For the first few weeks following the death of her parents, Kate believes that she was “protected from the reality by disbelief.” How did she carry this defense mechanism with her throughout her childhood and into adulthood? What are some examples? I wasn't the least bit surprised to learn from Mary Lawson's profile here on Goodreads that she's a distant relative to L.M. Montgomery, author of Anne of Green Gables, one of my favorite novels growing up. This captured a similar sense of that childhood classic's vibrant, close-knit community populated by memorable characters you never want to leave.

Crow Lake by Mary Lawson Reviews | Crow Lake by Mary Lawson

Great-grandmother Morrison’s love of learning set the standard against which Kate judged everyone around her. Do you think Great-grandmother Morrison would have approved of Kate’s disappointment in Matt? Why?

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I clearly remember the day that I put my emotions on ice—it was about a year and a half after the funerals and I remember thinking, “I’m so tired of crying.” So I quit. It has taken years to thaw that permafrost and I’m still unsure that the process is finished. Still a bit freezer-burned, I guess. On his side, I believe Daniel is attracted to Kate partly because of her honesty. She does not pretend, to others or to herself. It is this which is her salvation, in the end – she is able to look at her ‘picture of how things are’, and see that it is wrong. The whole of the spectacular Accidents in the Home - rich, lush and intricate as an Oriental rug - is poised on an excruciating tension about what matters in life: the 'real small accidental things' that alter it, as the tiniest mutations in cells can do, or 'the shimmering yielding fabric of opportunity and love'. Like the Morrison siblings in this novel, I come from a family of two boys and two girls, although thankfully our parents are still alive and healthy. Lawson examines with unsettling candor the volatile and sometimes violent dynamics between siblings, even and perhaps ESPECIALLY in families that care deeply about one another.

Mary Lawson | The Booker Prizes Mary Lawson | The Booker Prizes

I really liked this book. I love Kate’s voice, as a child and as an adult. Every character is sufficiently developed that I felt as though I knew them well and that I would immediately recognize them if I ever met any of them. I thought the family relationships and the psychology of each character were presented in an authentic and believable way. The writing is lovely too. No complaints about any of the above. Jake kept slipping sideways looks at their father as he said all this. Their mother would be hanging on every word, her face pink with pleasure, but it was their father's reaction he seemed interested in. But his father just chewed silently, pushing down the food."Centerstage are the Morrisons, whose tragedy looks more immediate if less brutal, but is, in reality, insidious and divisive. Orphaned young, Kate Morrison was her older brother Matt’s protegee, her fascination for pond life fed by his passionate interest in the natural world. Now a zoologist, she can identify organisms under a microscope but seems blind to the state of her own emotional life. And she thinks she’s outgrown her siblings–Luke, Matt, and Bo–who were once her entire world.

CROW LAKE by Mary Lawson - Publishers Weekly CROW LAKE by Mary Lawson - Publishers Weekly

Crow Lake isn't exactly Avonlea, though. This is no sweet and sentimental Hallmark movie. There's a darker edge to this story of four orphaned siblings learning to cope and survive in the aftermath of the sudden deaths of their parents, and the ways in which their fates collide with the secretive and troubled family from the farm down the road. This is the story of Kate and her family. She is the 3rd of 4 kids who grew up in a very rural farm village in Ontario. She is the narrator telling you this story as an adult. I feel such a commonality with this book—Mary Lawson's style, the movements, the issues, the dialogue that is perfect pitch and as natural as breathing—that it almost renders me speechless. It's a story about children raising children. About no grownups. About being propelled into adult responsibility as a child and the delusions of survivor's guilt. There's a short Q&A with Lawson ( http://www.marylawson.ca/qa-video/) where she qualifies the story as complete fiction. I believe her. The commonality I feel is not that I've lived this story because I haven't. What I feel is that, were I Canadian and from similar land, I too might have imagined it as she did.

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Viena vertus, vieną tų knygų, kur šiaip nelabai kas įvyksta ir tai daliai skaitytojų atrodys kaip didžiausias trūkumas. Kita vertus, įvyksta gyvenimas ir to gana. Ir kitai daliai skaitytojų tai bus didžiausias romano laimėjimas. Lawson man tampa viena tų autorių, į kurią suksiuos, kai norėsis kokybiško, visapusiškai atidirbto teksto. Skaitant labai susišaukė su Joyce Carol Oates „Mes – Malveiniai“ – tais didelės šeimos santykiais, akistata su didžiausiomis įmanomomis katastrofomis, asmeniniais išgyvenimais, kurie tampa bene giminės folkloru, teka kraujyje, įauga į DNR. Tiesa, pastaroji paveikesnė, bet čia tik mano asmeninė preferencija. Ir „Varnų ežerą“ galima rinktis, kai „Malveinius“ rinktis dar biškį tingisi. Gal netikėta, bet skaitydama galvojau, kad čia yra „Ten kur gieda vėžiai“, tik kitokiam skaitytojui – kuris nori nutylėjimų, bet tuo pačiu nori ir santykio su gamta, ir paslapties, kurią tik nujauti, ir asmeninių katastrofų, ir tikslo siekimo, kad ir kas bando tau sutrukdyti. Net jei bando Dievas, likimas, gyvenimas ir visi kiti, tie patys įtakingiausi. author Mary Lawson excels at writing realistic fiction! When four siblings are suddenly left orphaned, her slow-burn story shows how these children coped, and how their community rallied around them;

Crow Lake by Mary Lawson - January Magazine Reviews | Crow Lake by Mary Lawson - January Magazine

The boys work for neighbouring farmer Calvin Pye, whose presence is more menacing than neighbourly. Pye is always angry, and most in the community suspect he beats his wife and children. Pye’s son disappears and is thought to have run away from home, although the troubling behaviour of his mother hints at a more profound loss. Do you think Kate’s resentment and distaste toward Marie will lessen as she rebuilds her relationship with Matt? Given the chance to attend university, what choices do you think Matt would have made? Do you think he would have returned to Crow Lake? Why or why not? In Crow Lake, the narrator, Kate, quite consciously examines how much of the dire events affecting her family are a result of character, how much of circumstance and how circumstance shapes character. This assured, lucid narrative, less literary but still full of blossoming insights and emotional acuity, takes you into a family in northern Ontario. The father is the first of his farming clan to have finished secondary school; his job in a bank has justified the sacrifices made to get him there.Or was he merely surprised at how easy it was to give in to an impulse, and carry through the thought which lay in your mind? Simply to do whatever you wanted to do, and damn the consequences.