When Alice Lay Down with Peter
Language: English
Published by Knopf Canada, Canada, 2001
- First Edition
- Hardcover
- Used
Seller: GoldBookShelf, Burlington, ON, CanadaGoldBookShelf
AbeBooks seller since January 21, 2021
Condition: Used - As new
£ 28.76
Quantity: 1 available
Add to basketItem description from seller
Hardcover with price unclipped DJ. Stated first edition. Excellent condition like new. 459pp.
Seller Inventory # 13955
- Title
- When Alice Lay Down with Peter
- Author
- Sweatman, Margaret
- Publisher
- Knopf Canada, Canada
- Publication year
- 2001
- Condition
- As new
- Dust jacket
- As New
- Binding
- Hardcover
- Language
- English
- ISBN 10
- 0676973159
- ISBN 13
- 9780676973150
- Edition
- 1st Edition
- Printing
- 1st Printing
- Item weight
- 677.576 grams
- Dimensions
- 16 centimeters width by 23.62 centimeters height by 2.77 centimeters depth
- Seller catalogs
- Historical Fiction
Blondie’s narrative begins before her own life does, in the late 1860s, when Alice falls in love with Peter in the Orkneys, just before he sails for a new life in the New World. Disguising herself as a man, Alice follows his route and joins the Métis buffalo hunt in southern Manitoba, where she finds both Peter and the life experience she needs. But the expansion of Canada has wrought havoc on the buffalo population, and the Métis have had their work and their land cut out from under them. A way of life is dying, just as Alice and Peter are beginning their life together.
When Alice lays down with Peter, the ground shakes, the sky opens up, and lightning strikes the lovers, wrapped around each other under the open sky. At that moment, they both know that Alice has become pregnant with their child. But Alice continues her disguise, and joins Peter in fighting alongside Louis Riel and the Métis, against efforts to bring the west into the Dominion. She even participates in the political execution of Riel’s foe Thomas Scott, and is haunted by his ghost for the rest of her days. But as their baby comes closer to term, Alice and Peter realize the need to create a home, and it is on their new property near St. Norbert that Blondie, our narrator, is born.
On this piece of land, the story of Alice and Peter continues, and repeats itself through the coming generations. Blondie grows into a young woman and falls in love with Eli, a young buffalo hunter who eventually is forced to leave her when changes to his life and land become too heavy a weight to bear. Unlike her mother, Blondie reacts against her pain by going into seclusion, and studying only topics foreign to her surroundings. But when Eli returns, Blondie escapes her self-imposed isolation to take part in the Boer War, dressed as a young soldier. It is only on her return that they truly find each other again, and their lightning-fused reunion brings about the conception of their daughter, Helen.
And in that remarkable way that every generation can be seen as an exercise in repetition with variation, the McCormack women continue to find their own ways in the world and find, out there, the means of rejoining their family’s story. The too-beautiful Helen marries rich, but escapes her husband to live as a tramp on the rails and ends up fighting in the Spanish Civil War. Helen’s daughter Dianna trains as a lawyer, but gives it up to pour her passion and rebellion into botanical illustration and political protest. Each woman follows a very different path away from the family, but finds that the forces connecting them to home are too strong for any outside events to break.
Just as When Alice Lay Down with Peter is a story of a family, it is a story of a particular place over time. Margaret Sweatman’s characters are never separate from the story of the land itself, or from the natural and political events that work away at its edges. The history of the McCormacks is a history of life on the land: of bountiful crops and devastating floods, the renewal of spring and the death that marks each fall. It is in the connection between the place and its inhabitants that we find the deceptively simple meaning of “home.” And it is to this conjoining of histories that Sweatman brings the lightning spark of her imagination, and out of which this wonderful novel has been born.
"Synopsis" may belong to another edition of this title.
GoldBookShelf
Burlington, ON, Canada
AbeBooks seller since January 21, 2021
Shipping rates from Canada to U.S.A.
| Item | 4 to 8 business days | 2 to 4 business days |
|---|---|---|
| First item | £ 14.88 | £ 22.26 |
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This is Frank, A Book and Art Lover. The wonderful experience with book lovers on etsy.com (using the same name of goldbookshelf) encourages me to move forward. Now I have been one of the Book Sellers on ABEBooks.com too. My interest includes Biography, History, Art Books, Travel and antique Oriental books. All orders will be processed asap and packed in recycled box with tracking number. All books are carefully selected and thoroughly cleaned. Please be aware that some listings may need extra shipping charge. Book Lover help Book Lovers.…
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GoldBookShelf
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