Through the Green Valley

by Barbara Gowdy

The son of a peasant farmer, Michael Malone grows up surrounded by the poverty, hardships, and injustices of life in eighteenth-century Ireland, struggling to understand his place in society and to cope with the overwhelming effects of bitterness, anger,and despair

Genres: Fiction, Canada

249 pages, Hardcover

First published July 15, 1988

About the author

Barbara Gowdy is the author of seven books, including Helpless, The Romantic, The White Bone, Mister Sandman, We So Seldom Look on Love and Falling Angels, all of which have met with widespread international acclaim. A three-time finalist for The Governor General’s Award, two-time finalist for The Scotia Bank Giller Prize, The Rogers Writers’ Trust Fiction Prize and The Commonwealth Writers’ Prize, winner of the Marian Engel Award and The Trillium Book Prize, Gowdy has been longlisted for The Man Booker Prize. She has been called “a miraculous writer” by the Chicago Tribune, and in 2005 Harper’s magazine described her as a “terrific literary realist” who has “refused to subscribe to worn-out techniques and storytelling methods.” Born in Windsor, Ontario, she lives in Toronto.

Reviews

[Julie · Rating 3 out of 5]

I generally do not read historic romances but this is a Barbara Gowdy and I would read her grocery lists.I enjoyed it.

[Sarah · Rating 3 out of 5]

In 2000 I attended a lecture at York U that Barbara Gowdy gave including a reading from "The White Bone". When I brought my copy of "Mister Sandman" up to be signed instead, she thanked me for buying it in hardcover, and I admitted to owning all of her books in hardcover, but confessed not being able to find a copy of "Through the Green Valley". She said "I wouldn't bother trying to find it, it's not very good." a few years later I finally located a copy in the Victoria Public Library and read it...it's really NOTHING like her other books at all and, like she said, not very good.