ended up with more admiration than like. Not sorry to have read it, but it doesn’t make me want to try another book by this author.
I am reminded of Michener’s work, but with a twist. Not sure it needed the supernatural layering; I think Michener would have woven the house’s story into the plot more subtly. The juxtaposition of poetry, almanac pages, illustrations, real estate listings was a nice touch.
I will admit that this is the first time I’ve read beetle pornography.
When I finish a book I don’t often feel as if I’d gain a lot if I read it again – but in this case I do. (I’m not sure I will actually reread it, but it would be worthwhile.)
Oh, no–for those of you who’ve been around here a while, I think this is a repeat of “The Glass Room,” where I was one of the only people who loved the book! Because I loved this one, too!
The writing was so layered and gorgeous that I kept rereading and stopping so I could savor the descriptions. I didn’t want it to end.
The horror and creepiness didn’t really bother me, or that almost all of the characters (except maybe the first lovers) were unappealing, although now that I think about it, of course you are all right about that! Some of the stories dragged a bit, and the song interludes didn’t do much for me. And as a non-believer in afterlives, I would have preferred that the woman at the end survived and moved into the house instead.
But I LOVED The descriptions of the landscape and the house–how the world around them changed and the people changed the house and land, how nature itself harmed some species, and brought new ones. And although the characters weren’t all that appealing on their own, I loved the descriptions of their interior lives, their shortcomings, their desires and self-reflections. That and the linked short story format reminded me a lot of Winesburg, Ohio in that way–those characters were odd and broken, too. And I loved the mix of genres.
I listened to it on audio and then reread parts. The audio is amazing, with multiple narrators, including some of the best out there (Simon Vance, Mark Bramhall). Bramhall reading the beetle sex part (and the other sex scenes) is hilariously wonderful.
I should add that my other, 4-person book group also selected this title, and we are getting together in a few hours for a couple of days in a New England house in the woods on a lake, so I’ll let you know what the others in that group think!
