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A Virtuous Woman
When Blinking Jack Stokes met Ruby Pitt Woodrow, she was twenty and he was forty. She was the carefully raised daughter of Carolina gentry and he was a skinny tenant farmer who had never owned anything in his life. She was newly widowed after a disastrous marriage to a brutal drifter. He had never asked a woman to do more than help him hitch a mule. They didn't fall in love so much as they simply found each other and held on for dear life.
Kaye Gibbons's first novel, Ellen Foster , won the Sue Kaufman Prize for First Fiction from the American Academy and Institute of Arts and Letters and the praise of writers from Walker Percy to Eudora Welty. In A Virtuous Woman , Gibbons transcends her early promise, creating a multilayered and indelibly convincing portrait of two seemingly ill-matched people who somehow miraculously make a marriage.
Kaye Gibbons's first novel, Ellen Foster , won the Sue Kaufman Prize for First Fiction from the American Academy and Institute of Arts and Letters and the praise of writers from Walker Percy to Eudora Welty. In A Virtuous Woman , Gibbons transcends her early promise, creating a multilayered and indelibly convincing portrait of two seemingly ill-matched people who somehow miraculously make a marriage.
165 pages, Paperback
First published April 30, 1989
396 people are currently reading
11325 people want to read
About the author
Kaye Gibbons
45 books576 followersKaye Gibbons is an American novelist. Her first novel, Ellen Foster (1987), received the Sue Kaufman Prize for First Fiction from the American Academy and Institute of Arts and Letters, a Special Citation from the Ernest Hemingway Foundation and the Louis D. Rubin, Jr. Prize in Creative Writing from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Gibbons is a member of the Fellowship of Southern Writers and two of her books, Ellen Foster and A Virtuous Woman, were selected for Oprah's Book Club in 1998.
Gibbons was born in Nash County, North Carolina, and went to Rocky Mount Senior High School. She attended North Carolina State University and the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, studying American and English literature. She has three daughters.
Gibbons has bipolar disorder and notes that she is extremely creative during her manic phases, in which she believes that everything is instrumented by a "real magic". Ellen Foster was written during one such phase.
On November 2, 2008, Gibbons was arrested on prescription drug fraud charges. According to authorities, she was taken into custody while trying to pick up a fraudulent prescription for the painkiller hydrocodone. She was sentenced to a 90-day suspended sentence, 2 years probation, and a $300 fine.
Gibbons was born in Nash County, North Carolina, and went to Rocky Mount Senior High School. She attended North Carolina State University and the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, studying American and English literature. She has three daughters.
Gibbons has bipolar disorder and notes that she is extremely creative during her manic phases, in which she believes that everything is instrumented by a "real magic". Ellen Foster was written during one such phase.
On November 2, 2008, Gibbons was arrested on prescription drug fraud charges. According to authorities, she was taken into custody while trying to pick up a fraudulent prescription for the painkiller hydrocodone. She was sentenced to a 90-day suspended sentence, 2 years probation, and a $300 fine.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 772 reviews
March 18, 2021
I must admit that after this second reading of A Virtuous Woman by Kaye Gibbons my thoughts have changed and improved my rating from 2 to 4 stars. The reason I will surmise, having not written a review back then, is that I was younger and unable to connect on any level with the characters and I wasn’t reading this type of literature as I am now. I must have felt harshly with such a low rating but at least at this reading, I can understand why this worked this time around.
This is Kaye Gibbon's second novel, her debut being Ellen Foster which was a heartbreaking and sometimes painful coming of age story of a young girl. This time, Gibbons tells the story of an unlikely marriage between 40 year old Jack Stokes and 20 year old Ruby Pitts Woodrow Stokes. They tell their story in alternating voices and shed light on their troubles and their joys. Ruby and Jack come from completely different backgrounds. She is a wealthy farmer’s daughter and Jack is a tenant farmer who has never owned a thing in his life. This improbable pair meet after Ruby has spent a couple of horrible years married to her first husband. Throughout their telling of their story, we learn that Jack and Ruby long for companionship and fall into a marriage in which the two people learn how to live life learning each other’s faults and capabilities. Despite all of this, they have a good marriage.
Jack can be short and to the point the way he talks and sometimes what he says can come across as hurtful to outsiders. Ruby has learned his mannerisms and language and knows just how to handle him and love him. He loves her and when she dies of cancer at 45, he has to figure out how to get on with life.
This is not a pretty love story or one that will make you feel good. This is written in each of their voices and can be pretty bleak, but it’s realistic and raw. I liked Ruby and the woman she became with Jack. She was preparing meals to put away in the freezer for Jack so he’d have something for a few months after she was gone. I don’t know many women who’d think of another at such a time as this. We also hear the stories of Burr and Tiny Fran and their children June and Roland. Burr is Jack’s boss and he’s married to a demanding, lazy wife who treats June poorly and lets Roland do whatever he wants. He’s uncontrollable. Jack and Ruby bond with June and she becomes like the daughter they never had.
Kaye Gibbons writes a sparse story in plain and simple prose. Her unsympathetic and quiet style here is definitely enough to see the picture of a woman’s love and concern for her husband and his welfare.
It took me a long time to learn that mistakes aren’t good or bad, they’re just mistakes, and you clean them up and go on.
…I can honestly say that before I married Ruby I’d felt like a boy on the outside looking in, but Ruby, when she loved me, I said, This is what it must feel like to be a man.
Sometimes I feel like everything started with Ruby.
I did want somebody to take care of me. I needed it. And when I felt all that goodness coming from Jack, it didn’t matter what the person looked like that sent it out to me.
This is Kaye Gibbon's second novel, her debut being Ellen Foster which was a heartbreaking and sometimes painful coming of age story of a young girl. This time, Gibbons tells the story of an unlikely marriage between 40 year old Jack Stokes and 20 year old Ruby Pitts Woodrow Stokes. They tell their story in alternating voices and shed light on their troubles and their joys. Ruby and Jack come from completely different backgrounds. She is a wealthy farmer’s daughter and Jack is a tenant farmer who has never owned a thing in his life. This improbable pair meet after Ruby has spent a couple of horrible years married to her first husband. Throughout their telling of their story, we learn that Jack and Ruby long for companionship and fall into a marriage in which the two people learn how to live life learning each other’s faults and capabilities. Despite all of this, they have a good marriage.
Jack can be short and to the point the way he talks and sometimes what he says can come across as hurtful to outsiders. Ruby has learned his mannerisms and language and knows just how to handle him and love him. He loves her and when she dies of cancer at 45, he has to figure out how to get on with life.
This is not a pretty love story or one that will make you feel good. This is written in each of their voices and can be pretty bleak, but it’s realistic and raw. I liked Ruby and the woman she became with Jack. She was preparing meals to put away in the freezer for Jack so he’d have something for a few months after she was gone. I don’t know many women who’d think of another at such a time as this. We also hear the stories of Burr and Tiny Fran and their children June and Roland. Burr is Jack’s boss and he’s married to a demanding, lazy wife who treats June poorly and lets Roland do whatever he wants. He’s uncontrollable. Jack and Ruby bond with June and she becomes like the daughter they never had.
Kaye Gibbons writes a sparse story in plain and simple prose. Her unsympathetic and quiet style here is definitely enough to see the picture of a woman’s love and concern for her husband and his welfare.
It took me a long time to learn that mistakes aren’t good or bad, they’re just mistakes, and you clean them up and go on.
…I can honestly say that before I married Ruby I’d felt like a boy on the outside looking in, but Ruby, when she loved me, I said, This is what it must feel like to be a man.
Sometimes I feel like everything started with Ruby.
I did want somebody to take care of me. I needed it. And when I felt all that goodness coming from Jack, it didn’t matter what the person looked like that sent it out to me.
January 2, 2009
Have you ever read a book and felt so distant from it shocked you when you realized you were actually in tears? This novel, such a quick read that a devoted reader will finish it in one sitting, seems so benign and irrelevant, yet works its way into your heart. By the end I found myself shockingly gulping for air. This may be an Oprah pick, but it's a smart book that I'd recommend to anyone who can appreciate a simple story line and a solid tale.
April 20, 2008
I should have been wary of this book since Oprah picked it for her book club, and I rarely appreciate her picks. But I had liked Charms for the Easy Life by this same author. I think my problem this time was simply my expectations. It's not a bad book, but not what I hoped for after reading the back cover. I expected a good love story. The main characters did love each other, but the book was mostly descriptions of all the unpleasant things that happened in their lives, culminating with him trying to cope with her death. I don't enjoy gritty/sordid reality books. I read for escape, inspiration, education, beauty, entertainment, etc. So this book was a wrong turn for me. At least it was short.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
October 28, 2023
The story of a marriage from its inception through to the premature death of the wife. It is no grand passion, no Romeo and Juliet but the quiet loving relationship between two people jaded by life who, by finding each other, experience more happiness than either feel deserving of.
Ruby has made poor choices in life. Brought up in a comfortable family with a servant and loving parents she throws it aside for the adventure the wild man, John, has to offer. Ruby quickly realises that the romance of the open road is for those who do not live an itinerant lifestyle. He is a seasonal worker and they move from shack to shack. Her pride will not allow her to go back home even when he proves to be abusive and unfaithful (she walks in on him with a teenage girl).
Ruby is trapped until the day John dies from injuries he sustained in a bar brawl. The author does not dwell on the details, maybe to place us in the position of Ruby where she hears what has happened but has little more than a sketchy understanding of events or perhaps to intimate that there was more to it than being reported. In any case Ruby is relieved rather than grieving, much to the disapproval of her community, but still will not return home.
She meets Jack while taking a cigarette break from the maid’s job she has been forced to take. He is a bachelor twenty years her senior (she is still only in her early 20’s) and aesthetically nothing to write home about but they both sense in the other a need to be cared for and although one can’t call it a marriage of convenience there is something of the port in a storm to their union.
After their meeting the book tells the story of these two people who share a deep but quiet love. Together they weather personal tragedies and tragedies inflicted by others. It is a beautiful story of Jack and Ruby growing together, accepting each other in all their rawness and failings and how a simple, fulfilling life can bloom from unlikely beginnings told in uncompromising, unadorned prose.
Ruby has made poor choices in life. Brought up in a comfortable family with a servant and loving parents she throws it aside for the adventure the wild man, John, has to offer. Ruby quickly realises that the romance of the open road is for those who do not live an itinerant lifestyle. He is a seasonal worker and they move from shack to shack. Her pride will not allow her to go back home even when he proves to be abusive and unfaithful (she walks in on him with a teenage girl).
Ruby is trapped until the day John dies from injuries he sustained in a bar brawl. The author does not dwell on the details, maybe to place us in the position of Ruby where she hears what has happened but has little more than a sketchy understanding of events or perhaps to intimate that there was more to it than being reported. In any case Ruby is relieved rather than grieving, much to the disapproval of her community, but still will not return home.
She meets Jack while taking a cigarette break from the maid’s job she has been forced to take. He is a bachelor twenty years her senior (she is still only in her early 20’s) and aesthetically nothing to write home about but they both sense in the other a need to be cared for and although one can’t call it a marriage of convenience there is something of the port in a storm to their union.
After their meeting the book tells the story of these two people who share a deep but quiet love. Together they weather personal tragedies and tragedies inflicted by others. It is a beautiful story of Jack and Ruby growing together, accepting each other in all their rawness and failings and how a simple, fulfilling life can bloom from unlikely beginnings told in uncompromising, unadorned prose.
June 9, 2019
3,5* well deserved...the story is very simple, the love between a husband and his wife told until the tragic epilogue with the death of the woman for cancer. A tale with no particolar plot.... made of simple events, maybe even banal ( this is the reason for 3,5 stars), but reported in words as very few writers manage to do.
I love Gibbons, her writing is clear, straight and direct... It reminds me a lot of Eudora Welty, but the Gibbons also masterfully manages to use a continuous irony here and there to make your soul laughing.
Fantastic discovery of this writer!!
3,5* meritatissime...la storia è semplicissima, l'amore tra un marito e sua moglie narrata sino al tragico epilogo con la morte per cancro della donna. Un racconto senza nulla di chissà che.... fatto di eventi semplici, forse anche banali ( x questo le 3,5 stelline), ma riportati in parole come ben pochi scrittori riescono a fare.
Adoro la Gibbons, la sua scrittura è limpida ,schietta e diretta.... mi ricorda molto Eudora Welty , ma la Gibbons riesce anche magistralmente ad usare un continua ironia qui e là da farti morire.
Fantastica scoperta questa scrittrice!!
I love Gibbons, her writing is clear, straight and direct... It reminds me a lot of Eudora Welty, but the Gibbons also masterfully manages to use a continuous irony here and there to make your soul laughing.
Fantastic discovery of this writer!!
3,5* meritatissime...la storia è semplicissima, l'amore tra un marito e sua moglie narrata sino al tragico epilogo con la morte per cancro della donna. Un racconto senza nulla di chissà che.... fatto di eventi semplici, forse anche banali ( x questo le 3,5 stelline), ma riportati in parole come ben pochi scrittori riescono a fare.
Adoro la Gibbons, la sua scrittura è limpida ,schietta e diretta.... mi ricorda molto Eudora Welty , ma la Gibbons riesce anche magistralmente ad usare un continua ironia qui e là da farti morire.
Fantastica scoperta questa scrittrice!!
July 25, 2009
Beautifully written, A Virtuous Women, is the quiet love story of Ruby Pitt Woodrow, daughter of a rich farmer, and Jack Stokes, a tenant farmer. At first they seem an unlikely match, Ruby, although 20 years younger than Jack, is already widowed, Jack, unattractive and unsuccessful, has never been married. But both have had tough lives. Ruby is alienated from her parents due to her brief marriage which was a disaster. She is working as a maid when she meets Jack. Jack has never had much, although his dream is to own a piece of land. Together they find, if not what they were looking for, a sense of completeness.
The book is written in first person narration with both Jack and Ruby narrating alternate chapters (except the last chapter which is written in the third person). This technique helps make both characters seem real. For me, personally, Jack was the character I most cared about, mostly because we know from the very beginning that Ruby dies and we see that Jack is lost without her.
This is one of those simple, quiet kind of books where there is little action or plot, just the story of two people who come to love and care for each other. Yet, it's the kind of story that will stay with you long after you've read it.
The book is written in first person narration with both Jack and Ruby narrating alternate chapters (except the last chapter which is written in the third person). This technique helps make both characters seem real. For me, personally, Jack was the character I most cared about, mostly because we know from the very beginning that Ruby dies and we see that Jack is lost without her.
This is one of those simple, quiet kind of books where there is little action or plot, just the story of two people who come to love and care for each other. Yet, it's the kind of story that will stay with you long after you've read it.
April 24, 2021
RATING: 4 STARS
I enjoy Gibbons writing style and find that her stories are quite emotional. While this novel is quite short, the story is a powerful punch. I enjoyed this novel and am ready for more Kaye Gibbons.
I enjoy Gibbons writing style and find that her stories are quite emotional. While this novel is quite short, the story is a powerful punch. I enjoyed this novel and am ready for more Kaye Gibbons.
December 16, 2008
One of the reviews on this book was from the Atlanta Journal-Constitution newspaper. Their review states, "So true and so vital I would swear there were moments when A VIRTUOUS WOMAN actually vibrated in my hands." When I read that review, I just knew that this book would be a 'good read.' I was so disappointed with this book. The only vibrating that I experienced while reading this book was when I experienced convulsions from a boredom seizure. I didn't like the characters-- except for Mavis, and she was nixed from the story so quickly. I guess I was just expecting this great love story, and I got a story written in hillbilly colloquial context. At some points, it was just confusing because I don't speak hillbilly as a 2nd language. It was just WEIRD to read. Then, one of the uneducated characters, like Jack, would use a word like 'accumulate.' I just didn't see how that could be a realistic word within the scope of Jack's vocabulary. Anyway, I'm done ranting. I would not suggest for anybody to waste their time reading this book. Please... for the sake of all mankind.... do not read this book.
July 9, 2019
The setting is Carolina in what seems to be the 1940's. These people are poor and their language shows their poor education.
Blinking Jack Stokes met Ruby Pitt Woodrow when he was 40 and she was 20. When he meets her she was married but soon becomes a widow. Her first husband taught her to smoke and lung cancer is what kills her at 45.
Jack and Ruby do marry. The story itself alternates between the thoughts of Jack and the thoughts of Ruby. This is the story of a love that transcends death.
What was compelling but also sometimes annoying was the dialogue that Kaye Gibbons has woven into this book. Very folksy and at times just poor English. I was impressed that she could write a book with people talking in a way that the author probably did not. Annoying because after reading the book for a while, I would find myself thinking in this jargon.
"Well, I better get these here dishes done before my comp'ney comes"
4 stars
Blinking Jack Stokes met Ruby Pitt Woodrow when he was 40 and she was 20. When he meets her she was married but soon becomes a widow. Her first husband taught her to smoke and lung cancer is what kills her at 45.
Jack and Ruby do marry. The story itself alternates between the thoughts of Jack and the thoughts of Ruby. This is the story of a love that transcends death.
What was compelling but also sometimes annoying was the dialogue that Kaye Gibbons has woven into this book. Very folksy and at times just poor English. I was impressed that she could write a book with people talking in a way that the author probably did not. Annoying because after reading the book for a while, I would find myself thinking in this jargon.
"Well, I better get these here dishes done before my comp'ney comes"
4 stars
March 28, 2009
I loved this simple, oft-told story of two down-and-out people who find each under and get pleasure in the duty of caring for one another. The story and setting are not unique, but the voice of both characters, and the collage the story is laid out in, and the insights resonate with me still. OK, and I cried at the end. Not many books can make me do that anymore.
May 1, 2021
Harsh dialect and intense characterizations. I really truly wanted to give it 3 stars for the carved and at times intrepid voices but the entire life pictures drawn were too bleak and against any logical love or spousal core affections and common sense protections of each other. So I just cannot.
I loved her "Charms" novel and a few others of her prose materials, even the shorty ones I have read previous to this one- but now I am finding the ignorance and abuse factors just dominant. And not in a learning way, IMHO.
It's a slice of life. Thank God, despite some true meanies I have met along the way- not mine. All the joy you could get from this story would fit into a touch DNA sample with room left over.
Life is short and far too precious. Others grab the irony and humor out of this set of relationships. I just find them incredibly sad. Wasteful. And the entire perceptive quality of the prose was cored to the negative.
I loved her "Charms" novel and a few others of her prose materials, even the shorty ones I have read previous to this one- but now I am finding the ignorance and abuse factors just dominant. And not in a learning way, IMHO.
It's a slice of life. Thank God, despite some true meanies I have met along the way- not mine. All the joy you could get from this story would fit into a touch DNA sample with room left over.
Life is short and far too precious. Others grab the irony and humor out of this set of relationships. I just find them incredibly sad. Wasteful. And the entire perceptive quality of the prose was cored to the negative.
June 22, 2025
I read this nearly twenty years ago, and all I really remember it that it was about a recent widower remembering his life with his late wife who died of lung cancer. Peeking at the book now, I can see there are also POV chapters from the wife getting her husband ready for a life without her. But after trying to reread Ellen Foster, I found I didn't click with this author's writing style, so I'm not going to reread this as I had originally planned. Check out some other reviews or the sample of the ebook wherever your buy ebooks and see if it's something you'd be interested in. (At least this one has some quotation marks.)
September 26, 2010
After reading Ellen Foster, I thought I simply had to read more by this author. I made a special trip to the library to obtain another.
I was disappointed. While I realize it is difficult to follow one superb book with another, this one fell flat, was choppy, was boring and I'm very glad I read Ellen Foster first or I would not have continued to read more.
Ruby Trip is privileged by southern, small-town farm standards. She has loving parents who dote on her and who can afford food on the table and a roof over their head.
Ruby was pampered to the detrimental extent that when unsupervised she makes very poor choices, including running away to marry a near-do-well migrant worker.
Jack Stokes is a tenant farmer, poor in worldly goods, rich in a loving spirit and gentleness toward ruby. Rescuing Ruby from poverty when her abusive husband dies, Jack shows Ruby respect, patience and a life of kind understanding.
This is the story of Ruby and Jack as they grow to love each other.
A story is one of a loving untraditional relationship, with one chapter told by Ruby and another by Jack.
I was disappointed. While I realize it is difficult to follow one superb book with another, this one fell flat, was choppy, was boring and I'm very glad I read Ellen Foster first or I would not have continued to read more.
Ruby Trip is privileged by southern, small-town farm standards. She has loving parents who dote on her and who can afford food on the table and a roof over their head.
Ruby was pampered to the detrimental extent that when unsupervised she makes very poor choices, including running away to marry a near-do-well migrant worker.
Jack Stokes is a tenant farmer, poor in worldly goods, rich in a loving spirit and gentleness toward ruby. Rescuing Ruby from poverty when her abusive husband dies, Jack shows Ruby respect, patience and a life of kind understanding.
This is the story of Ruby and Jack as they grow to love each other.
A story is one of a loving untraditional relationship, with one chapter told by Ruby and another by Jack.
April 14, 2025
Excellent
A lovely picture of a marriage. I especially enjoyed the alternating voices and the sweet relationship between Jack and Ruby.
A lovely picture of a marriage. I especially enjoyed the alternating voices and the sweet relationship between Jack and Ruby.
May 17, 2012
I read this book in 1997 and wrote a letter to the Oprah Book Club hoping to be invited to be on the show to have dinner with the author. I'm serious. I thought I could get chosen.
I was at my monthly pedicure appointment with my feet in water when my cell phone rang. It was my son who said I should probably come home because the Oprah Show had just called and was going to call back. I jumped out of the water and went running home in time to get the second call.
The producer asked me questions about the book, about myself, and about my reading tastes. She said they really liked my letter and that I was sure to be on the show UNLESS Oprah decided to only invite people who had been adopted as was the main character in the book. Alas, sigh....they called back a few days later to say that Oprah had indeed chosen to go with adoptees as guests. And that was my brush with fame.
I was at my monthly pedicure appointment with my feet in water when my cell phone rang. It was my son who said I should probably come home because the Oprah Show had just called and was going to call back. I jumped out of the water and went running home in time to get the second call.
The producer asked me questions about the book, about myself, and about my reading tastes. She said they really liked my letter and that I was sure to be on the show UNLESS Oprah decided to only invite people who had been adopted as was the main character in the book. Alas, sigh....they called back a few days later to say that Oprah had indeed chosen to go with adoptees as guests. And that was my brush with fame.
September 15, 2008
This was a very spare novel about a husband and wife, Ruby and Jack. The author alternates the POV between the two. I found the vernacular a little confusing at first, and the switching between narrators had me flipping back and forth to see who was speaking. The last two or three chapters were told by other narrators, and that was interesting.
The book gives a very intimate look into their lives. You find out early on that Ruby is dying of lung cancer. It reminded me of some of Annie Proulx's books. The prose is very spartan. These characters say what they need to in few words. It's intimate, but not overly introspective, which is nice.
The book gives a very intimate look into their lives. You find out early on that Ruby is dying of lung cancer. It reminded me of some of Annie Proulx's books. The prose is very spartan. These characters say what they need to in few words. It's intimate, but not overly introspective, which is nice.
September 11, 2014
Meh. Started strong and drew me in, but then slowly fell apart.
May 16, 2025
When the final page in a book leaves you with a lump in your throat, it's an automatic 5 star.
Just as good the second time around.
Just as good the second time around.
July 7, 2016
I really did not like this book. I made myself finish it simply because it was not very long. But I struggled with it and even skimmed over 3/4 of the pages. I didn't like the way it was written, I didn't like how it kept skipping back and forth between the past and future with no indication of which part you were, and I didn't like the wording in which the entire book was written. I'm glad I finished it.
April 20, 2020
This book has been collecting dust on my shelf for many years so it was a long overdue read. I assumed it would be enjoyable because it was a pick for Oprah Winfrey’s book club. Wrong assumption. I was disappointed and bored after the first few chapters, forcing myself to finish it. The reasons why? (A)few characters—most were not interesting (b)no plot (c)the writing style (d)mostly negative experiences described (e)left me with nothing—no food for thought. Thankfully, this was a quick read.
February 5, 2012
I didnt really care for this book. It wasn't bad, it just didnt captivate me, it was something to do, more than a book I couldn't put down... I actually read up to the last 10 pages and didnt bother to finish, I just wasnt that interested....
May 12, 2022
I just looked again at the stars in the rating system: two stars is for "it was ok." OK. I vacillate between liking aspects of A Virtuous Woman and feeling "meh" about this short novel (only 165 pages so good for a fast read).
What I appreciate: the two narrators, Blinking Jack Ernest Stokes, a 40 yo tenant farmer who falls in love with and remains in love with Ruby Pitt Woodrow Stokes, the 20 yo widow he marries. As different as can be, they enjoy a comfortable, companionable marriage until Ruby's death (not a spoiler as Jack tell us this early on). Gibbons's flipping between these two voices moves along what plot there is. It's a quiet novel, deceptively simple.
I chafed at chapter 13 and the inclusion of Mavis Washington. What is that about? Ugh. And why the italics at the end?
so, 2.5 or 3 or 2.
What I appreciate: the two narrators, Blinking Jack Ernest Stokes, a 40 yo tenant farmer who falls in love with and remains in love with Ruby Pitt Woodrow Stokes, the 20 yo widow he marries. As different as can be, they enjoy a comfortable, companionable marriage until Ruby's death (not a spoiler as Jack tell us this early on). Gibbons's flipping between these two voices moves along what plot there is. It's a quiet novel, deceptively simple.
I chafed at chapter 13 and the inclusion of Mavis Washington. What is that about? Ugh. And why the italics at the end?
so, 2.5 or 3 or 2.
February 9, 2022
A quiet little book told from alternating perspectives of a husband and wife. The book starts off with telling you that the wife dies of cancer, and as it goes on each one is reflecting on their life and life together. They're speaking from the future - her, right before she passes away, him, after she passes away. It goes through the trials and hardships they had as individuals and as a couple, and ends in a slightly different tone which helps to reveal the depth of emotions. I enjoyed Gibbons' Ellen Foster a few years ago, but found this one a bit less memorable. That being said, I also couldn't tell you anything about Ellen Foster right now either, though.
November 9, 2023
Simply a book about people needing people and what do to when we lose the person we need
April 17, 2024
Love her writing. Sweet novella.
November 18, 2010
My interest in this story was initially poked during one of my husband’s daily devotion. That day’s lesson was entitled Greatness written by Brian K. Bauknight and the Bible reference was from Proverbs 31:10-31. That day was my birthday.
A virtuous woman, Ruby was diagnosed with Lung Cancer. Instead of worrying on her dying state, she busied herself preparing food for her husband for the months ahead… when she’s already gone. She was more worried about how Jack will get by without her.
Being orphaned at an early age, it was difficult for Jack to let go of Ruby. She was the only tangible evidence of life for him… the only one who truly cared. He was a farmer without a land, a man without a child, and a husband without a wife.
On the surface, this was a marriage of circumstance and convenience between two brutally honest people, Ruby and Jack. Beneath, theirs was an unconventional love story with unquestionable depth. A relationship that only two people who truly cares for each other may understand. Each was cherished quietly but unconditionally.
This story was alternately narrated between the two main characters, which gave it more emotion and made it very personal.
A virtuous woman, Ruby was diagnosed with Lung Cancer. Instead of worrying on her dying state, she busied herself preparing food for her husband for the months ahead… when she’s already gone. She was more worried about how Jack will get by without her.
Being orphaned at an early age, it was difficult for Jack to let go of Ruby. She was the only tangible evidence of life for him… the only one who truly cared. He was a farmer without a land, a man without a child, and a husband without a wife.
On the surface, this was a marriage of circumstance and convenience between two brutally honest people, Ruby and Jack. Beneath, theirs was an unconventional love story with unquestionable depth. A relationship that only two people who truly cares for each other may understand. Each was cherished quietly but unconditionally.
This story was alternately narrated between the two main characters, which gave it more emotion and made it very personal.
December 26, 2021
I don't really know why I decided to read this book. I found it at a bookstore, and it was basically free. It was probably because it was short. It was pretty good. A simple story of a small community's life with its sorrows and loves that easily strikes a chord with its reader's lives.
December 8, 2016
59th book read in 2016.
Number 503 out of 552 on my all time book list.
Review Pending:
Number 503 out of 552 on my all time book list.
Review Pending:
December 16, 2020
Full disclaimer so you can appreciate the sincerity behind my review- I didn't expect to like A Virtuous Woman as much as I ended up liking it! This title has been on my TBR shelf for ages and has a low page count, so I picked it up in a last-ditch attempt to finish my Mount TBR challenge for 2020. The title seemed very 'literary' and 'old-fashioned' and I wasn't sure I'd be able to keep focus long enough for me to finish it. When I ended up near tears toward the end, I was pleasantly surprised.
Gibbons alternates between the points-of-view of Blinking Jack Stokes and his much younger wife Ruby Pitt Woodrow, telling the story of how they met and the struggles each faced throughout their lives, eventually weaving them together to show the love they found in one another. The storytelling is succinct and each voice is distinct, creating a compact love story that packs quite the punch. Somehow you fall in deep and root for this odd couple.
I would recommend for romance fans, though there's no ~steam~ and it's not at all your typical romance. However, it is a beautiful love story that all can appreciate.
Gibbons alternates between the points-of-view of Blinking Jack Stokes and his much younger wife Ruby Pitt Woodrow, telling the story of how they met and the struggles each faced throughout their lives, eventually weaving them together to show the love they found in one another. The storytelling is succinct and each voice is distinct, creating a compact love story that packs quite the punch. Somehow you fall in deep and root for this odd couple.
I would recommend for romance fans, though there's no ~steam~ and it's not at all your typical romance. However, it is a beautiful love story that all can appreciate.
February 21, 2019
This is a compact story of a marriage between two souls who stumbled into each other, one who sees the potential to fill a missing gap in his life and the other who is recovering from a loveless marriage and isn't really looking for anything. The tale is skillfully and poetically told with alternating points of view from chapter to chapter. The story is bittersweet since Ruby has terminal cancer, and some of it is painful to read. "His frustration and anger had rooted in and taken hold well below the place where tears start, and so would not be washed up nor out by them." However, there is much joy to be gleaned from the pages too. Well worth a read.
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