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Throw Down Your Shadows
Sixteen-year-old Winnie is a creature of habit, a lover of ritual and stability. If she had her way, not much would change. But when a new family moves to town, Winnie and her three best friends & boys;find themselves changing quickly and dramatically to impress Caleb, their strange and charismatic new companion. Under Caleb's influence, Winnie and her friends test boundaries, flirt with danger, and in the end, illuminate darkness within each other and themselves.
Following a before and after structure that pivots around a mysterious and devastating fire at a local winery, Throw Down Your Shadows is a compelling exploration of the contours of young friendship and the development of powerful new appetites.
Fiction for candid portrayals of the young female experience as complex and provocative, and announces a bold new voice in Canadian fiction.
Following a before and after structure that pivots around a mysterious and devastating fire at a local winery, Throw Down Your Shadows is a compelling exploration of the contours of young friendship and the development of powerful new appetites.
Fiction for candid portrayals of the young female experience as complex and provocative, and announces a bold new voice in Canadian fiction.
272 pages, Paperback
Published June 30, 2020
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90 people want to read
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Displaying 1 - 10 of 10 reviews
March 29, 2021
This book follows the coming of age of Winnie, whose everything is nestled in Annapolis Valley. This is Winnie's childhood haven, rural and riverside, but where she also navigates the many tributaries of young adulthood along with three others: stargazer Tom, compass Jake and follower Sam.
Each one of their summers is spent doing the same things in the same places. But new and dangerous things arrive in the form of one more- manipulator Caleb (picture seventeen-year-old Iago with less … murderous motives), and the balanced rhythms of the quartet are ever changed…
I had a wonderful time with Throw Down Your Shadows - its retrospective and alternating chronology give the reader an opportunity to piece together the narrative timeline in an unconventional yet compelling manner. Anchoring each chapter to either ‘before’ or ’after’ the central, smouldering plot point immediately hooked my attention and continued holding it throughout. Moreover, even though I was always aware of this plot anchor whilst reading, the whole truth of it still managed to catch me off guard when it was revealed in its entirety. I also enjoyed how far ‘after’ we travel with Winnie, following her through her late teens through to her late twenties.
Because of this narrative pacing, I found myself easily immersed in both setting and story. I’ve never stepped foot in Canada however I feel as though I’ve lived a lifetime there because of the short time I’ve shared with Winnie. Not only does the environment often feel like a character itself, but because of the unique narrative structure through which it is built, you become very connected to Winnie. Her personality shines through the use of parenthesis (quirky) and her succinct yet beautiful observations of characters and context. This fleshed out a curious, yet confident female protagonist whose strength and solitude I grew to admire.
When reading this novel, I couldn’t think of one particular book that I could exactly parallel it with, which speaks volumes to its originality and how much I valued this. If you combined together Jim Crace’s Harvest with dashes of Gilmore Girls and Stiefvater’s Raven Boys you can begin imagining the atmosphere of this book. Although Throw Down Your Shadows stands strong as a new, highly recommended favourite of mine, it if you did enjoy any of these any I highly suggest picking it up!
Each one of their summers is spent doing the same things in the same places. But new and dangerous things arrive in the form of one more- manipulator Caleb (picture seventeen-year-old Iago with less … murderous motives), and the balanced rhythms of the quartet are ever changed…
I had a wonderful time with Throw Down Your Shadows - its retrospective and alternating chronology give the reader an opportunity to piece together the narrative timeline in an unconventional yet compelling manner. Anchoring each chapter to either ‘before’ or ’after’ the central, smouldering plot point immediately hooked my attention and continued holding it throughout. Moreover, even though I was always aware of this plot anchor whilst reading, the whole truth of it still managed to catch me off guard when it was revealed in its entirety. I also enjoyed how far ‘after’ we travel with Winnie, following her through her late teens through to her late twenties.
Because of this narrative pacing, I found myself easily immersed in both setting and story. I’ve never stepped foot in Canada however I feel as though I’ve lived a lifetime there because of the short time I’ve shared with Winnie. Not only does the environment often feel like a character itself, but because of the unique narrative structure through which it is built, you become very connected to Winnie. Her personality shines through the use of parenthesis (quirky) and her succinct yet beautiful observations of characters and context. This fleshed out a curious, yet confident female protagonist whose strength and solitude I grew to admire.
When reading this novel, I couldn’t think of one particular book that I could exactly parallel it with, which speaks volumes to its originality and how much I valued this. If you combined together Jim Crace’s Harvest with dashes of Gilmore Girls and Stiefvater’s Raven Boys you can begin imagining the atmosphere of this book. Although Throw Down Your Shadows stands strong as a new, highly recommended favourite of mine, it if you did enjoy any of these any I highly suggest picking it up!
June 28, 2020
*ARC provided via #netgalley
Winnie is a high schooler who lives in a small town nestled in the Nova Scotian valley. She has three best friends-Tom, Sam, and Jake. They are a close group who do everything together and feel superior to their fellow classmates, and everyone seems to be satisfied with this arrangement. When an alluring new student moves to town and befriends their group, Winnie struggles to deal with the growing fissures in her relationship with the boys.
It’s not always easy for adult authors to capture the complex essence of teenage characters, but Deborah Hemming did just that; taking us into the mind and heart of Winnie. Her fears, her desires, her faults were laid bare. I remember clearly feeling the same possessiveness and worry that Winnie felt for her friends when I was a teenager, and it’s not an emotion regarding teen characters I have read about in a long time. I enjoyed the alternating chronology and felt it added suspense and depth to the story. There is also a big reveal within that caught me completely by surprise.
The author not only has a way with character descriptions but the scenery as well. She paints us a rich and inviting portrait of an area I have only seen on a map. There are also delectable descriptions of various wines that I wished I could sip and savor as I read along.
Winnie is a high schooler who lives in a small town nestled in the Nova Scotian valley. She has three best friends-Tom, Sam, and Jake. They are a close group who do everything together and feel superior to their fellow classmates, and everyone seems to be satisfied with this arrangement. When an alluring new student moves to town and befriends their group, Winnie struggles to deal with the growing fissures in her relationship with the boys.
It’s not always easy for adult authors to capture the complex essence of teenage characters, but Deborah Hemming did just that; taking us into the mind and heart of Winnie. Her fears, her desires, her faults were laid bare. I remember clearly feeling the same possessiveness and worry that Winnie felt for her friends when I was a teenager, and it’s not an emotion regarding teen characters I have read about in a long time. I enjoyed the alternating chronology and felt it added suspense and depth to the story. There is also a big reveal within that caught me completely by surprise.
The author not only has a way with character descriptions but the scenery as well. She paints us a rich and inviting portrait of an area I have only seen on a map. There are also delectable descriptions of various wines that I wished I could sip and savor as I read along.
July 30, 2023
I wish Goodreads had a 1/2 star function because this book deserves a 4.5. It’s been a few days since I finished this book and I keep thinking about it. The only *negative* thing I have to say is there were some things I wish we had explanations for early on in the book. Overall a super captivating read set in one of my favourite places
April 4, 2020
I've been picking this up and putting it down for days now. Not my cup of tea.
Generally a Before/After structure is fine - except that much of Winnie’s self-reflection happens in the ‘Before’ sections. I also found the whole novel to be very preachy… I felt like I was getting a lesson about the history - social and economic - of the region.
One of the things that bothered me throughout the book was it not being firmly grounded in time. I deduce that the ‘action’ takes place around 2010… the first e-reader was commercially available in 2007 (there are other ‘clues’ as well)... but the final events take place 12 years later… which totally not jibe (first personal computers circa 1997 (i.e. my original grape iMac) yet Angela ref e-mails between friends and colleagues from ‘years ago’). The timelines are a mess and it creates a disconnect for me as the reader.
But even if you back up another twelve years or so... if that becomes the timeline… do you really expect me to believe that they not know about climate change (Hello, An Invconvenient Truth? Hello, Kyoto Accord?); or that ‘her boys’ not behave/speak like ‘normal’ teenaged boys? Boys will be boys… and teenaged boys have thought with the wrong body part, and been rude and crude, since time immemorial.
There are so many things I’m not buying - not drinking the KoolAid - about actions and events and motivations (fully acknowledging that Winnie is a totally unreliable narrator in the extreme... indeed, she’s a sociopath).
I also did not have any sense that the author knows what she wants our key takeaway to be from this novel. I think she tells us on p100… “The cruel delusion that simply being was not enough”... but really it’s anybody’s guess.
And the concept of ‘winning’? Not one I care for, even in my fiction. That they engage, so willingly, in these behaviours, and that there are ZERO consequences for them, well…
Generally a Before/After structure is fine - except that much of Winnie’s self-reflection happens in the ‘Before’ sections. I also found the whole novel to be very preachy… I felt like I was getting a lesson about the history - social and economic - of the region.
One of the things that bothered me throughout the book was it not being firmly grounded in time. I deduce that the ‘action’ takes place around 2010… the first e-reader was commercially available in 2007 (there are other ‘clues’ as well)... but the final events take place 12 years later… which totally not jibe (first personal computers circa 1997 (i.e. my original grape iMac) yet Angela ref e-mails between friends and colleagues from ‘years ago’). The timelines are a mess and it creates a disconnect for me as the reader.
But even if you back up another twelve years or so... if that becomes the timeline… do you really expect me to believe that they not know about climate change (Hello, An Invconvenient Truth? Hello, Kyoto Accord?); or that ‘her boys’ not behave/speak like ‘normal’ teenaged boys? Boys will be boys… and teenaged boys have thought with the wrong body part, and been rude and crude, since time immemorial.
There are so many things I’m not buying - not drinking the KoolAid - about actions and events and motivations (fully acknowledging that Winnie is a totally unreliable narrator in the extreme... indeed, she’s a sociopath).
I also did not have any sense that the author knows what she wants our key takeaway to be from this novel. I think she tells us on p100… “The cruel delusion that simply being was not enough”... but really it’s anybody’s guess.
And the concept of ‘winning’? Not one I care for, even in my fiction. That they engage, so willingly, in these behaviours, and that there are ZERO consequences for them, well…
September 25, 2020
What does it mean, to do the wrong thing for the right reasons? 16-year-old Winnie, the self-reliant narrator of Deborah Hemming’s taut novel Throw Down Your Shadows, is about to learn that painful lesson. It’s summer, 2005. Winnie lives with her artist mother, Ruth, in Gaspereau, a small rural community next door to Wolfville, in Nova Scotia’s Annapolis Valley: wine and apple country. Winnie, something of a tomboy, regards girls her age as shallow and uninteresting and wants nothing to do with them. Instead, her best friends are Tom, Jake and Sam, three boys with whom she spends most of her time, biking around, swimming, or just hanging out in each other’s company. An exclusive group, they are also honest, responsible and community minded. She and Tom work summers at a U-Pick. Jake helps his father on the family farm. But this is the summer when everything is about to change. Winnie’s relationship with her three friends becomes strained when Caleb’s family settles in Gaspereau, having moved across country from Vancouver. The boys invite Caleb into the group, and immediately Winnie finds herself witnessing a gradual shift in the balance of power. Accustomed to being in control and getting her way, Winnie discovers that she is helpless to counteract Caleb’s slow and sneaky seduction of her three friends. Caleb, with his personal magnetism, air of mystery, big-city smarts and blasé contempt for authority, draws Winnie and the others into a petty crime spree. It all seems like harmless fun. After all, the losses are minor, and nobody’s being hurt. But then, to her horror, Winnie realizes that a profound physical attraction to Caleb is changing her. Not only does she tremble at his touch, seek his glance, and agonize over whether or not he feels the same way, a relentless and powerful craving for his approval is blinding her to his true nature. Confused by the emergence of these new feelings, annoyed that Caleb seems to be toying with her affections, she finds reasons to excuse his behaviour and resists clear evidence that he poses a genuine danger, not just to her and her friends, but to the entire community. But Winnie is also pragmatic, cautious and observant, and as the summer passes and school starts again, she can no longer deny that the threat is real and imminent. Deeply ashamed of her failure to protect her friends, she decides that drastic action is needed. In her debut novel Deborah Hemming has written a deliberately paced and gripping story of adolescent angst. Throw Down Your Shadows is a psychologically probing and morally complex novel, one that also displays patience and a deep sympathy for adolescent states of mind. Winnie’s voice is convincing, her dilemma heart-rending as she leaves innocence behind and her eyes are opened to unwelcome truths. Does she make the right decision? In the end, is the pain she causes worth an uncertain victory? Writing with admirable restraint, Deborah Hemming leaves it to the reader to answer these questions.
September 29, 2020
A book I would have loved to read in high school but, who am I kidding, long out of high school this story still rings true and sheds light where darkness tends to be.
Having a group of four good guy friends and no real girl friends, Winnie thought her life was complicated but somewhat predictable. With many traditions including a trip to the market with her single mom and nights alone while her mother tried to find ‘the one’, lazy summers with her friends who were dependable and didn’t always need to speak to understand, until they met Caleb.
It really just takes one pin to make a balloon pop and the world you’ve known comes crumbling down. It’s up to all of us to pick up the pieces and make something new but how will Winnie manage without her safety net of 16 years?
Twisty and turny and heartbreaking but with some relief, Throw Down Your Shadows is a must read for ages 15 and up.
Having a group of four good guy friends and no real girl friends, Winnie thought her life was complicated but somewhat predictable. With many traditions including a trip to the market with her single mom and nights alone while her mother tried to find ‘the one’, lazy summers with her friends who were dependable and didn’t always need to speak to understand, until they met Caleb.
It really just takes one pin to make a balloon pop and the world you’ve known comes crumbling down. It’s up to all of us to pick up the pieces and make something new but how will Winnie manage without her safety net of 16 years?
Twisty and turny and heartbreaking but with some relief, Throw Down Your Shadows is a must read for ages 15 and up.
October 18, 2020
A marvelous debut by a Nova Scotian author! Deborah weaves a profound coming of age story that will probably evoke teenage memories and high school experiences. The story is authenticly set in the rich agricultural and beautiful Gaspereau Valley and the small university town of Wolfville. (Nova Scotia, Canada)
I really like how the story moves back and forth from the "Before" and "After" the winery fire. This book has all the elements for an extremely satisfying reading experience including a complex protagonist, family dynamics, relationships,art, good food and wine descriptions, an authentic setting and an intense plot.Brava Deborah!
I really like how the story moves back and forth from the "Before" and "After" the winery fire. This book has all the elements for an extremely satisfying reading experience including a complex protagonist, family dynamics, relationships,art, good food and wine descriptions, an authentic setting and an intense plot.Brava Deborah!
December 7, 2023
As someone who has lived in the valley this was a comforting book in the sense that it reminded me of Gaspereau and Wolfville. The descriptions of places and the community was great and but the characters felt a bit more flat to me in comparison.
March 13, 2021
It was hard to put this book down. The writing is beautiful and love or hate the characters they are well developed.
December 1, 2020
Deborah Hemming’s debut novel Throw Down Your Shadows, which is scheduled to released in July of this year, is a breathtaking tale of finding out who you are, learning lessons, and realizing that we truly never stop growing up. Hemming’s main character Winnie brings the reader through one of the biggest moments of her life and reveals how that experience shaped her into becoming who she is today, while also having Winnie remind the reader that growing up never truly ends.
Winnie is a sixteen year old girl in the Annapolis Valley of Nova Scotia, Canada. She lives with her mom Ruth where farmland is abundant and so is the possibility of getting away with some lighthearted mischief. Winnie spends her summer before eleventh grade with her three friends: Tom, Sam, and Jake, when a new impish boy named Caleb from Vancouver, British Columbia joins the four outcasts and quickly changes the dynamics of the group of friends. Winnie realizes that having a rotten apple amongst her and her friends truly does spoil the bunch as Caleb creates havoc throughout the Annapolis Valley.
In addition to the distinctive characters that Hemming has created, she also uses her home as inspiration for the setting of Throw Down Your Shadows. Rich detail can be seen throughout Hemming’s prose as she describes the valley and the vineyards that surround it and it is easy for the reader to picture the lush vineyards as they read along. One of the main settings in Throw Down Your Shadows is a vineyard where Winnie spends her summer working and learning about the art of wine. This plays a huge role throughout the storyline as well as in Winnie’s life as she grows up.
Deborah Hemming has created an exquisite piece of art that shows the beauty and pain in growing up, and that we truly are never done learning and growing. Throw Down Your Shadows is a wonderful Young Adult book with an enticing coming-of-age story that Hemming has created that is sure to inspire others to follow their dreams. Hemming’s characters and setting are truly memorable and will leave the reader wondering where life has taken these fictional characters long after the story ends. Throw Down Your Shadows is a wonderful debut novel and Hemming has proved that she has a gift in writing to share with the world. We are hoping to see more from this talented author in the future!
*Throw Down Your Shadows has been pushed back to July for publishing due to the COVID-19 pandemic currently sweeping our continent. I highly recommend pre-ordering this novel because it is truly the perfect summer read while you enjoy a glass of your favourite wine.*
Thank you to Nimbus Publishing for providing Cloud Lake Literary this book to review. Note that while the book was gifted, our reviews are independent and unbiased.
https://www.cloudlakeliterary.ca/blog...
Originally published on Cloud Lake Literary’s website. Link above.
Winnie is a sixteen year old girl in the Annapolis Valley of Nova Scotia, Canada. She lives with her mom Ruth where farmland is abundant and so is the possibility of getting away with some lighthearted mischief. Winnie spends her summer before eleventh grade with her three friends: Tom, Sam, and Jake, when a new impish boy named Caleb from Vancouver, British Columbia joins the four outcasts and quickly changes the dynamics of the group of friends. Winnie realizes that having a rotten apple amongst her and her friends truly does spoil the bunch as Caleb creates havoc throughout the Annapolis Valley.
In addition to the distinctive characters that Hemming has created, she also uses her home as inspiration for the setting of Throw Down Your Shadows. Rich detail can be seen throughout Hemming’s prose as she describes the valley and the vineyards that surround it and it is easy for the reader to picture the lush vineyards as they read along. One of the main settings in Throw Down Your Shadows is a vineyard where Winnie spends her summer working and learning about the art of wine. This plays a huge role throughout the storyline as well as in Winnie’s life as she grows up.
Deborah Hemming has created an exquisite piece of art that shows the beauty and pain in growing up, and that we truly are never done learning and growing. Throw Down Your Shadows is a wonderful Young Adult book with an enticing coming-of-age story that Hemming has created that is sure to inspire others to follow their dreams. Hemming’s characters and setting are truly memorable and will leave the reader wondering where life has taken these fictional characters long after the story ends. Throw Down Your Shadows is a wonderful debut novel and Hemming has proved that she has a gift in writing to share with the world. We are hoping to see more from this talented author in the future!
*Throw Down Your Shadows has been pushed back to July for publishing due to the COVID-19 pandemic currently sweeping our continent. I highly recommend pre-ordering this novel because it is truly the perfect summer read while you enjoy a glass of your favourite wine.*
Thank you to Nimbus Publishing for providing Cloud Lake Literary this book to review. Note that while the book was gifted, our reviews are independent and unbiased.
https://www.cloudlakeliterary.ca/blog...
Originally published on Cloud Lake Literary’s website. Link above.
Displaying 1 - 10 of 10 reviews