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To the Forest
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Check link for latest rating. ( 2,849 ratings, 272 reviews)
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Format: Paperback / softback
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Description
CBC BOOKS WORKS OF CANADIAN FICTION TO READ IN THE FIRST HALF OF 2023
49th SHELF EDITORS' PICK FOR JUNE 2023
When a family is forced to return to the mother's childhood home, she seeks meaning in her ancestral roots and the violent beauty of the natural world.
Fleeing the city at the beginning of the pandemic, two families are cramped together in a small century-old country house. Winter seeps through the walls, the wallpaper is peeling, and mice make their nest in the piano. Without phones or internet, they turn to the outdoors, where a new language unfolds, a language of fireflies and clover.
The five children explore nature and its treasures, while our narrator, Anas, turns to the eccentric neighbours and her own family history to find peace and meaning in the middle of her life.
To the Forest is a field guide to a quieter life, a call to return to the places where we can reweave the threads of memory, where existence waltzes with death, where we can recapture what it means to be alive.
Book Hero Magic summarised reviews for this book. While it's new and still learning, it may not be perfect - your feedback is welcome! HOW HAS THIS BEEN REVIEWED?
Barbeau-Lavalette's To the Forest is praised for its poetic exploration of themes such as interconnectedness, grief, growth, and rebirth in the context of nature and climate change. Reviewers highlight the novel's literary talent, emotional depth, and engaging narrative style, celebrating its ability to capture ordinary and magical moments in a familial and natural setting. The story is described as an exquisite blend of autobiography and imagination, revealing the delicate balance of love, death, and resilience.
Book Details
INFORMATION
ISBN: 9781552454633
Publisher: Coach House Books
Format: Paperback / softback
Date Published: 03 August 2023
Country: Canada
Imprint: Coach House Books
Illustration: Illustrations
Contributors:
- Translated by Rhonda Mullins
Audience: General / adult
DIMENSIONS
Width: 133.0mm
Height: 209.0mm
Weight: 250g
Pages: 200
About the Author
Born in 1979, and named an Artist for Peace in 2012, Anas Barbeau-Lavalette has directed several award-winning documentary features. She also directed two fiction features: Le Ring (2008) and Inch'allah (2012), which received the Fipresci Prize in Berlin. She is the author of the travelogue Embrasser Yasser Arafat (2011) and the novels Je voudrais qu'on m'efface (Neighbourhood Watch) and the international bestseller Le femme qui fuit (Suzanne), Prix des libraires du Quebec, Prix France-Quebec, Prix de la ville de Montreal, and shortlisted for the Best Translated Book Award and Canada Reads.
Rhonda Mullins is a Montreal-based translator who has translated many books from French into English, including Jocelyne Saucier's And Miles To Go Before I Sleep, Gregoire Courtois' The Laws of the Skies, Dominique Fortier's Paper Houses, and Anas Barbeau-Lavalette's Suzanne. She is a seven-time finalist for the Governor General's Literary Award for Translation, winning the award in 2015 for her translation of Jocelyne Saucier's Twenty-One Cardinals. Novels she has translated were contenders for CBC Canada Reads in 2015 and 2019 and one was a finalist for the 2018 Best Translated Book Award. Mullins was the inaugural literary translator in residence at Concordia University in 2018. She is a mentor to emerging translators in the Banff International Literary Translation Program.
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