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| A Map of the World (Oprah's Book Club) | 
 enlarge | Author: Jane Hamilton
Publisher: Anchor
Category: Book
List Price: $13.95
Buy New: $0.01
You Save: $13.94 (100%)
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Avg. Customer Rating:  (360 reviews)
Sales Rank: 145393
Languages: English (Original Language), English (Unknown), English (Published)
Media: Paperback
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 352
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.5
Dimensions (in): 7.8 x 4.9 x 0.7
ISBN: 0385720106
Dewey Decimal Number: 813.54
EAN: 9780385720106
ASIN: 0385720106
Publication Date: December 3, 1999
Release Date: December 3, 1999
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
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| Editorial Reviews:
Product Description
From the author of the widely acclaimed The Book of Ruth comes a harrowing, heartbreaking drama about a rural American family and a disastrous event that forever changes their lives.
The Goodwins, Howard, Alice, and their little girls, Emma and Claire, live on a dairy farm in Wisconsin. Although suspiciously regarded by their neighbors as "that hippie couple" because of their well-educated, urban background, Howard and Alice believe they have found a source of emotional strength in the farm, he tending the barn while Alice works as a nurse in the local elementary school.
But their peaceful life is shattered one day when a neighbor's two-year-old daughter drowns in the Goodwins' pond while under Alice's care. Tormented by the accident, Alice descends even further into darkness when she is accused of sexually abusing of a student at the elementary school. Soon, Alice is arrested, incarcerated, and as good as convicted in the eyes of a suspicious community. As a child, Alice designed her own map of the world to find her bearings. Now, as an adult, she must find her way again, through a maze of lies, doubt and ill will.
A vivid human drama of guilt and betrayal, A Map of the World chronicles the intricate geographies of the human heart and all its mysterious, uncharted terrain.The result is a piercing drama about family bonds and a disappearing rural American life.
Amazon.com Review
Oprah Book Club Selection, December 1999: In A Map of the World, appearance overwhelms reality and communal hysteria threatens common sense. Howard and Alice Goodheart, the couple at the center of Jane Hamilton's 1994 novel, have labored mightily to create a pastoral paradise in a Wisconsin subdivision. Their 400-acre dairy farm is the last in Prairie Center, and they're working flat out to raise their two young girls in a traditionally bucolic manner. Yet paradoxically, they strike their neighbors as unacceptably modern, and have been treated as interlopers since the day of their arrival. Howard, in love with his vocation, chooses not to believe that they've been frozen out. But Alice, flinty and quick to judge, finds things harder. And her job as school nurse doesn't work wonders for her reputation either. Happily, there's one exception to this epidemic of unfriendliness: their closest neighbors. Theresa and Dan, who also have two young daughters, function as a virtual lifeline for the embattled family. But in June 1990, whatever idyll the Goodhearts have worked for comes to a permanent end. On a beautiful morning--marred by her 5-year-old's tantrum but still recuperable--Alice looks forward to taking her children and Theresa's youngest for a swim. Distracted for several minutes, she has no idea that the 2-year-old is no longer in the house: Lizzy had run to the pond and splashed in. It had felt good on her hot feet and she kept running and then she was pedaling and pedaling. She tried to grab hold of the water, pawing for the metal bar, a ladder rung, her mother, but there was nothing. She clutched and flailed.... She sank. The trout that Howard had stocked in the pond swam along through the dark water. They noticed Lizzy out of the corner of their eyes. They had inherited the knowledge of that look, and they knew it by heart. This is only the first of Alice's body blows. Next, she's questioned about one of her students, a memorably bad seed. On the verge of collapse, she cries out, "I hurt everybody!"--which will later be construed as a confession. Charged with sexual abuse and unable to come up with $100,000 in bail, she is forced to await trial in jail. Narrated first by Alice, then Howard, and then Alice again, A Map of the World moves from intimate domesticity to courtroom drama with grace and subtlety. Hamilton wrote her book when accusations of abuse in schools and day care were peaking, yet this is not a modish work or an "issue novel" but a lasting creation of several complex lives. At one point, fed up with civil mechanisms, Alice tells her lawyer: "'Let Oprah be the judge.... Let Robbie and me, Mrs. Mackessy, Howard, Theresa, Dan, Mrs. Glevitch--let all of us come before Oprah. Let the studio audience decide. They're nice suburban woman, many of them, dressed for a lark. They have common sense and speak their minds.'" Apparently La Winfrey was listening, since she chose this beautifully observed novel for her book club. --Kerry Fried
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| Customer Reviews: Read 355 more reviews...
 Not so much October 19, 2008
Depressing, bleak, sorrowful.
I don't know why I even picked up this book - oh yeah, it was .50 at a yard sale - it wasn't even worth that!
 Pleasant Lives Abruptly Changed July 23, 2008
This novel is set in and around the last remaining dairy farm in a rapidly suburbanizing Wisconsin county. Being a diary farmer is the fulfillment of the dream for Howard Goodheart, a dream wholeheartedly shared by his wife Alice. They enjoy a lifestyle that harkens back to a simpler time, as well as the bond of friendship with one of the nearby families who live in a new suburb that abuts their farm acreage. The two women are best friends, the kind who can breeze into each other's kitchen with a yoo-hoo instead of a knock. Their ordered and pleasant lives are abruptly changed when an accidental drowning occurs in the Goodheart's farm pond. The repercussions are immediate and devastating for both families and for the community. At the same time, one of the main characters is falsely accused of a crime unrelated to the drowning, and from this false accusation, their lives further unravel.
This novel (as has become somewhat a formula in contemporary fiction) is told alternately from the viewpoints of several of the protagonists. The reader must readjust to the various vantage points. Thankfully, Hamilton limits the narrative shifts to large sections of the book, rather than an every other chapter (a frequently disconcerting style popularized by other authors and book editors). It is fair to observe Hamilton's voice is more effective when writing from the female point of view than from the male.
One of the most ominous characters, albeit in a small supporting role, is the gossip, Mrs. Glevitch. "What Mrs. Glevitch thought she knew was as potent as truth, and pretty soon would become truth... she would take the bits of information and dress them up with her distinctive brand of poetry." (page 62). We all know people like her, the deceitful, manipulative, rude, and malicious people whose unchecked behavior we must occasionally interact with, for whom passing on a daily dose of malevolent falsehood is like mother' s milk. Any novelist who sheds the spotlight of truth on such spitefulness gets a big thumbs up from me.
 Loved it! June 1, 2008
Couldn't hardly put this one down. It isn't a happy story, but the writing was fantastic and the story really makes you think how quickly your life can change and how hard it is to recover when bad things happen to good people.
A Map of Two Hearts May 3, 2008
This was a beautifully written novel about how our minds can often trip us up. A tragic accident has caused a young woman to blame herself for the death of a little girl; and a domino effect is triggered. Shortly, the entire community is blaming her not only for the child's death but for atrocities far worse than her supposed negligence.
Very engrossing April 18, 2008
I'm not 100% sure "enjoyed" is the right word for how I experienced this book. It was hard to put down, and I was emotionally involved with the characters, but along with enjoying the story and the character development I found it frightening. It's so easy to find yourself out in the cold, accused of something you didn't do, or at least finding that your life is completely altered by an event that only took seconds to happen. A bit haunting. I liked seeing the story from both Alice's and Howard's viewpoints.
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