Sanctuary Line

by Jane Urquhart

From the #1 national bestselling author of Away, The Stone Carvers, and A Map of Glass, Sanctuary Line is the eagerly anticipated new novel by Jane Urquhart.

Set in the present day on a farm at the shores of Lake Erie, Jane Urquhart's stunning new novel weaves elements from the nineteenth-century past, in Ireland and Ontario, into a gradually unfolding contemporary story of events in the lives of the members of one family that come to alter their futures irrevocably.

There are ancestral lighthouse-keepers, seasonal Mexican workers; the migratory patterns and survival techniques of the Monarch butterfly; the tragedy of a young woman's death during a tour of duty in Afghanistan; three very different but equally powerful love stories.

Jane Urquhart brings to vivid life the things of the past that make us who we are, and reveals the sometimes difficult path to understanding and forgiveness.

Genres: Fiction, Canada, Literary Fiction, Canadian Literature, Book Club, Literature, Contemporary

256 pages, Paperback

First published August 31, 2010

About the author

She is the author of seven internationally acclaimed novels entitled, The Whirlpool, Changing Heaven, Away, The Underpainter, The Stone Carvers, A Map of Glass, and Sanctuary Line.

The Whirlpool received the French Prix du Meilleur Livre Étranger (Best Foreign Book Award). Away was winner of the Trillium Book Award and a finalist for the prestigious International IMPAC Dublin Literary Award. The Underpainter won the Governor General's Award for English-language fiction and was a finalist for the Rogers Writers' Trust Fiction Prize.

The Stone Carvers was a finalist for the Giller Prize and the Governor General's Award, and was longlisted for the Booker Prize. A Map of Glass was a finalist for a regional Commonwealth Writers' Prize for Best Book.

She is also the author of a collection of short fiction, Storm Glass, and four books of poetry, I Am Walking in the Garden of His Imaginary Palace, False Shuffles, The Little Flowers of Madame de Montespan, and Some Other Garden. Her work has been translated into numerous foreign languages.
Urquhart has received the Marian Engel Award, Calgary's Bob Edwards Award and the Harbourfront Festival Prize, and is a Chevalier dans l’Ordre des Arts et des Lettres in France. In 2005 she was named an Officer of the Order of Canada.
Recently, she was named the 2007 Banff Distinguished Writer.

Urquhart has received numerous honorary doctorates from Canadian universities and has been writer-in-residence at the University of Ottawa and at Memorial University of Newfoundland, the University of Toronto, and the University of Guelph.

She has also given readings and lectures in Canada, Britain, Europe, the U.S.A., and Australia.
In 2007 she edited and published The Penguin Book of Canadian Short Stories, and in 2009 she published a biography of

Lucy Maud Montgomery as part of Penguin’s “Extraordinary Canadians” series.

Urquhart lives in Northumberland County, Ontario, Canada, and occasionally in Ireland.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jane_Urq...

Reviews

[Eef Pannekoeke · Rating 4 out of 5]

the feminine urge om vlinders te gaan bestuderen en ze te vergelijken met alles en iedereen in mijn leven

[Kristine · Rating 2 out of 5]

I found this book very hard to get through. Urquart no doubt is very talented with the written word but unfortunately the story got lost in her words. It takes the entire book to get to the story which occurs in the last couple of chapters. There are a few moments of brilliance in these last chapters but not enough to compensate for the overly wordy story that is all over the map in the beginning and middle of the book. The fact that there was no resolve of any sort left me more than frustrated when I finally finished it.

[Iris · Rating 3 out of 5]

Jane Urquhart’s Sanctuary Line weaves together many elements in the story of one family living in Ontario. The narrator, Liz Crane, has moved back to her family’s farmhouse to study the migratory pattern of monarch butterflies. But events, among which is the dead of her cousin, military strategist Amanda Butler, who was killed in Afghanistan, lead her to spend much of her time reflecting on the past of her family.

There is much to be said about Urquhart’s novel. For one, her prose is stunningly beautiful. What is more, she manages to achieve a lot in relatively few words and a relatively short novel. Through a form of storytelling that is calm, and comfortable, she alludes to grander themes that most humans encounter throughout their lives.

One such theme is that of sanctuary. In many ways, Liz relives the past to find comfort in how things used to be, or to find questions to how that comfort fell apart. At the same time, her story contains example after example of people failing to find sanctuary, or with a less grand gesture: comfort, somewhere, of the ruptures in the calm that will never be fully achieved. It can be found in every storyline, that of the butterflies, of Liz’s life, that of her family members, down to all the stories the family has told itself for decades to give a sense of grounding, of home, of tradition. It is really very admirably done.

I find it hard to tell you how I felt about Sanctuary Line. I could appreciate all that Urquhart did, I could appreciate the intricate ways in which grander themes are part of almost every page in the book, and her beautiful use of language. However, I am sorry to tell you that I could not love it. There is something very puzzling to writing about a book that holds so many perfections, but that you fail to connect to personally. It may have been the manner in which the story was told. Liz Crane as a narrator tells her story to someone, a “you”, of whom you only learn the identity at the end of the book. She assumes a familiarity with the landscape, with what she is ostensibly pointing out to the “you” in question. I constantly felt that this was a clever mechanism, as it has the reader imagining Liz is talking directly to him or her, but at the same time it kept me at a distance, knowing full well that I was not in that room looking out the window at the grounds with her. It may also have been that the build-up of the first half of the book was very slow, and there was no urgency to the storyline. It was clear that at some point, somewhere, something had happened, but the hints towards that something were too scattered, and I was too little involved with any of the characters mentioned to feel it mattered much. This changed once I was past page 100, when I started to care about the story and its execution. Too little, too late, in a sense. On the other hand, I do not feel Urquhart was trying to achieve a linear, thrilling storyline, but meant the book to be more of an exploration of themes and settings, of memories, comfort, and loss. And once I was past that page-100 point, my former hesitancy towards the novel disappeared.

I do appreciate all that Jane Urquhart did in Sanctuary Line, she delivered a beautifully executed story, tackling themes in an interesting way and in prose that I am sure many will love. Nevertheless, to a certain extent, it always remained just that to me, a story, not something I wanted or needed to relate to, or that felt very real until halfway into the book.

[Tara · Rating 4 out of 5]

I admit this book caught my eye on a library shelf because of the cover. I love butterflies, nature, so I picked it up and started reading the jacket copy and only read "Solitary, nostalgic Liz Crane returns to her family's now-deserted farmhouse . . . to study the migratory habits of the Monarch butterfly" and I was "caught."

I have heard about this writer, but never read her, and am so glad I found this book. It's not perfect--the plot seems forced in some places, the big secret that is revealed I knew was coming, and a side plot that veers into the Afghan war was unnecessary in my view and broke the spell of the location. My interest in her studies of the Monarch became basic recitations of facts any one of us can get off the Internet.

HOWEVER, this is one of the most beautifully written books I've ever read. I savored every word and sentence, and the narrator's recounting of her life on the edge of Lake Erie is so believable I was astounded to discover it was fiction. It has to be a closeted memoir, I kept saying to myself. The characters, facts, family stories seemed so real.

Finally, the novel brims with the beauty of nature and place. The Canadian side of Lake Erie is as much a character as the two Irish generations she explores, and her sidetracks into the great-great family members are so unique they take on a mythic quality.

Not surprised to find out she is also a poet. While not perfect, I will for sure search out her other books. Highly recommend if you love lyric prose, nature, place, symbolism, memoir-type books, and immigrant stories. Warning: this is a tell, not show book. You have to be content to listen and savor the narration.

[Anna Quilter · Rating 4 out of 5]

A tale of memories and butterflies.
A girl remembers from her past and more recent times...transitioning from childhood thoughts to more adult happenings within her family and friends.

[Cynthia · Rating 4 out of 5]

The nature of memories

“Sanctuary Line” is about family tradition and how those family legends impact the current generation. It’s also a coming of age novel though the main character is probably in her 40’s. The story is told in childhood flashbacks by Liz Crane who’s currently working as an etymologist and living in her now government owned childhood family seat which used to be a working orchard. She reconsiders the stories her uncle loved to tell her and her cousin Amanda who was like a sister to Liz. She thinks about past and upcoming deaths and how those deaths will affect and have affected her. She almost obsessively wonders if her memories are true returning over and over again to examine others’ motivations while also questioning her own. The orchard setting itself seems almost idyllic with the monarch butterflies returning yearly to light up a particular tree. Some of her memories are dreamlike, others harsh. As children Liz and her cousins had plentiful land to explore; a lake to swim in, books to read, parents to ignore and to idolize but the adult Liz wonders what it all meant, what was true. As she seeks to create a sanctuary for her well loved butterflies she ponders her assumption that her childhood was safe.

Liz also struggles to come to terms with recent and past tragedies. Memory is never static and a slight change in perspective can recalculate a life. The rehashing of the past in “Sanctuary Line” never seems obsessive just needed because Liz is determined to make sense of what’s happened and reconcile what others have told her, what her teenage/childhood self perceived, and the stories that were subsequently told about the events.

This review is based on an advance reader's copy provided by the publisher.
(Disclaimer included as required by the FTC.)

[Victoria Casteels · Rating 4 out of 5]

this is a beautiful novel and i loved it (loved my test on it a little less). a clever combination of family drama, literary fiction and a critique on modern America (the continent), but the wonderful language and butterfly imagery is what did it for me personally. would recommend, but only four stars as it didn’t blow me away (maybe bc i had to read it for uni as well which kinda ruins the magic). definitely excited about reading more of her work !

[Jim Puskas · Rating 4 out of 5]

Told from the perspective of a woman in her middle years, this is all about memories, migration and a pervasive sense of place. Although many of the memories are glorious, of a girl growing up in an almost enchanted summer place, there is a compelling sense of nostalgia, regret for a lost world, lost loves. Migration forms layer upon layer of metaphor, the migration of Irish immigrant families to North America; the seasonal migration of Mexican farm workers to and from Ontario; and the astonishing multi-generational migration of the Monarch — also to and from Mexico. (The latter, poignantly, seems to be little more than a memory today.)
The book is set in what used to be the abundantly productive fruit growing lands along the north shore of lake Erie — now sadly mostly turned into residential estates, commercial development and great numbers of retirement residences, all of that in consequence of the mild climate, a rarity in this otherwise frigid country; a few wineries offer a vague echo of the sprawling orchards that existed during my own childhood in that corner of the province. Of course, my own deep familiarity with the place enhanced my enjoyment of the book.
Much of the story is set at the time of Canada’s ten-year involvement in the war in Afghanistan. Since our forces are so few in number, that engagement meant that almost every soldier served at least one and often many tours of duty in that conflict; that reality, especially the public spectacle of convoys bearing coffins along the “Highway of Heroes” provides a stark contrast to an otherwise idyllic setting.
As always, Urqhuart brings forth wonderful characters who emerge whole and breathing from the page: Liz, the narrator gradually reveals herself but does so almost entirely through her passionate relationships with the others — her tempestuous uncle Stanley; her cousin and bosom friend Mandy; her lost love Teo, struggling to find his place in the world; and her great rambling host of uncles, aunts, cousins and great-greats. Their restless, unredeemable Irishness transforms what would otherwise be a quiet novel where not much happens into a busy melee of comings and goings.
This novel doesn’t approach the layered psychological intricacy of The Underpainter, nor does it capture the sweep of events and locales of The Stone Carvers; this is much more heart-on-sleeve. But all of Urquhart’s rich prose is here, it has a beauty all its own. I will include only a couple of quotes to show what I mean:
Of her long-vanished uncle, Liz says "A lost person must in some way or another choose rescue."
And this one passage might easily sum up what the book is about: "I now believe that memory is rarely a friend to anyone. Always attended by transience and loss, often by anguish, the very notion that the elderly spend their days wrapped in the comfort of pleasant mental journeys into the past is simply absurd."

[Elena Sala · Rating 5 out of 5]

Liz Crane, an entomologist, returns to the abandoned family farm where she experienced her happiest and most emotionally troubling moments as she grew up. She returns to study the monarch butterfly, however, she spends much of her time musing about the past. She addresses her story of family history to an unnamed "you", but we do not know who that "you" is until the end.

Set in Canada, on the coast of Lake Erie in Western Ontario, SANCTUARY LINE (2010) is a sad story of family tragedy contrasted with an idyllic childhood. When misfortune struck, I was astonished by the gracious way Urquhart brought the story to closure and put clarity into the past. The lives of her characters mirror the lives of the monarch butterfly, lives which are marked by flight, migration, return and loss. A haunting story of transience and change.

Jane Urquhart is a Canadian writer whose writing style is so lyrical, full of literary allusions and descriptions of nature that made me wish the story would never end. Highly recommended.

[runa · Rating 3 out of 5]

had to read it for school, but i do love a family drama so 3 stars it is (i won’t like the test on it though)

[Emil Krastev · Rating 2 out of 5]

Disclaimer: The amount of stars I gave this book is solely based on my reading experience. It is by no means a judgement of its quality.

For some reason, this story just felt very languid to me. Unfortunately, I had a hard time connecting with the narrator and therefore was never lured into the narrative. While I do understand the appeal, I don’t think I’ll be reading anything else be Jane Urquhart soon.

[Roger Brunyate · Rating 4 out of 5]

Of Monarchs and Memory

This is a novel about memory, nostalgic, partial, sometimes painful, but always intriguing. At any time, a person's mind potentially holds the sum total of all her experience, though she may not be able to access all of it. She may have forgotten details, until reminded by revisiting a place or picking up a keepsake. There may be memories too hurtful to recall, until the recounting of simpler things clears a pathway to them. There may be things that she cannot understand until the light of maturity suddenly reveals their meaning. Unlike a tale told chronologically, a novel based on memory contains its entire story in outline from the first pages on—although it remains unclear in detail, emotion, and significance until we have lived long enough in the narrator's mind to explore her past from within. And Jane Urquhart, in the gradual unspooling of memory that is the essence of her latest novel, allows us to inhabit the mind of Liz Crane, her protagonist and narrator, as though it were our own.

Liz is an entomologist, working at a sanctuary situated on a promontory of the Canadian shore of Lake Erie. She studies the Monarch butterfly, which migrates annually from Canada to Mexico and back again, the task being spread between several generations, dying so that others may live. Urquhart makes this a metaphor for the theme of human migration over successive generations that threads through this book. As a child, Liz would spend her summers at her uncle's orchard farm, worked each year by families flown in from Mexico, whose children she would get to know. Her own family, the Butlers, emigrated from Ireland a century before, settling on both the American and Canadian sides of the lake; the novel is full of their stories of risk-taking and loss. Her uncle himself was given to unexplained disappearances, and one year he simply walked out of their lives for good. More recently, her cousin Mandy, a senior officer in the Canadian army, spent several years in Afghanistan, dying there shortly before the book opens. There are other deaths also that will emerge as the memories come into focus, but there is also life, love, and friendship, and golden echoes of those endless summer evenings of childhood in the country.

The three novels by Jane Urquhart that precede this— Away (1993), The Stone Carvers (2001), and A Map of Glass (2005)—have all been panoramic stories told chronologically. Sanctuary Line is different in being intimate, personal, and reflective, the same events coming back again and again, growing in meaning with each telling. Urquhart has always been a poet, even in her prose, and this book has the structure of poetry itself—a quality that is found also in Changing Heaven (1990), though its atmosphere is altogether wilder than the relative quietness here. Poetry, which was Mandy's passion, actually plays a large part in it, with well-placed quotations from Robert Louis Stevenson (whose greatness I cannot see) and Emily Dickinson (whom Urquhart makes me appreciate as never before). This is distinctly an older person's vision. Its prevailing poetic moods are pastoral and elegy: Urquhart's love of the country and her lament for its disappearance. In this, she echoes themes from her earlier novels, especially A Map of Glass. All her books draw strength from their local roots.

But she very much needs those roots. When Mandy goes to Afghanistan, she is in an utterly different environment that Urquhart does not entirely manage to connect to her own; she is absent from this world, but never convincingly present in that one. This matters most in the final section, when Urquhart attempts to close the circle and does not quite succeed. Which is a pity since this epilogue is intended to balance the opening book-end, showing Mandy's hearse being driven along Canadian highways as policemen, firemen, and members of the public gather on overpasses. It is a hero's return, a poignant image of loss and homecoming, the themes of this entire book. But the most hopeful symbol is that of the Monarchs, flying to and fro between Mexico and Canada, and converting the trees on which they land into tongues of living flame.

[Nina · Rating 4 out of 5]

read this for Engels taal & tekst, deel 2.
3.75⭐️

[switterbug (Betsey) · Rating 5 out of 5]

The Butlers, a once prosperous Irish-American family, ran a progressive farm and orchards on the shore of Lake Erie in southwestern Ontario. The road that ran from the shore to inland was called Sanctuary Line. The orchards have now decayed, the farm has gone to seed, and the family has been gone since a crucial night in the 1980's, a night of crisis which is the dramatic center of this novel. The enigmatic patriarch, Stan Butler, was uncle to the fatherless Liz Crane, the novel's melancholic narrator. He abandoned the family and never returned, and his literature-loving poet daughter Mandy, Liz's closest friend and confidante, died during a tour of duty in Afghanistan one year ago.

Liz, now a forty-year-old entomologist, is studying the monarch butterfly, which has brought her back to this land that she spent her summers and to the sadness of memories that revisit her. In measured tones, she recounts her childhood history with the Butlers and the accumulation of her losses--Mandy, her uncle, and a boy named Teo, son of one of the crew of Mexican migrant workers who also came every summer. Some of her memories are impaired by their very trauma, and Liz's inward and outward search for answers about the night her uncle left and the haunting memories of Teo provide the primary tension of the story.

This is a quiet, introspective novel, but despite its brevity (200 pages), it is also sprawling. The numerous characters are memorable mostly for their impact on the themes and the epic sense of loss, and are mainly imprints, except for Liz, Stan, and Teo. Urquhart's use of symbolism is meaty and powerful, and the fragile beauty of the monarch butterflies and their mating, migratory, and survival patterns are tied into the central drama. Additionally, the geography of the land and the themes of family, (ancestral) history, and transition are delicately woven into the story.

I had a little difficulty at times pairing Mandy's love of the military with her soulful connection to literature and poetry. In retrospect, Mandy herself seemed less a character than use as an emotional context for Liz and a source for the anti-climax. The contrast of soldier-poet seemed a bit forced and contrived, but it is such a small complaint and forgivable overall. On the other hand, I especially enjoyed the rambling stories of the ancestral bifurcation (she likes that--bifurcation--and uses that word a lot): in the 19th century, one half of the family became farmers and one half became lighthouse keepers. There is a potent myth of one of the lighthouse keepers that resounded with me as much as Liz's predominating story.

The power of Sanctuary Line lies in Liz's narrow aperture of her family history that gradually deepens and widens, revealing that her often grim and irresolute past yet opens up to a more clarifying and promising future.

[Allyson · Rating 2 out of 5]

I am not really sure what to say about this book. Up until page 178, I found it unmoving and had little interest in any of her characters. She finally established some connection between Liz and Mandy which felt legitimate but even after calamitous events, I felt it was too little too late to salvage my feelings about her story. I really disliked Stanley, the uncle and found his stories and character off putting and uninteresting. It was a fast read with a pretty cover and she clearly is an excellent writer with an ability to create a complicated storyline. I just did not find her delivery or actual novel original or intriguing. I was very aware of reading every word, never a good sign and it did not at all sing to me despite beautiful details.

[Alexis · Rating 3 out of 5]

Three stars because of the beauty of the language. There were a lot of really gorgeous themes in this book including monarch butterflies, orchardists and farm history. The book was full of rich description.

However, I must admit that I didn't enjoy this book as much as I would have liked to. THe majority of the book is remembered as a long flashback, which I couldn't get into. Since the character was remembering, it seemed rather languid to me, and it didn't have the urgency that the plot deserved.

I got more into it as things were revealed at the end. I wish I would have enjoyed this more, because I think it was quite well crafted.

[Lue · Rating 3 out of 5]

I really wanted to like this more than I did. Normally I fall in love with Urquhart's writing from the first few pages. However, it felt like the first 40 or so pages were meandering, like she was struggling to find the beginning of the book (not the story). Instead of being able to relax into the Urquhart's gentle voice, I was too busy trying to find my footing as a reader. And this lessened any impact the could have had on me.

[Craig · Rating 2 out of 5]

Beautiful writing but the story was very boring. An entomologist studying monarch butterflies reflects back on her family life on the farm. There are the usual topics like love, crisis, coming of age, and symbolism. Sanctuary Line was a very subtle book, too subtle for me.

[Tine Korsten · Rating 4 out of 5]

My nostalgic heart really liked this book :)

[Jill · Rating 4 out of 5]

Liz Crane, an entomologist researching the migration of monarch butterflies, is the narrator of this elegant and reflective novel by Jane Urquhart and indeed, butterflies are the metaphor that ties the story together. The prose – dense, descriptive, and beautifully-wrought—flutters like a butterfly, taking flight (as memory itself does) in the past, then alighting back in the present, making its way back and forth to answer the question: what happened on a pivotal evening man years back, at her charismatic uncle’s orchard farm?

As Liz mulls over the events leading up to that fortuitous evening, she thinks, “Sometimes I feel the past will eat me alive, will devour me in the same way that the now abundantly overgrown cedar bush is devouring the pioneer rail fences on which, as children, we used to stand.”

Small wonder. Her charming yet impetuous and damaged uncle Stanley – who looms larger than life in her memories --vanished years back and his daughter, Cousin Mandy – poet and soldier – is also gone, killed on active duty in Afghanistan while in the throes of a mysterious love affair. And then there’s Teo, a young Mexican boy, whose fate is darkly hinted at almost from the beginning.

Uncle Stanley was the keeper and weaver of generations of family mythology, and the stories he tells -- and Liz recalls – are vibrant: ancestors immigrating from Ireland to become lighthouse keepers, others who became farmers and pined for love and experienced it in one fleeting moment. These “great-greats” permeate both the topographical and the emotional topography.

In just a little over 200 pages, Ms. Urquhart effectively mines so much of our human experience: love and death, lies and secrets, the paths of migration and the arcs of life, our personal metamorphosis and the integration of nature into our lives.

Are there flaws? Perhaps a few. I never quite understood Mandy’s decision to enter Canada’s armed forces – given her character development – and I couldn’t help but feel that the Afghanistan story was tacked on to create modern relevancy. One of the ending denouements – which I won’t spoil – seemed a little too implausible. Liz’s vocation – as an entomologist – is never capitalized on (we never see her at work, for example), which make the butterfly metaphors less organic in their evocation.

All in all, this is a beautifully lyrical and haunting book, but not a perfect one. It’s the first book I’ve read by Ms. Urquhart ; other friends and readers I respect have long been Jane Urquhart fans. The brilliant writing makes it a foregone conclusion that I will read much more from this author.

[Erin · Rating 2 out of 5]

I’m writing about Jane Urquhart’s A Map of Glass for the big T right now, and so I should begin this post with the caveat that my interpretation of Sanctuary Line may be skewed by my frustration with writing about A Map of Glass. That said, even though I am writing endless pages about it, I like A Map of Glass. I do not, however, like Sanctuary Line.

The top lists of 2010 like Sanctuary Line. They like it, I suspect, because it comes heavily laden with symbolism and with the promise that this. is. literary. fiction. Unfortunately the endless symbols of butterflies, transformation, lighthouses, reading, vigilance, connection, and a vital past do not accompany anything like an engaging plot. Instead the reader encounters chapter after chapter of a frustrating (not tantalizing) promise that soon - no! soon! - the “mystery” that explains the disappearance of Liz’s uncle and the tragedy of Liz’s childhood will be revealed. This reader suspected, nay expected, that somehow the over-determined symbolism that weighed down the narrative would, in the final reveal, make sense, would make the plot richer and the experience of slogging through worthwhile. Alas. The big mystery appeared to this reader so surprising, so unexpected that I couldn’t help but wonder if in all my attention to symbolism I had somehow missed the connection between transformation and… (the big reveal).

I have to say I generally admire Urquhart for her poetic descriptions of landscape, her weaving of symbol, plot, metaphor and character, and her ambition in thematic scope. This novel, however, left me feeling frustrated and vaguely discomfited: have I become a poorer reader? Let’s not discount this possibility, it’s been a long semester. But let’s also consider the possibility that this book may have missed the mark, and instead of weaving a delightful tapestry of character, plot, theme and symbol we’re left with a knotted ball of (enter the misplaced metaphor).

[Czarny Pies · Rating 2 out of 5]

"Sanctuary Line" was for me a great disappointment being greatly inferior both to "A Map of Glass" which preceded it and "The Night Stages" which followed it. Jane Urquhart is at her best when her novel is simultaneously a both character studies and commentaries on the artist process. There are no artists in "Sanctuary Line" whose protagonist is an entomologist.
The basic objective of "Sanctuary Line" is simple and very solid. It presents the memories of a young woman who reflects, first, on her strong feelings of love for cousin and uncle; and, second, her grief at their passing. The details of the mannerisms of a family of Canadian Wasps living in the twentieth century in Ontario are excellent. Urquhart's decision to compare them to short-lived but beautiful and endangered Monarch butterflies is less effective. I found the narrator/protagonist barely credible as entomologist. Her cousin a poetry-loving soldier who dies on a peace-keeping mission in Afghanistan is similarly highly improbable.
Urquhart's portrait of her uncle, a highly talented bungler who fails at everything that he undertakes, is on the other hand quite brilliant. It is the uncle's extra-marital affair that destroys forever the happiness all those in his family. For Urquhart who views adulterers as victims of social prejudice rather than sinners, the great transgression of the uncle is not that he is unfaithful but he that allows his wife to physically abuse his lover. The only flaw Urquhart's handling of the relationship is the bloody and highly melodramatic manner in which it is brought to an end.
I consider "The Sanctuary" to be an aberration in Urquhart's otherwise stellar career. As I have already noted, "The Night Stages" which followed was a much better effort.

[Eric Wright · Rating 4 out of 5]

Initially I didn't know whether to give Urquhart's new book two stars or 4+. The story is told from the perspective of Liz Crane, an entomologist moved into the now deserted farmhouse of her relatives. She was hired to study the migratory patterns of the Monarch butterfly. But in her story she muses over the deterioration of her family's fortunes starting from the 19th century to the present. What started as a promising family with a thriving orchard business on the short of Lake Erie in Ontario collapsed due to slowly revealed tragedies in her family; her uncle, her aunt, the death of her close cousin, a femal soldier in Afghanistan and her doomed love affair. Until the very end the story vibrates with the haunting echoes of sad events. The life and death of the butterflies reflects the loss and loves of the Irish Butler clan and the slow loss of the old farms overwhelmed by factory farms. Urquhart's eloquecy ultimately led me to give her a four, although such dark and literary musings don't usually catch my attention. The story is that of the vast majority of settlers who wrested farms from the forests of southern Ontario. Now forgotten, their barns nothing but skeletons, their houses surrounded by overgrown lilacs or torn down, their progency gone off to the cities.

[Irene · Rating 4 out of 5]

Jane Urquhart's writing pulls you in and her descriptions are lovely, which is a good thing because her novels tend to build so gradually that they can be a struggle. In "The Night Stages" Urquhart's female protagonist is looking back at her life while fogged in at Gander Airport. Happily, in Sanctuary Line, Liz is actively working as a entomologist while she recalls the history of her family and the farm where she now lives. The story line is tighter than in The Night Stages and the build-up of tension is more palpable. After reading The Night Stages I probably would have had little impetus to read another of Urquhart's books but I had already purchased Sanctuary Line. Now I am more likely to pick up another Urquhart.

[nore · Rating 4 out of 5]

reminded me of one of my favorite children’s books

[geikew · Rating 3 out of 5]

the last 40 pages were good

[Lies Adam · Rating 3 out of 5]

hmmm een goed boek, hield van sommige van de ancestor achtergrondverhalen, de vlindersymboliek en de referenties naar poëzie!

hield minder van sommige andere ancestorverhalen en de incest…tf

[Mmars · Rating 4 out of 5]

Readers who are patient and like to linger in reflective family sagas will find much to like in "Sanctuary Line." Because the first-person narrator often referred to an uncle as "uncle" and an aunt as "aunt", I needed to go back, skim the first 50 pages and make a family tree to keep all the uncles, aunts, cousins, and great-greats straight. But it was worth it.

You know from the beginning that the denoument referred to throughout Liz's walk down memory lane will be unhappy and disturbing, and she does not disappoint. I'd love to say more about the ending, and I think this would make an excellent book discusion choice, but anything said here would likely spoil the experience of reading the book, and it's definitely worth the read.

This is the second Uruquhart book I've read. She excels in producing an atmosphere of place. In both this and "Away" rural Canda's isolation and fragile beauty linger long in the back of the mind. In "Sanctuary Line" her effective use of poetry - good, bad, adult, children's - adds a dimension to the ephemeral aspect of her characters and their lives.

[Ann · Rating 4 out of 5]

Wonderful story populated by many stories.

The main tale is about the Butler family farm and who it was a childhood sanctuary every summer when Liz was a child. She narrates the novel often looking back to her girlhood surrounded by Butler cousins and a Mexican boy who was part of a work crew. I think everyone would welcome a lakefront farm like this to belong to. Time and place are important components of Liz's life -- the dismantling of the farm and the relationships that drifted away.

There is also the story of Mandy -- Liz's closest cousin who became a soldier and suffered from a secret relationship with an officer.

Liz's uncle Stanley was like a pied piper. He embarked on outrageous adventures that the rest of the family clamored to keep up with. The stories he tells the children about their ancestors influence their lives on many levels. Larger than life, Uncle Stanley's comeuppance marks the end of the sanctuary.

The climactic scene that was foreshadowed from the beginning doesn't disappoint, though it may have been more ordinary in another story.

As flavourful as the harvest of the Butler farm.

[Dale Harcombe · Rating 4 out of 5]

Sometimes you get a book that just makes you pause over the sentences because the writing is so beautiful. That is the case with Sanctuary Line. I enjoyed the prose and the story of Liz Crane as she looks back at her family and in particular her uncle, seeing him in a different light to how she did when younger. She also reflects on her cousin Amanda, (Mandy) their times together as children and the relationship between them. Mandy died during a military tour in Afghanistan. This is a novel about landscape, relationships, racial differences and prejudice, loss and first love, the things that draw people together and those that drive them apart.
I liked the setting and learning about the Monarch butterflies that are part of this story. This is not what you would call a page turner but it did keep my interest throughout. A reflective literary novel, I felt it was a story with several layers. One thing that really grated on me though, was the repetitive use of ‘bifurcation.’ Still that is a small quibble in what is a beautifully written book.