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Come to the Window: A Novel
A drama of murder, love, and redemption set in Nova Scotia in the final year of World War I.
It’s l9l8. The war in Europe grinds on, and the Spanish flu seems to be on an insatiable killing spree. But in the small fishing village of Parrsboro, Nova Scotia, a more confined drama—harrowing and provocative—slowly unfolds. It begins when Elizabeth Frame murders her husband hours after their wedding and thrusts the revolver into the blowhole of a beached whale.
Crime reporter Toby Havenshaw is dispatched by the Halifax Evening Mail to cover the hearing, and his diary subsequently follows the surprising twists and turns of Elizabeth Frame’s flight from the law, accompanied as she is by a love-besotted court stenographer. But Toby’s diary also paints a vivid and deeply affecting portrait of his marriage to Amelia, a surgeon just returned from the front lines in France and Belgium. When a child is born to Elizabeth Frame on the lam, Amelia is drawn into events in ways she could never have imagined. And then everything changes.
Come to the Window explores a question both universal and How does one recover hope in a time of great bewilderment and grief?
It’s l9l8. The war in Europe grinds on, and the Spanish flu seems to be on an insatiable killing spree. But in the small fishing village of Parrsboro, Nova Scotia, a more confined drama—harrowing and provocative—slowly unfolds. It begins when Elizabeth Frame murders her husband hours after their wedding and thrusts the revolver into the blowhole of a beached whale.
Crime reporter Toby Havenshaw is dispatched by the Halifax Evening Mail to cover the hearing, and his diary subsequently follows the surprising twists and turns of Elizabeth Frame’s flight from the law, accompanied as she is by a love-besotted court stenographer. But Toby’s diary also paints a vivid and deeply affecting portrait of his marriage to Amelia, a surgeon just returned from the front lines in France and Belgium. When a child is born to Elizabeth Frame on the lam, Amelia is drawn into events in ways she could never have imagined. And then everything changes.
Come to the Window explores a question both universal and How does one recover hope in a time of great bewilderment and grief?
181 pages, Kindle Edition
First published July 9, 2024
60 people are currently reading
10617 people want to read
About the author
Howard Norman
59 books282 followersHoward A. Norman (born 1949), is an American award-winning writer and educator. Most of his short stories and novels are set in Canada's Maritime Provinces. He has written several translations of Algonquin, Cree, Eskimo, and Inuit folklore. His books have been translated into 12 languages.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 127 reviews
February 10, 2024
What a beautiful and captivating story. Howard's lyrical prose is so lovely and descriptive. This book has humor, sadness, and wit, and I loved Toby and Amelia's relationship.
July 21, 2024
Come To The Window is a hidden gem for me. I had no idea what I was in for when I started this book but it soon became apparent I had seldom read anything quite like it in a very long time.
Set in Nova Scotia in 1918, the final year of World War l takes center stage with a deadly outbreak of the Spanish flu. A murder mystery without the mystery - a love story built on confidence and a beautiful ending started by tragic beginnings.
I really liked this one - it took me by surprise.
Set in Nova Scotia in 1918, the final year of World War l takes center stage with a deadly outbreak of the Spanish flu. A murder mystery without the mystery - a love story built on confidence and a beautiful ending started by tragic beginnings.
I really liked this one - it took me by surprise.
July 31, 2024
(3.5) This was my eighth book by Norman and felt most similar to My Darling Detective and Next Life Might Be Kinder. Nothing much happens in the Nova Scotia fishing village of Parrsboro – until the night in April 1918 that Elizabeth Frame shoots dead her husband of 11 hours and throws the revolver into the blowhole of a beached whale. The story is a boon for Tobias Havenshaw, a journalist with the Halifax Evening Mail, and quickly becomes an obsession. It’s never a whodunit so much as a why as Toby reports on the trial and follows Elizabeth when she goes on the lam. The sordid case just keeps getting stranger, drawing in bigamy, illegitimate pregnancy, and so on.
But Norman never treats all this too seriously; it is almost a tragicomic foil to the more consequential matters of world war and an influenza pandemic, which soon has Atlantic Canada in its grip as well. Toby’s wife, Amelia, is a hospital surgeon operating on returning veterans. She’s so quietly capable she makes Toby look a dunce, and their everyday rapport and unusual road to parenthood in their late thirties are charming. I also enjoyed Norman’s Dickensian naming (Bevel Cousins, Dr. S. S. Particulate) and literary references: the title phrase is from Matthew Arnold, and L. M. Montgomery gets a mention.
No doubt Norman wrote this as a Covid response; the parallel with the Spanish flu has been irresistible for many. He really captures the feeling of living through a uniquely terrible world situation. However, I’m not sure this short novel will prove memorable. Such has been true for his other recent novels, which pale by comparison with The Bird Artist.
Originally published on my blog, Bookish Beck.
But Norman never treats all this too seriously; it is almost a tragicomic foil to the more consequential matters of world war and an influenza pandemic, which soon has Atlantic Canada in its grip as well. Toby’s wife, Amelia, is a hospital surgeon operating on returning veterans. She’s so quietly capable she makes Toby look a dunce, and their everyday rapport and unusual road to parenthood in their late thirties are charming. I also enjoyed Norman’s Dickensian naming (Bevel Cousins, Dr. S. S. Particulate) and literary references: the title phrase is from Matthew Arnold, and L. M. Montgomery gets a mention.
No doubt Norman wrote this as a Covid response; the parallel with the Spanish flu has been irresistible for many. He really captures the feeling of living through a uniquely terrible world situation. However, I’m not sure this short novel will prove memorable. Such has been true for his other recent novels, which pale by comparison with The Bird Artist.
Originally published on my blog, Bookish Beck.
November 28, 2024
Another small gem proving once again that less is more.
August 22, 2025
3.5. A satisfying, original novel set in Nova Scotia in 1918. The world is still at war, and the mechanical deaths of trenches and gas and howitzers is now abetted by the Spanish Flu. The narrator is a crime report for a Halifax newspaper. His wife is a surgeon, currently on the other side of the Atlantic working in the wartime hospitals. The event that sets the story in motion is dramatic: up in a small Nova Scotian fishing village a woman has murdered her husband — on their wedding night. The narrator is sent by his paper to cover the trial. The story, told through the narrator’s diary, recounts what happens at the trial and its curious aftermath. It’s categorized as a mystery — at least that’s where our library put it. There’s a mystery here — several of them, in fact — but it is best read as well crafted, engaging fiction.
Howard Norman is a gifted writer. His style is direct, uncluttered, and the manner of his storytelling graceful and direct. I believe I’m going to check out his other books.
Howard Norman is a gifted writer. His style is direct, uncluttered, and the manner of his storytelling graceful and direct. I believe I’m going to check out his other books.
December 5, 2024
During the last months of World War I, Toby Havenshaw, a Halifax Evening Mail crime reporter in his mid thirties, is sent by his editor to Parrsboro, Nova Scotia to attend a preliminary hearing for an unusual crime. On the night of their wedding, twenty-four-year-old Elizabeth Frame killed her husband Elliot, shot him three times with the military revolver he was inexplicably carrrying in his satchel, apparently because he declined to “come to the window” to see a massive whale that had beached not far from the inn where the couple were staying. The hearing, it turns out, is as bizarre as the crime: the stenographer, Peter Lear, was at Passchendaele, and is shell shocked, and the demolitionist, brought in to “remove” the whale’s carcass by explosives, is suicidal (he, too, was at the front). The plot of the novel mostly revolves the murderess’s flight from justice —with Lear, the stenographer—part way through the hearing. It also considers Elizabeth’s peculiar romance and prior marriage to a Bavarian music teacher almost two decades her senior, who was once held under suspicion of seditious activity. .
Norman is a very quirky writer, and I love his deadpan voice, philosophical musings (Heraclitus is big in this book, so is sleeplessness), and general marvelling at the strangeness of life and human behaviour. Having said that, I should add that a very significant part of this novel is dedicated to Toby’s marriage to a female surgeon who has served at the front. She, too, suffers from PTSD. And this is the issue for me: as much as I enjoyed reading about their relationship and delighted in their conversations, I was not convinced that this pair were of their time. They seemed far too modern in many ways. Spanish Flu also plays a big role in the novel (particularly in the story’s resolution); however, the epidemic isn’t convincingly handled. Amelia, Toby’s surgeon wife, says influenza is rampant at her hospital, but the Halifax papers aren’t reporting on it, and life seems—very strangely—to carry on almost entirely normally. The virus’s lethality basically seems bent to suit the plot.
I’ve really liked what I’ve read from Norman. It’s his point of view, sensibility, and unique take on the human condition that appeal to me. I’m quite willing to suspend disbelief and go along for the ride. In this case, however, I found it hard to overlook that Toby and Amelia seem to be a present-day couple dropped back in 1918. They didn’t quite fit.
Norman is a very quirky writer, and I love his deadpan voice, philosophical musings (Heraclitus is big in this book, so is sleeplessness), and general marvelling at the strangeness of life and human behaviour. Having said that, I should add that a very significant part of this novel is dedicated to Toby’s marriage to a female surgeon who has served at the front. She, too, suffers from PTSD. And this is the issue for me: as much as I enjoyed reading about their relationship and delighted in their conversations, I was not convinced that this pair were of their time. They seemed far too modern in many ways. Spanish Flu also plays a big role in the novel (particularly in the story’s resolution); however, the epidemic isn’t convincingly handled. Amelia, Toby’s surgeon wife, says influenza is rampant at her hospital, but the Halifax papers aren’t reporting on it, and life seems—very strangely—to carry on almost entirely normally. The virus’s lethality basically seems bent to suit the plot.
I’ve really liked what I’ve read from Norman. It’s his point of view, sensibility, and unique take on the human condition that appeal to me. I’m quite willing to suspend disbelief and go along for the ride. In this case, however, I found it hard to overlook that Toby and Amelia seem to be a present-day couple dropped back in 1918. They didn’t quite fit.
September 16, 2024
In the spring of 1918, during the last months of World War One, a huge dead whale washes up on the beach in Parrsboro, a little fishing village in Nova Scotia. Soon after, Elizabeth Frame murders her husband on their wedding night, walks down to the beach, and stuffs the murder weapon in the whale’s blowhole.
The story of what comes next is told from the perspective of newspaper reporter Toby Havenshaw. Elizabeth goes on the lam with court stenographer Peter Lear. It soon emerges that Elizabeth is pregnant. And that’s not her only secret.
My problem with this book is that Elizabeth never does anything for any discernable reason. After keeping very serious secrets right up until the start of her trial, she suddenly confesses everything in a matter-of-fact way that seems to imply that she doesn’t think she’s done anything wrong. Or at least that it was worth it. This young woman has just committed more than one pretty reprehensible act. But she is portrayed as just a sweet young thing who follows her whims. We never get a good sense of her, because we see her only through Havenshaw’s eyes.
Mixed in with Havenshaw’s search for Elizabeth is his reunion with his surgeon wife, who has just returned from gruesome service on the front in Europe. But that is treated as lightly as Elizabeth’s misdeeds. Havenshaw’s and Amelia’s perfect marriage goes right back to what it was before the war.
The story set-up and characters in this book are interesting, but they never develop any depth or even make any sense.
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Author of The Saint's Mistress
The story of what comes next is told from the perspective of newspaper reporter Toby Havenshaw. Elizabeth goes on the lam with court stenographer Peter Lear. It soon emerges that Elizabeth is pregnant. And that’s not her only secret.
My problem with this book is that Elizabeth never does anything for any discernable reason. After keeping very serious secrets right up until the start of her trial, she suddenly confesses everything in a matter-of-fact way that seems to imply that she doesn’t think she’s done anything wrong. Or at least that it was worth it. This young woman has just committed more than one pretty reprehensible act. But she is portrayed as just a sweet young thing who follows her whims. We never get a good sense of her, because we see her only through Havenshaw’s eyes.
Mixed in with Havenshaw’s search for Elizabeth is his reunion with his surgeon wife, who has just returned from gruesome service on the front in Europe. But that is treated as lightly as Elizabeth’s misdeeds. Havenshaw’s and Amelia’s perfect marriage goes right back to what it was before the war.
The story set-up and characters in this book are interesting, but they never develop any depth or even make any sense.
Like my reviews? Check out my blog
Author of The Saint's Mistress
August 10, 2024
We already know who the killer is in Come To the Window. There’s no mystery hiding within these pages. What’s perplexing is the motive. Why did Elizabeth Frame shoot and kill her husband on their wedding night? And why did she push the murder weapon into the blowhole of a beached whale?
I once heard someone say, “A book doesn’t owe us any answers,” and I’m pretty sure I agree. Perhaps there are times when I’m disappointed with what an author refuses to tell me. I can’t think of specific examples at this moment. But if what I want to know keeps me turning the page, and if I do not end up getting what I was looking for, it doesn’t mean what I do receive can’t be equally satisfying.
Despite its dark premise and bloody cover, Come to the Window is actually a quiet literary beauty. It isn’t about Elizabeth Frame as much as it is about Toby, a reporter investigating her case, and his wife, Amelia, a surgeon whose work is affected by The Great War and The Spanish Flu. The curious murder has an impact upon their lives, and it doesn’t really stand as a background player, but it isn’t the strongest thread that holds this tale together.
This is not a book of answers. It is a book of hope during hopeless times. Yes, hope, despite opening with a wedding night tragedy. It’s a book that brings the reader to unexpected places, with gasp-inducing surprises around almost every corner, and a tone of gentle intellect. All of this, you may find, is better than simply getting the answers you seek.
I am immensely grateful to Bibliolifestyle and W.W. Norton and Company for my copy. All opinions are my own.
I once heard someone say, “A book doesn’t owe us any answers,” and I’m pretty sure I agree. Perhaps there are times when I’m disappointed with what an author refuses to tell me. I can’t think of specific examples at this moment. But if what I want to know keeps me turning the page, and if I do not end up getting what I was looking for, it doesn’t mean what I do receive can’t be equally satisfying.
Despite its dark premise and bloody cover, Come to the Window is actually a quiet literary beauty. It isn’t about Elizabeth Frame as much as it is about Toby, a reporter investigating her case, and his wife, Amelia, a surgeon whose work is affected by The Great War and The Spanish Flu. The curious murder has an impact upon their lives, and it doesn’t really stand as a background player, but it isn’t the strongest thread that holds this tale together.
This is not a book of answers. It is a book of hope during hopeless times. Yes, hope, despite opening with a wedding night tragedy. It’s a book that brings the reader to unexpected places, with gasp-inducing surprises around almost every corner, and a tone of gentle intellect. All of this, you may find, is better than simply getting the answers you seek.
I am immensely grateful to Bibliolifestyle and W.W. Norton and Company for my copy. All opinions are my own.
March 30, 2025
Fascinating format, story, characters, Nova Scotia, you name it. WWI, Spanish Flu, strange goings-on. Held my interest, I think because of the excellent writing. I think I will look further into Mr Norman!
July 16, 2024
Bittersweet but with an uplifting ending and written with the author's distinctive style that keeps one turning pages until the end, Come to the Window starts with a beached whale and a murder trial which actually are quite related. Having their wedding night at a hotel with ocean views in a small Nova Scotia village, the bride Elizabeth Frame wakes in the middle of the night, sees the whale and calls for her husband to come to the window; when he refuses, she gets his army revolver (the story starts in 1918 during the war and the Spanish Flu epidemic) which is loaded and puts three bullets into him...
At the preliminary hearing she confesses the above - though things are more complicated of course - but then she seduces the young stenographer also recently returned from the war and profoundly marked by it too and goes on the lam with him while being pregnant to boot.
The narrator, a local crime reporter from Halifax assigned to cover this weird trial and whose wife, a surgeon, is also returning from the battlefields of France around this time is fascinated by the story and keeps trying to find out what happened with the fugitives...
There is of course quite a lot more going on involving war memories and guilt, the flu epidemic, prejudice against foreigners, the quirks of the legal system etc but the book moves fast and the ending is excellent.
Overall another entertaining offer from the author whose novels seldom miss.
At the preliminary hearing she confesses the above - though things are more complicated of course - but then she seduces the young stenographer also recently returned from the war and profoundly marked by it too and goes on the lam with him while being pregnant to boot.
The narrator, a local crime reporter from Halifax assigned to cover this weird trial and whose wife, a surgeon, is also returning from the battlefields of France around this time is fascinated by the story and keeps trying to find out what happened with the fugitives...
There is of course quite a lot more going on involving war memories and guilt, the flu epidemic, prejudice against foreigners, the quirks of the legal system etc but the book moves fast and the ending is excellent.
Overall another entertaining offer from the author whose novels seldom miss.
March 2, 2025
Ratings:
Writing 5
Story line 4
Characters 4
Impact/enjoyment 5
Overall rating: 4.5
Writing 5
Story line 4
Characters 4
Impact/enjoyment 5
Overall rating: 4.5
September 4, 2024
This book didn’t go where I thought it would, but that was the point. Sometimes things happen that are much worse than your expectations, but eventually you get through it and the future is okay, if not quite what you expected. I think this is the point that Norman is making with what appears to be an abrupt change in tone about halfway through. I didn’t like it at first, but then I understood. And it was indeed okay.
One thing that I don’t like about contemporary literary fiction, in general, is that writers seem to feel obliged to focus on topics of immediate, rather than timeless, interest. While Come to the Window is very much a book of the early 2020s, Normal addresses contemporary societal issues with subtlety, in part by distancing the setting to 1918. He doesn’t hit the reader over the head with concerns of the modern day, which is a nice change. By the time you’re done, it’s not hard to figure out what he’s getting at, but neither is it unduly entangled in zeitgeist.
Norman’s prose and dialog are excellent. Also, it’s nice to see a depiction of a married couple dealing with difficult external circumstances without their relationship reaching the brink of collapse. They have points of reasonable disagreement, but not acrimony or despair. We should all be so fortunate, and Norman shows us that perhaps we could be.
One thing that I don’t like about contemporary literary fiction, in general, is that writers seem to feel obliged to focus on topics of immediate, rather than timeless, interest. While Come to the Window is very much a book of the early 2020s, Normal addresses contemporary societal issues with subtlety, in part by distancing the setting to 1918. He doesn’t hit the reader over the head with concerns of the modern day, which is a nice change. By the time you’re done, it’s not hard to figure out what he’s getting at, but neither is it unduly entangled in zeitgeist.
Norman’s prose and dialog are excellent. Also, it’s nice to see a depiction of a married couple dealing with difficult external circumstances without their relationship reaching the brink of collapse. They have points of reasonable disagreement, but not acrimony or despair. We should all be so fortunate, and Norman shows us that perhaps we could be.
July 11, 2024
Beautiful story.
Thank you, Partner @bibliolifestyle @w.w.norton.
It’s hard for me to describe this book because it has different components to it. Mystery, historical fiction of war and Spanish influenza, murder, loss and beached whale.
The writing is absolutely beautiful. It is told as it’s the diary of Toby, a newspaper reporter. It starts as he is covering the court room trial of Elizabeth Frame, who shot and killed her husband on their wedding night.
It also follows Toby and his wife, Amelia. She is a surgeon who is changed from her time in war. While Toby is immersed in the case with Elizabeth, Amelia tries to live with the horrors of war and the epidemic.
Thank you, Partner @bibliolifestyle @w.w.norton.
It’s hard for me to describe this book because it has different components to it. Mystery, historical fiction of war and Spanish influenza, murder, loss and beached whale.
The writing is absolutely beautiful. It is told as it’s the diary of Toby, a newspaper reporter. It starts as he is covering the court room trial of Elizabeth Frame, who shot and killed her husband on their wedding night.
It also follows Toby and his wife, Amelia. She is a surgeon who is changed from her time in war. While Toby is immersed in the case with Elizabeth, Amelia tries to live with the horrors of war and the epidemic.
November 17, 2025
First book I have ever DNFed. I just couldn't do it anymore. Not my cup of tea
September 2, 2024
This was an interesting book. A quick read, being under 200 pages. Although not a beach read, I enjoyed reading it by the pool.
There’s a lot in this book about shell shock and PTSD. So many suffered thanks to the First World War and the Spanish Flu. I spent a lot of time trying to get into Elizabeth’s head, wondering what possessed her to do the things that she did, manipulating the men in her life, murder and running from the law. Toby tells the story, but I was more intrigued by his wife, Amelia. A woman as a surgeon in the early 20th century, such an uncommon thing. She also suffered from PTSD thanks to her time treating soldiers and helping with the Spanish Flu.
Thank you Bibliolifestyle and W.W. Norton for my gifted copy of this book.
There’s a lot in this book about shell shock and PTSD. So many suffered thanks to the First World War and the Spanish Flu. I spent a lot of time trying to get into Elizabeth’s head, wondering what possessed her to do the things that she did, manipulating the men in her life, murder and running from the law. Toby tells the story, but I was more intrigued by his wife, Amelia. A woman as a surgeon in the early 20th century, such an uncommon thing. She also suffered from PTSD thanks to her time treating soldiers and helping with the Spanish Flu.
Thank you Bibliolifestyle and W.W. Norton for my gifted copy of this book.
November 23, 2024
There were some wonderful elements to this book. And some strange elements. Sadness and mystery. For me, however, I had a hard time sorting through all the bits and pieces to make sense of where the storyline was going. I still give it 3 stars, it’s not badly written and it has some interesting and strong characters.
March 20, 2025
If there are mysteries here (there really aren’t), they are definitely left unresolved by the end of the novel. Most of the characters remain ciphers in terms of their actions…and all the overdone symbolism in the world can’t solve that problem. There’s a lot of compelling atmosphere here, and the setting, both time and place, is interestingly and competently rendered. But the novel aims higher than what it ultimately achieves.
August 15, 2024
It was ok. Nice prose.
December 28, 2024
This was just okay.
March 18, 2025
Quick, easy read. Gave me Agatha Christie vibes with some drama. Was simple and straightforward, relaxing, I liked it :)
April 15, 2025
This is a real little gem of a book. Its seeming simplicity is elegant and sophisticated.
June 11, 2025
Howard Norman tales of small town Nova Scotia focus on the conflict between the town’s residents and always include a nautical experience. In this case, a young woman is on trial for murdering her newlywed husband. Her trial testimony shuts down the defense when she testifies that she had married another man shortly before this second wedding. I guess that gives a new meaning to shotgun wedding. Meanwhile a large whale died beached on the coastline and is beginning to decompose. The town hires a demolition expert to blow up the decaying whale body. It’s a hilarious story that is told from the perspective of an older couple that remind me of Nick and Nora in The Thin Man.
July 9, 2024
Small town scandal against the backdrop of world war and an international epidemic.
In April of 1918, in the small fishing village of Parrsboro in Nova Scotia, two astounding events happen more or less simultaneously. A large dead whale washes up on the beach, and a lovely young woman named Elizabeth Frame shoots and kills Everett Dewis, the man she had married some eleven hours earlier. As she testifies in her trial held in the local inn, she arose from the bed in their room at the top of the Ottawa House that night to gaze at the beached whale, and encouraged her husband to come to the window and view it as well. When he would not, she reached into his bag, grabbed his gun and shot him. Newspaper reporter Toby Havenshaw is sent by his editor at the Evening Mail to report on the proceedings, which only get stranger. Elizabeth, it is discovered, had married another man in Halifax (a Bavarian named Oscar Asch) shortly before her marriage to Everett, and is with child. The trial is interrupted first by a gaffe made by Peter Lear, the newly-minted court stenographer recently returned from serving overseas and suffering from bouts of shell shock, and then by a catastrophic explosion by the demolitionist hired to blow up the whale who (suffering himself from the aftereffects of war) decided to kill himself at the same time. In the chaos of that moment Elizabeth is allowed to escape in the company of Peter Lear. Toby returns to Halifax, at the same time as does his wife, a surgeon who has been doing wartime work in Europe and finds herself changed by her experiences there. The specter of the deadly influenza killing people all over the world is also hovering nearby. Toby remains fascinated by Elizabeth’s case and now her escape, and finds that his life will remain entwined in it as his career follows new paths, his wife struggles to put the horrors she witnessed behind her, and the epidemic sweeps through their corner of the world.
The writing of author Howard Norman, whose earlier novel The Bird Artist is one of my favorite novels, has a gentle elegance to it. His characters are everyday people whose lives unfold with dignity and compassion, and who live on in the reader’s memory beyond the last page. In a book with an adulterous murderer who sticks the gun she used to kill her husband in the blowhole of a whale, that character is certainly memorable, but so are Toby and his wife Amelia, a loving and well-matched couple who do their best to hold on to hope and happiness in a world full of war, death, and casual violence. As readers who have ourselves recently lived through a worldwide pandemic, the descriptions of precautions taken back in 1918 are eerily familiar, and the anti-immigrant zealotry and ever-present thoughts of war are echoed in today’s world as well. Do not be fooled by the relatively small size of the book, it is powerful and wise and it was a genuine pleasure to immerse myself in the prose. Readers of Kent Haruf, RIchard Ford and E. Annie Proulx will be well-pleased should they treat themselves to a copy of Come to the Window. Many thanks to NetGalley and W. W. Norton & Company for allowing me early access to this beautiful story.
In April of 1918, in the small fishing village of Parrsboro in Nova Scotia, two astounding events happen more or less simultaneously. A large dead whale washes up on the beach, and a lovely young woman named Elizabeth Frame shoots and kills Everett Dewis, the man she had married some eleven hours earlier. As she testifies in her trial held in the local inn, she arose from the bed in their room at the top of the Ottawa House that night to gaze at the beached whale, and encouraged her husband to come to the window and view it as well. When he would not, she reached into his bag, grabbed his gun and shot him. Newspaper reporter Toby Havenshaw is sent by his editor at the Evening Mail to report on the proceedings, which only get stranger. Elizabeth, it is discovered, had married another man in Halifax (a Bavarian named Oscar Asch) shortly before her marriage to Everett, and is with child. The trial is interrupted first by a gaffe made by Peter Lear, the newly-minted court stenographer recently returned from serving overseas and suffering from bouts of shell shock, and then by a catastrophic explosion by the demolitionist hired to blow up the whale who (suffering himself from the aftereffects of war) decided to kill himself at the same time. In the chaos of that moment Elizabeth is allowed to escape in the company of Peter Lear. Toby returns to Halifax, at the same time as does his wife, a surgeon who has been doing wartime work in Europe and finds herself changed by her experiences there. The specter of the deadly influenza killing people all over the world is also hovering nearby. Toby remains fascinated by Elizabeth’s case and now her escape, and finds that his life will remain entwined in it as his career follows new paths, his wife struggles to put the horrors she witnessed behind her, and the epidemic sweeps through their corner of the world.
The writing of author Howard Norman, whose earlier novel The Bird Artist is one of my favorite novels, has a gentle elegance to it. His characters are everyday people whose lives unfold with dignity and compassion, and who live on in the reader’s memory beyond the last page. In a book with an adulterous murderer who sticks the gun she used to kill her husband in the blowhole of a whale, that character is certainly memorable, but so are Toby and his wife Amelia, a loving and well-matched couple who do their best to hold on to hope and happiness in a world full of war, death, and casual violence. As readers who have ourselves recently lived through a worldwide pandemic, the descriptions of precautions taken back in 1918 are eerily familiar, and the anti-immigrant zealotry and ever-present thoughts of war are echoed in today’s world as well. Do not be fooled by the relatively small size of the book, it is powerful and wise and it was a genuine pleasure to immerse myself in the prose. Readers of Kent Haruf, RIchard Ford and E. Annie Proulx will be well-pleased should they treat themselves to a copy of Come to the Window. Many thanks to NetGalley and W. W. Norton & Company for allowing me early access to this beautiful story.
March 19, 2024
Trying to get a full handle on Howard Norman’s “Come to the Window” is as slippery a proposition as trying to get a firm grasp on the poem from which the novel’s title is taken, Matthew Arnold's classic “Dover Beach.”
“Come to the window,” Arnold’s narrator exhorts the reader or perhaps a lover, with the look that the window affords of calm sea and tranquil bay, though no sooner is the exhortation made than it’s followed by stanzas of strife and confusion, ending with the disturbing image of "a darkling plain … where ignorant armies clash by night.”
The image, in reality, of the terrain of Norman’s novel, or at least that of the killing fields across the way from the immediate Nova Scotia location, where the horror of the war for residents mourning their losses is heightened by the impact of the so-called Spanish flu, whose lethality competed with that of the war and in fact claims the life of one of the novel’s principals.
Though for all the ever-present war and flu, they’re not front and center in the novel, whose immediate focus is the mystery of why a woman puts three bullets into her groom on her wedding night – or more precisely, into one of her husbands, with her being married twice. And indeed the novel opens with her trial, which newspaper reporter Toby Havenshaw has been dispatched to cover, with the bizarreness of the situation heightened by a whale that has washed ashore and into whose blowhole the accused has stashed her gun.
Enough, just those ingredients, along with the war and the flu in the background, to make for a compelling read, but the action is further intensified when the accused, who’s not been incarcerated, takes off with the court stenographer, a veteran who has been traumatized by what he endured in the war. And not just he who has been traumatized, but Toby’s wife, Amelia, a surgeon who has ministered enough to the war’s dead and dying to tell Toby upon her return that she's been “changed” by it.
Saying more would give away too much, just suffice to say that in addition to the reference to Arnold’s poem, there are other literary references suggesting larger concerns of the novel, including, with the whale, “Moby Dick,” and, with the name of the stenographer being Lear, perhaps Shakespeare. Further, with the last name of the accused being Frame and the word’s alternative meanings of enclosure or unjust accusation, there are hints of larger concerns there as well. But to my mind those possible concerns, if they're in fact there, aren’t as fully realized as they might have been, given the novel's brevity, which also made for some occasional disjointedness for me. Also, it was unclear to me at times, with an absence of stated attribution, who was speaking.
Still, an estimable accomplishment, Norman’s novel, which with its depiction of the flu had me reflecting on how thankful Amelia and the medical establishment back then would have been for a vaccine like the one developed in our time for Covid, whose tragedy was compounded by how so many of the deaths could have been prevented but for intransigent anti-vaccine stupidity.
“Come to the window,” Arnold’s narrator exhorts the reader or perhaps a lover, with the look that the window affords of calm sea and tranquil bay, though no sooner is the exhortation made than it’s followed by stanzas of strife and confusion, ending with the disturbing image of "a darkling plain … where ignorant armies clash by night.”
The image, in reality, of the terrain of Norman’s novel, or at least that of the killing fields across the way from the immediate Nova Scotia location, where the horror of the war for residents mourning their losses is heightened by the impact of the so-called Spanish flu, whose lethality competed with that of the war and in fact claims the life of one of the novel’s principals.
Though for all the ever-present war and flu, they’re not front and center in the novel, whose immediate focus is the mystery of why a woman puts three bullets into her groom on her wedding night – or more precisely, into one of her husbands, with her being married twice. And indeed the novel opens with her trial, which newspaper reporter Toby Havenshaw has been dispatched to cover, with the bizarreness of the situation heightened by a whale that has washed ashore and into whose blowhole the accused has stashed her gun.
Enough, just those ingredients, along with the war and the flu in the background, to make for a compelling read, but the action is further intensified when the accused, who’s not been incarcerated, takes off with the court stenographer, a veteran who has been traumatized by what he endured in the war. And not just he who has been traumatized, but Toby’s wife, Amelia, a surgeon who has ministered enough to the war’s dead and dying to tell Toby upon her return that she's been “changed” by it.
Saying more would give away too much, just suffice to say that in addition to the reference to Arnold’s poem, there are other literary references suggesting larger concerns of the novel, including, with the whale, “Moby Dick,” and, with the name of the stenographer being Lear, perhaps Shakespeare. Further, with the last name of the accused being Frame and the word’s alternative meanings of enclosure or unjust accusation, there are hints of larger concerns there as well. But to my mind those possible concerns, if they're in fact there, aren’t as fully realized as they might have been, given the novel's brevity, which also made for some occasional disjointedness for me. Also, it was unclear to me at times, with an absence of stated attribution, who was speaking.
Still, an estimable accomplishment, Norman’s novel, which with its depiction of the flu had me reflecting on how thankful Amelia and the medical establishment back then would have been for a vaccine like the one developed in our time for Covid, whose tragedy was compounded by how so many of the deaths could have been prevented but for intransigent anti-vaccine stupidity.
March 24, 2024
In the dimly lit St. George's Anglican Church, you can observe the joy at the baptismal fount, the soft whispers of newlyweds exchanging vows, and the hard grief alongside the mourners shaken by the deadly outreach of the Spanish Flu. There are never any guarantees in life. Not ever.
It's 1918 in the small village of Parrsboro, Nova Scotia. World War I adds another dimension. There are the returning soldiers fearful of closing their eyes at night. And then there are those in which reality leans heavily on the eyelids of those who will never return. 1918 will also bring about another impact never expected nor prepared for.
Elizabeth Frame, just twenty-four, beckons in the night to her newlywed husband, Everett: "Darling, come to the window." She spots an enormous beached whale dying in the sands in the moonlight. Everett refuses to come to the window and rolls over rather for sleep. It will be the last thing that this young man will ever do. Elizabeth will be arrested for his murder.
Howard Norman presents a novel in a continuous curving motion. "A collapse of the spirit" threads its way throughout these pages. And yet, in spite of the dread constantly delivered in 1918, there is a flicker of hope worn on the sleeve of Toby Havenshaw, a journalist for the Halifax Evening Mail. He's there to sit in the courtroom during the trial of Elizabeth Frame. At first, he's as perplexed as the rest of the attendees. No one can figure out the actions of Elizabeth who speaks in circles and quotes. Not even her mother, Elsbeth, who sits stoically behind her daughter.
Howard Norman's Come to the Window (Just check out the beautifully rendered cover) is a puzzle box of characters. The individuals in the courtroom sit and stare. "They've most of them gone inward." Emotions have been spent while living through the year of 1918. Facing Elizabeth is almost a daunting task.
But the character of Toby Havenshaw makes you believe in humanity once again. Norman carves out the strength of Toby and his wife, Amelia, a surgeon who has spent most of the year in France and Belgium under the dire circumstances of war. Their easiness of soft banter and genuine kindness adds so much to this remarkable novel. Howard Norman reminds us that the tragedies of life are also the stepping stones to greater things to come.
I received a copy of this book through NetGalley for an honest review. My thanks to W.W. Norton & Company and to the talented Howard Norman for the opportunity.
It's 1918 in the small village of Parrsboro, Nova Scotia. World War I adds another dimension. There are the returning soldiers fearful of closing their eyes at night. And then there are those in which reality leans heavily on the eyelids of those who will never return. 1918 will also bring about another impact never expected nor prepared for.
Elizabeth Frame, just twenty-four, beckons in the night to her newlywed husband, Everett: "Darling, come to the window." She spots an enormous beached whale dying in the sands in the moonlight. Everett refuses to come to the window and rolls over rather for sleep. It will be the last thing that this young man will ever do. Elizabeth will be arrested for his murder.
Howard Norman presents a novel in a continuous curving motion. "A collapse of the spirit" threads its way throughout these pages. And yet, in spite of the dread constantly delivered in 1918, there is a flicker of hope worn on the sleeve of Toby Havenshaw, a journalist for the Halifax Evening Mail. He's there to sit in the courtroom during the trial of Elizabeth Frame. At first, he's as perplexed as the rest of the attendees. No one can figure out the actions of Elizabeth who speaks in circles and quotes. Not even her mother, Elsbeth, who sits stoically behind her daughter.
Howard Norman's Come to the Window (Just check out the beautifully rendered cover) is a puzzle box of characters. The individuals in the courtroom sit and stare. "They've most of them gone inward." Emotions have been spent while living through the year of 1918. Facing Elizabeth is almost a daunting task.
But the character of Toby Havenshaw makes you believe in humanity once again. Norman carves out the strength of Toby and his wife, Amelia, a surgeon who has spent most of the year in France and Belgium under the dire circumstances of war. Their easiness of soft banter and genuine kindness adds so much to this remarkable novel. Howard Norman reminds us that the tragedies of life are also the stepping stones to greater things to come.
I received a copy of this book through NetGalley for an honest review. My thanks to W.W. Norton & Company and to the talented Howard Norman for the opportunity.
November 18, 2024
This novel, set in Nova Scotia, begins in 1918 in the last year of World War I as the Spanish flu begins its deadly rampage across the province. The narrator is Toby Havenshaw, a court reporter sent to Parrsboro for the trial of Elizabeth Frame. She admits to killing her husband on their wedding night and pushing the murder weapon into the blowhole of a beached whale. She makes more surprising revelations, but the trial is cut short when she escapes with Peter Lear, the court stenographer.
Though he returns to Halifax, Toby becomes almost obsessed with following Elizabeth and Peter. He tries to understand Elizabeth’s motives and Peter’s as well, especially after he learns more about Elizabeth’s past. In the end, Toby’s life becomes inextricably entwined with Elizabeth’s.
The novel examines the effects of trauma. People suffer trauma because of the actions and deaths of loved ones. There’s the pandemic, which will have the reader drawing parallels to the COVID-19 pandemic. People not only maintain physical distance but also become distrustful. The war is still waging and there are several characters who are suffering from PTSD, Peter Lear and the man given the job of detonating the whale’s carcass being two obvious examples. Amelia, Toby’s wife, is a surgeon who has returned from France, and she speaks openly about being changed by the horrors she witnessed.
What stands out for me is Toby and Amelia’s relationship. The two so obviously love and support each other. In a book with little humour, there is some in their exchanges. I correctly guessed how events would come together for the couple. If there is a message in the book, it’s that love can help people navigate through and recover from difficult times.
The title comes from Matthew Arnold’s poem “Dover Beach” which, like the novel, speaks of a time “Swept with confused alarms of struggle and flight, / Where ignorant armies clash by night.” The speaker pleads, “Ah, love, let us be true / To one another!” and that seems to be Toby and Amelia’s response to the chaos that surrounds them.
At just over 200 pages, this is not a long novel, but it speaks movingly about the human condition. In the end it is hopeful in a way not expected given the circumstances.
Please check out my reader's blog (https://schatjesshelves.blogspot.com/) or substack (https://doreenyakabuski.substack.com/) for over 1,100 of my book reviews.
Though he returns to Halifax, Toby becomes almost obsessed with following Elizabeth and Peter. He tries to understand Elizabeth’s motives and Peter’s as well, especially after he learns more about Elizabeth’s past. In the end, Toby’s life becomes inextricably entwined with Elizabeth’s.
The novel examines the effects of trauma. People suffer trauma because of the actions and deaths of loved ones. There’s the pandemic, which will have the reader drawing parallels to the COVID-19 pandemic. People not only maintain physical distance but also become distrustful. The war is still waging and there are several characters who are suffering from PTSD, Peter Lear and the man given the job of detonating the whale’s carcass being two obvious examples. Amelia, Toby’s wife, is a surgeon who has returned from France, and she speaks openly about being changed by the horrors she witnessed.
What stands out for me is Toby and Amelia’s relationship. The two so obviously love and support each other. In a book with little humour, there is some in their exchanges. I correctly guessed how events would come together for the couple. If there is a message in the book, it’s that love can help people navigate through and recover from difficult times.
The title comes from Matthew Arnold’s poem “Dover Beach” which, like the novel, speaks of a time “Swept with confused alarms of struggle and flight, / Where ignorant armies clash by night.” The speaker pleads, “Ah, love, let us be true / To one another!” and that seems to be Toby and Amelia’s response to the chaos that surrounds them.
At just over 200 pages, this is not a long novel, but it speaks movingly about the human condition. In the end it is hopeful in a way not expected given the circumstances.
Please check out my reader's blog (https://schatjesshelves.blogspot.com/) or substack (https://doreenyakabuski.substack.com/) for over 1,100 of my book reviews.
November 18, 2025
This book has a brilliant structural premise… and an absolutely unremarkable story.
Norman builds the entire novel around clever devices — newspaper headlines, clipped dialogue, sparse narration, and a style that reads almost like a screenplay with all the emotional direction deleted. It feels like it’s setting up something: a twist, a reveal, a layer of satire, a psychological angle, anything.
Instead, what you actually get is a very straightforward, emotionally muted tale of a couple adopting a baby with a complicated past. That’s it. No twist. No deeper meaning. No payoff hidden between the lines. Just a very quiet domestic story wrapped in the scaffolding of a much more ambitious novel.
The writing style is the biggest culprit. Almost every conversation is a series of single-line exchanges with zero description between them. No facial expressions. No physical cues. No internal thoughts. No emotional temperature. Just dialogue floating in space like a deposition transcript. The effect is sterile, distant, and soporific. Every time I picked it up, I nodded off — not because I was tired, but because the book offers nothing to anchor the human emotion it keeps hinting at.
And that’s the problem:
The structure promises complexity, but the plot delivers simplicity.
The tone suggests tension, but the story resolves into mildness.
The style implies hidden layers, but there aren’t any.
It’s all setup with very little delivery.
I can respect what the author was trying to do — the concept truly is clever, and the occasional newspaper headlines are a fun narrative flourish — but the emotional flatness and lack of payoff left me more confused than moved.
If the author had leaned into satire, or delivered a real twist, or played with unreliable narration, this could’ve been stellar. As it stands, it’s a slow, numb little story wearing the costume of a bigger one.
Clever idea. Dull execution. Not a reread, not for me.
Norman builds the entire novel around clever devices — newspaper headlines, clipped dialogue, sparse narration, and a style that reads almost like a screenplay with all the emotional direction deleted. It feels like it’s setting up something: a twist, a reveal, a layer of satire, a psychological angle, anything.
Instead, what you actually get is a very straightforward, emotionally muted tale of a couple adopting a baby with a complicated past. That’s it. No twist. No deeper meaning. No payoff hidden between the lines. Just a very quiet domestic story wrapped in the scaffolding of a much more ambitious novel.
The writing style is the biggest culprit. Almost every conversation is a series of single-line exchanges with zero description between them. No facial expressions. No physical cues. No internal thoughts. No emotional temperature. Just dialogue floating in space like a deposition transcript. The effect is sterile, distant, and soporific. Every time I picked it up, I nodded off — not because I was tired, but because the book offers nothing to anchor the human emotion it keeps hinting at.
And that’s the problem:
The structure promises complexity, but the plot delivers simplicity.
The tone suggests tension, but the story resolves into mildness.
The style implies hidden layers, but there aren’t any.
It’s all setup with very little delivery.
I can respect what the author was trying to do — the concept truly is clever, and the occasional newspaper headlines are a fun narrative flourish — but the emotional flatness and lack of payoff left me more confused than moved.
If the author had leaned into satire, or delivered a real twist, or played with unreliable narration, this could’ve been stellar. As it stands, it’s a slow, numb little story wearing the costume of a bigger one.
Clever idea. Dull execution. Not a reread, not for me.
July 22, 2024
What a pleasure to enter Howard Norman's fictional world again! I don't usually like historical novels but this one worked for me.
The setting is Canada, 1918. Toby, a crime reporter, is sent to a small town where Elizabeth Frame has just murdered her husband- on her wedding night - after which crime she sauntered over to the beached whale she could see from their hotel window, and shoved the gun into the dead animal's blow hole.
What an unusual story - and what an unusual defendant! The second day of the trial there is a major tragedy in town, and Elizabeth escapes, together with the court stenographer, Peter. Fugitives on the lam!
Well, Toby can't care too much, because his wife Amelia, a surgeon, has just returned from a field hospital in France and has definitely been changed by what she experienced there. But the story is not yet at an end, and from time to time Toby hears from the fugitives. In the meantime, the Spanish flu is raging.
Beautifully written, very moving without sentimentality. I couldn't help but wonder if the background of the Spanish flu was the author's response to COVID - his "COVID novel", one pandemic removed. The plight of shell-shocked WWI veterans (such as the fugitive stenographer, Peter) is shown without melodrama. I recognized the typical Howard Norman themes : the setting in Halifax, pivotal scenes taking place in hotels and inns, the dramatic, apparently impulsive event that will affect lives for decades to come. The writing style, as always with this author, is deceptively simple. The dialog is rendered without embellishments, and the way his characters converse with each other is rather lapidary - all of which are style elements that I enjoy.
I hope that Howard Norman, twice nominated for a National Book Award, finally wins with this book!
The setting is Canada, 1918. Toby, a crime reporter, is sent to a small town where Elizabeth Frame has just murdered her husband- on her wedding night - after which crime she sauntered over to the beached whale she could see from their hotel window, and shoved the gun into the dead animal's blow hole.
What an unusual story - and what an unusual defendant! The second day of the trial there is a major tragedy in town, and Elizabeth escapes, together with the court stenographer, Peter. Fugitives on the lam!
Well, Toby can't care too much, because his wife Amelia, a surgeon, has just returned from a field hospital in France and has definitely been changed by what she experienced there. But the story is not yet at an end, and from time to time Toby hears from the fugitives. In the meantime, the Spanish flu is raging.
Beautifully written, very moving without sentimentality. I couldn't help but wonder if the background of the Spanish flu was the author's response to COVID - his "COVID novel", one pandemic removed. The plight of shell-shocked WWI veterans (such as the fugitive stenographer, Peter) is shown without melodrama. I recognized the typical Howard Norman themes : the setting in Halifax, pivotal scenes taking place in hotels and inns, the dramatic, apparently impulsive event that will affect lives for decades to come. The writing style, as always with this author, is deceptively simple. The dialog is rendered without embellishments, and the way his characters converse with each other is rather lapidary - all of which are style elements that I enjoy.
I hope that Howard Norman, twice nominated for a National Book Award, finally wins with this book!
January 6, 2025
In a small outport town in Nova Scotia in the last months of World War I a dead whale is stranded on the shoreline. In a hotel in town Elizabeth Frame shoots her husband on their wedding night. She then goes to the whale carcass and shoots the revolver into its blowhole. Halifax newspaper reporter Toby Havenshaw is dispatched to cover the trial. Though there is no doubt of Elizabeth's guilt, Toby is determined to uncover her motive. Things get more complicated when Elizabeth runs off with the court stenographer, a shell-shocked veteran of the war. Toby's wife Amelia (a surgeon in Halifax returned from the European front) is his sounding-board, anchor, and soulmate through all of this.
The narration is excerpts from Toby's reporter's journal, told with bemusement and irony. His turns of phrase and observations are wonderful. "There are missed opportunities to be a better person. To dignify an undignified situation. You miss one of these, it doesn't come back." (p. 34)
"A person sizes up each situation as it comes, and you're either charitable toward it or you aren't charitable." (p. 118) "Wherever you sit, so sit all the insistences of fate. Still, the moments [hold] promise of a full life." (p. 190)
One of the Christian Science Monitor's best books of 2024, and rightly so.
"
The narration is excerpts from Toby's reporter's journal, told with bemusement and irony. His turns of phrase and observations are wonderful. "There are missed opportunities to be a better person. To dignify an undignified situation. You miss one of these, it doesn't come back." (p. 34)
"A person sizes up each situation as it comes, and you're either charitable toward it or you aren't charitable." (p. 118) "Wherever you sit, so sit all the insistences of fate. Still, the moments [hold] promise of a full life." (p. 190)
One of the Christian Science Monitor's best books of 2024, and rightly so.
"
April 28, 2024
There is no mystery except why the murder was committed in the first place. It is a book that looks at tragedy with an eye for humor. It's a simple book of people, and why they do what they do. It is a love story wrapped up in dilemma and humanity. If you are looking for a murder mystery, this book is not for you; however, if you are looking for a book that explores what people endure and survive in a time of war and a time of plague you have found your book. I did find the parallels to this time of the Spanish Influenza (simply named because Spain was the first to recognize it rather than being the cause) and this era of a covid pandemic, an eye-opening and sad comparison. The panic is similar, the spread of disease and distrust very much the same, and the resulting behavior of the human race spot on. The story of one woman and what she did - a gruesome death that more or less goes unexplained - is almost forgiven, and the man who helped her although he knew she was guilty, kept my attention from beginning to the end. It is a quick read but a read that makes one think beyond the surface.
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