Larry Weller is a regular guy, or so Carol Shields has him think. The scene of our first sight of Larry is Winnipeg in 1977, and the 26 year old is pondering the pluses of Harris tweed, still living at home and realizing he's in love with his girlfriend, Dorrie, a flinty car saleswoman. Larry is proud of his job at Flowerfolks, even though he fell into floral design by accident, and if his relationship with his parents isn't perfect, neither is it that bad. (Stu and Flo Weller may have less page-time in Larry's Party, but they are hugely memorable. He is a master upholsterer, happiest when working, she a woman ruined by nervous guilt having inadvertently killed off her mother-in-law with some improperly preserved green beans.)

Carol Shields has said that she had "always been struck by the fact that in most novels people aren't working." Though her hero climbs the floral managerial trellis for 17 years and finds more rhapsody in work than marriage, Larry and Dorrie's honeymoon in England points him toward what will be his true vocation--mazes. These living constructs turn him into a thinker, a man of imagination, and the author's descriptions are quietly spectacular as well as effortlessly sweet. Larry wonders at their "teasing elegance and circularity ... a snail, a scribble, a doodle on the earth's skin with no other directed purpose but to wind its sinuous way around itself." Just as Larry changes with the times--each elliptical chapter ages him by one or two years--so does his art. In 1990, he designs a maze in which you can't really lose yourself. In 1997, the McCord Maze "is intended to mirror the descent into unconscious sleep, followed by a slow awakening." Larry, too, has a slow awakening, taking several false turns before reaching midlife. As the novel closes, with a bravura dinner party scene, he may finally be at ease in the world. But his creator knows that he is only halfway there, and still has to negotiate his way from the centre of the maze to its exit.

always brings me back, 21 Sep 2005
I am searching amazon in order to purchase Larry's Party -- again. I read this book over seven years ago, and no matter where I have gone, esp within England, memories of this book and of Larry's life come back to me. I want to reread this novel to keep it fresh. With the help of this novel, my ability to sucessfully manage a maze sped up considerably -- and Larry has always been there too. He is an inspiring character and a great representative of real life. Not many books have stuck in my mind like Larry's Party. Carol Shields is a brilliant writer and I have enjoyed all of her books.

Ambiguous..., 18 Apr 2001
Me and/or the book, take your pick. This is the first book I've read of the authors and I've read it in two days - not because I was absorbed but because I wanted to get through the thing. I've given it three stars because on the one hand it is extraordinarily brilliant but on the other hand there is something missing. I was once told that with regard to writing 'show' don't 'tell' and I'm afraid that is what she does. Larry does this, Larry does that, Larry feels happy, sad, whatever! Perhaps that's the problem - I don't know if her other books are written in the same fashion (and I have her short story collection to get through - which I'm half dreading, half hopeful) but I find it off-putting.

Also, you could argue that there is an incredible, underlying (even poignant) meaning to the book, but some will only find it pointless. Fine if you're already a fan but if this is your first choice of hers, don't be assured that it will inspire you to try more of her work. This is a really difficult book to comment on.

A good man is hard to find, 20 Aug 2000
Oh Larry, if only you existed in real life. Carol Shields gives us a tender portrait of a real guy, just trying to do right by himself and his life. And what an interesting guy he is. I loved every minute of this book, and even missed Larry when he was gone. Read it.

What starts out as humdrum becomes totally absorbing, 19 Aug 2000
I give this 4 stars only because I belive only the best book I've ever read should get five: I don't know what that is yet. This caught me by surpise. I'd bought it for a relative called Larry, without knowing anything about it or Carol Shields and then thought I'd better read it and see what I'd done (especially since one of the chapters has a vaguely suggestive title). What at the outset seemed to be a rather mundane and pretty low-key fictional biagraphy became gradually more and more gripping. It catches Larry's development from somewhat undereducated normality to the status of highly regarded expert in his field whilst never really feeling that he has changed within himself. He seems almost surprised to find that he has developed as much. This seems to me to be a normal experience as we grow older. This is a first class book.

Take a step back from how you usually read, 04 Jul 2000
"Larry's Party" is a very clever book; Carol Shields a very clever author.Plot aside, the entire arrangement and structure of the novel demands that the reader abandons old ways of dealing with and receiving fiction,truly taking the history of the form somewhere new. One of my contemporaries complained that the book was "rubbish...nothing happens". And that is the whole point. Nothing happens, yet everything does. Larry ages, marries, divorces, has an occupation- Larry lives, and just like in 'real life', Larry's story develops and progresses steadily and surely, with no intervention or added excitement from God, or in this fictive case, Ms Shields.

always brings me back, 21 Sep 2005
I am searching amazon in order to purchase Larry's Party -- again. I read this book over seven years ago, and no matter where I have gone, esp within England, memories of this book and of Larry's life come back to me. I want to reread this novel to keep it fresh. With the help of this novel, my ability to sucessfully manage a maze sped up considerably -- and Larry has always been there too. He is an inspiring character and a great representative of real life. Not many books have stuck in my mind like Larry's Party. Carol Shields is a brilliant writer and I have enjoyed all of her books.

Ambiguous..., 18 Apr 2001
Me and/or the book, take your pick. This is the first book I've read of the authors and I've read it in two days - not because I was absorbed but because I wanted to get through the thing. I've given it three stars because on the one hand it is extraordinarily brilliant but on the other hand there is something missing. I was once told that with regard to writing 'show' don't 'tell' and I'm afraid that is what she does. Larry does this, Larry does that, Larry feels happy, sad, whatever! Perhaps that's the problem - I don't know if her other books are written in the same fashion (and I have her short story collection to get through - which I'm half dreading, half hopeful) but I find it off-putting.

Also, you could argue that there is an incredible, underlying (even poignant) meaning to the book, but some will only find it pointless. Fine if you're already a fan but if this is your first choice of hers, don't be assured that it will inspire you to try more of her work. This is a really difficult book to comment on.

A good man is hard to find, 20 Aug 2000
Oh Larry, if only you existed in real life. Carol Shields gives us a tender portrait of a real guy, just trying to do right by himself and his life. And what an interesting guy he is. I loved every minute of this book, and even missed Larry when he was gone. Read it.

What starts out as humdrum becomes totally absorbing, 19 Aug 2000
I give this 4 stars only because I belive only the best book I've ever read should get five: I don't know what that is yet. This caught me by surpise. I'd bought it for a relative called Larry, without knowing anything about it or Carol Shields and then thought I'd better read it and see what I'd done (especially since one of the chapters has a vaguely suggestive title). What at the outset seemed to be a rather mundane and pretty low-key fictional biagraphy became gradually more and more gripping. It catches Larry's development from somewhat undereducated normality to the status of highly regarded expert in his field whilst never really feeling that he has changed within himself. He seems almost surprised to find that he has developed as much. This seems to me to be a normal experience as we grow older. This is a first class book.

Take a step back from how you usually read, 04 Jul 2000
"Larry's Party" is a very clever book; Carol Shields a very clever author.Plot aside, the entire arrangement and structure of the novel demands that the reader abandons old ways of dealing with and receiving fiction,truly taking the history of the form somewhere new. One of my contemporaries complained that the book was "rubbish...nothing happens". And that is the whole point. Nothing happens, yet everything does. Larry ages, marries, divorces, has an occupation- Larry lives, and just like in 'real life', Larry's story develops and progresses steadily and surely, with no intervention or added excitement from God, or in this fictive case, Ms Shields.

Fantastic, 28 May 2007
Brilliantly written, amazingly insightful, sumptous prose that describes the little things so well. And somehow it remains very readable (much easier that the Stone Diaries - which I gave up upon). The story line is slow to start, but in retrospect, this is one the novel's achievements and it actually gives a suspense to the latter half.

And yes, it's a love story, but not a cheesy one (despite the book's title), but one that is grounded in reality which gives real power to the words.

If you havent read Carol Shields before, this is a great place to start.

PERSEVERE, 26 Sep 2005
I did not find this book compelling reading but was happily able to put it down and pick it up when it suited. The protagonists did not meet until after the half-way mark and this was frustrating. I feel the scene was perhaps too well set although I still did not feel I knew the characters very well. Their relationship therefore was not well described. I did persevere and sailed through the second half and totally loved the ending. I am now going to read another one of the author's books to see if it holds my interest sooner as it was so well written. In all this story is frustrating, just as life usually is!

A beautiful story filled with raw emotion., 27 Aug 2001
A beautiful story of how even the most ordinary of peoples lives can be changed in an instant. Told with a raw emotion so powerful you cannot fail to be moved!

Good. But really that good?, 07 Aug 2000
Right. So Fay and Tom are both single. They both have a string of failed relationships behind them. They meet by chance and fall in love at first sight. Eventually, after yet another string of unforeseeable events, they get married. So far, so good. Whatever the poetic contents of the book, the story is less than original. The fact that the novel still makes for fascinating, compulsive reading is due to Carol Shield`s softly ironic style and her almost motherly understanding of human nature. However, the background of the characters somehow seems more interesting than what actually happens to them - Fay`s thesis on mermaids fascinated me more than her love affair with Tom, whose failed three marriages also carry a lot more content than him tying the knot with Fay. Of course, the different perspectives of love in all its shapes and forms is perfectly valid, especially in our day and age, and Shields brilliantly captures the essence of singledom - freedom, yes, but at what a price. But is marriage really the one and only answer? Where are the people that live perfectly valid lives on their own? (And I`m sure there are some of those out there. Why is it that all the books on modern singledom somehow end with the marriage - or at least relationship - knot?) This is only half the story, I`m sure. However, it is a great one and I thoroughly enjoyed it.

One of the sweetest books I have ever read, 25 Feb 1999
I have read this book about four times and each time it has made me cry. It is a sweet, lyrical, lovely book and I unreservedly recommend it.

always brings me back, 21 Sep 2005
I am searching amazon in order to purchase Larry's Party -- again. I read this book over seven years ago, and no matter where I have gone, esp within England, memories of this book and of Larry's life come back to me. I want to reread this novel to keep it fresh. With the help of this novel, my ability to sucessfully manage a maze sped up considerably -- and Larry has always been there too. He is an inspiring character and a great representative of real life. Not many books have stuck in my mind like Larry's Party. Carol Shields is a brilliant writer and I have enjoyed all of her books.

Ambiguous..., 18 Apr 2001
Me and/or the book, take your pick. This is the first book I've read of the authors and I've read it in two days - not because I was absorbed but because I wanted to get through the thing. I've given it three stars because on the one hand it is extraordinarily brilliant but on the other hand there is something missing. I was once told that with regard to writing 'show' don't 'tell' and I'm afraid that is what she does. Larry does this, Larry does that, Larry feels happy, sad, whatever! Perhaps that's the problem - I don't know if her other books are written in the same fashion (and I have her short story collection to get through - which I'm half dreading, half hopeful) but I find it off-putting.

Also, you could argue that there is an incredible, underlying (even poignant) meaning to the book, but some will only find it pointless. Fine if you're already a fan but if this is your first choice of hers, don't be assured that it will inspire you to try more of her work. This is a really difficult book to comment on.

A good man is hard to find, 20 Aug 2000
Oh Larry, if only you existed in real life. Carol Shields gives us a tender portrait of a real guy, just trying to do right by himself and his life. And what an interesting guy he is. I loved every minute of this book, and even missed Larry when he was gone. Read it.

What starts out as humdrum becomes totally absorbing, 19 Aug 2000
I give this 4 stars only because I belive only the best book I've ever read should get five: I don't know what that is yet. This caught me by surpise. I'd bought it for a relative called Larry, without knowing anything about it or Carol Shields and then thought I'd better read it and see what I'd done (especially since one of the chapters has a vaguely suggestive title). What at the outset seemed to be a rather mundane and pretty low-key fictional biagraphy became gradually more and more gripping. It catches Larry's development from somewhat undereducated normality to the status of highly regarded expert in his field whilst never really feeling that he has changed within himself. He seems almost surprised to find that he has developed as much. This seems to me to be a normal experience as we grow older. This is a first class book.

Take a step back from how you usually read, 04 Jul 2000
"Larry's Party" is a very clever book; Carol Shields a very clever author.Plot aside, the entire arrangement and structure of the novel demands that the reader abandons old ways of dealing with and receiving fiction,truly taking the history of the form somewhere new. One of my contemporaries complained that the book was "rubbish...nothing happens". And that is the whole point. Nothing happens, yet everything does. Larry ages, marries, divorces, has an occupation- Larry lives, and just like in 'real life', Larry's story develops and progresses steadily and surely, with no intervention or added excitement from God, or in this fictive case, Ms Shields.

Fantastic, 28 May 2007
Brilliantly written, amazingly insightful, sumptous prose that describes the little things so well. And somehow it remains very readable (much easier that the Stone Diaries - which I gave up upon). The story line is slow to start, but in retrospect, this is one the novel's achievements and it actually gives a suspense to the latter half.

And yes, it's a love story, but not a cheesy one (despite the book's title), but one that is grounded in reality which gives real power to the words.

If you havent read Carol Shields before, this is a great place to start.

PERSEVERE, 26 Sep 2005
I did not find this book compelling reading but was happily able to put it down and pick it up when it suited. The protagonists did not meet until after the half-way mark and this was frustrating. I feel the scene was perhaps too well set although I still did not feel I knew the characters very well. Their relationship therefore was not well described. I did persevere and sailed through the second half and totally loved the ending. I am now going to read another one of the author's books to see if it holds my interest sooner as it was so well written. In all this story is frustrating, just as life usually is!

A beautiful story filled with raw emotion., 27 Aug 2001
A beautiful story of how even the most ordinary of peoples lives can be changed in an instant. Told with a raw emotion so powerful you cannot fail to be moved!

Good. But really that good?, 07 Aug 2000
Right. So Fay and Tom are both single. They both have a string of failed relationships behind them. They meet by chance and fall in love at first sight. Eventually, after yet another string of unforeseeable events, they get married. So far, so good. Whatever the poetic contents of the book, the story is less than original. The fact that the novel still makes for fascinating, compulsive reading is due to Carol Shield`s softly ironic style and her almost motherly understanding of human nature. However, the background of the characters somehow seems more interesting than what actually happens to them - Fay`s thesis on mermaids fascinated me more than her love affair with Tom, whose failed three marriages also carry a lot more content than him tying the knot with Fay. Of course, the different perspectives of love in all its shapes and forms is perfectly valid, especially in our day and age, and Shields brilliantly captures the essence of singledom - freedom, yes, but at what a price. But is marriage really the one and only answer? Where are the people that live perfectly valid lives on their own? (And I`m sure there are some of those out there. Why is it that all the books on modern singledom somehow end with the marriage - or at least relationship - knot?) This is only half the story, I`m sure. However, it is a great one and I thoroughly enjoyed it.

One of the sweetest books I have ever read, 25 Feb 1999
I have read this book about four times and each time it has made me cry. It is a sweet, lyrical, lovely book and I unreservedly recommend it.

Ugly Duckling Poetry, 13 Jul 2008
Mary Swann, a farmer's wife in rural Ontario, is murdered and dismembered by her possessive husband just before her first book of poetry is published. Years later, four different people - a feminist writer, an unscrupulous biographer, the local librarian who knew her and the man who published her poems - relive their connection to Swann as they travel to the first symposeum dedicated to her work.

This novel intelligently asks whether an uneducated person can create moving poetry, and how well we can know a literary figure, especially in this day and age when people are more concerened with building their careers on top of someone's work rather than finding the truth. Shields only misses a beat in the end, with a section written as a screenplay pastiche which underwhelms.

As a follow up, you might want to read Margaret Atwood's "Negotiating with the Dead", which is about the role of the author in the world, and which includes commentary on "Mary Swann" (Carold Shields was a good friend of Atwood's.)

never trust the teller, trust the tale, 09 Nov 2006
What was that? That was the rug - and it was taken from right under your feet, by the brilliant Carol shields. And it is uncomfortable, and uncompromising, and utterly, utterly compelling. As a Pulitzer winning author,who presumably knows better than you or I, what it feels like to be "written" and "re-written" and to have our intentions reshaped, retold - "no, I did not mean that at all, I did not say that, that was not what I meant..." Well, you get the gist. In a world of celebrity when what is said is bent, or not meant, when semantics becomes the murky world not of black or white, or even grey, but a darker world of black arts, when meaning strays from language, when the life becomes the work, the question remains for Shileds, for all of us : Who are we?
If you have lost anyone you have loved, you will understand this - that when someone has gone, they become open to any interpretation we put on them. They become public property. Why? Because they cannot speak for themselves. And so they become a myriad of contradictions. How different people remember them.
Shields does not merely open the can of worms of literary biography, but states the uncomfortable truth that all of us, in life (but especially in death,) are unknowable. She slowly erodes the "facts" relating to the fictional but poignant Mary Swann, be they retold in diaries, or photographs, or conversations, or poems, or memories. The things that root all of us in the here and now become open to doubt. The things we hope that count slowly disappear in the course of "Mary Swann", and Shields successfully illuminates the greater truth: that in our lifetimes, no one will ever get close to revealing who we are. The human spirit is unknowable.
And it is in that we become aware of our own sense of loneliness, of desolation, and equally that the lonely quest to know another leaves all of us feeling unconnected, and drives Shileds' characters apart.
Whether we are looking to escape, or to be found, or to find ourselves in another, all of us are constantly on a quest which ends with us tracing our own footsteps round in a circle, back to where we started from, knowing nothing, and wondering - who we are? Who any of us are?


A beautifully written book and a constant surprise., 14 Nov 2000
Mary Swann was a Canadian housewife with a brutal husband. She led a hard dull and monotonous life isolated from other people. Her only item of luxury was a Parker 51 fountain pen and her only treat was to borrow two books every fortnight from the limited local library. Edna Ferber was one of her favourites. Yet, she wrote poetry. Small beautifully crafted rhyming verses on shabby scraps of paper that she presented to a newspaper editor in a carrier bag.

Prepared to patronise, they were to his astonishment worthy of publishing. it was not to be Mary's destiny to see the printed book - her husband murdered her shortly after the visit to the editor's office, a visit marred by her anxiety about missing the bus home.

I am not giving away all the plot here! The book centres round four main characters who are obsessed with her: Frederic Cruzzi the newspaper editor, the lonely librarian Rose Hindmarch who 'knew her best', the obsessive and bitter Morton Jimroy and Sarah Maloney, a feminist writer. Had Mary Swann lived she would not have recognised herself as the person they prepare to present at the Mary Swann symposium that is the culmination of the book. She may not have even recognised some of her poems after Cruzzi's beloved wife mistakenly discards fish bones in the bag of her work causing the ink to run.

Mary Swann remains a shadowy figure and I must confess I would have liked an extra chapter that revealed more bout her life and death and the minor mysteries that were hinted at. For instance, to whom were the love poems written?

However, perhaps like a good meal it is best to leave the table wanting just a little more.

always brings me back, 21 Sep 2005
I am searching amazon in order to purchase Larry's Party -- again. I read this book over seven years ago, and no matter where I have gone, esp within England, memories of this book and of Larry's life come back to me. I want to reread this novel to keep it fresh. With the help of this novel, my ability to sucessfully manage a maze sped up considerably -- and Larry has always been there too. He is an inspiring character and a great representative of real life. Not many books have stuck in my mind like Larry's Party. Carol Shields is a brilliant writer and I have enjoyed all of her books.

Ambiguous..., 18 Apr 2001
Me and/or the book, take your pick. This is the first book I've read of the authors and I've read it in two days - not because I was absorbed but because I wanted to get through the thing. I've given it three stars because on the one hand it is extraordinarily brilliant but on the other hand there is something missing. I was once told that with regard to writing 'show' don't 'tell' and I'm afraid that is what she does. Larry does this, Larry does that, Larry feels happy, sad, whatever! Perhaps that's the problem - I don't know if her other books are written in the same fashion (and I have her short story collection to get through - which I'm half dreading, half hopeful) but I find it off-putting.

Also, you could argue that there is an incredible, underlying (even poignant) meaning to the book, but some will only find it pointless. Fine if you're already a fan but if this is your first choice of hers, don't be assured that it will inspire you to try more of her work. This is a really difficult book to comment on.

A good man is hard to find, 20 Aug 2000
Oh Larry, if only you existed in real life. Carol Shields gives us a tender portrait of a real guy, just trying to do right by himself and his life. And what an interesting guy he is. I loved every minute of this book, and even missed Larry when he was gone. Read it.

What starts out as humdrum becomes totally absorbing, 19 Aug 2000
I give this 4 stars only because I belive only the best book I've ever read should get five: I don't know what that is yet. This caught me by surpise. I'd bought it for a relative called Larry, without knowing anything about it or Carol Shields and then thought I'd better read it and see what I'd done (especially since one of the chapters has a vaguely suggestive title). What at the outset seemed to be a rather mundane and pretty low-key fictional biagraphy became gradually more and more gripping. It catches Larry's development from somewhat undereducated normality to the status of highly regarded expert in his field whilst never really feeling that he has changed within himself. He seems almost surprised to find that he has developed as much. This seems to me to be a normal experience as we grow older. This is a first class book.

Take a step back from how you usually read, 04 Jul 2000
"Larry's Party" is a very clever book; Carol Shields a very clever author.Plot aside, the entire arrangement and structure of the novel demands that the reader abandons old ways of dealing with and receiving fiction,truly taking the history of the form somewhere new. One of my contemporaries complained that the book was "rubbish...nothing happens". And that is the whole point. Nothing happens, yet everything does. Larry ages, marries, divorces, has an occupation- Larry lives, and just like in 'real life', Larry's story develops and progresses steadily and surely, with no intervention or added excitement from God, or in this fictive case, Ms Shields.

Fantastic, 28 May 2007
Brilliantly written, amazingly insightful, sumptous prose that describes the little things so well. And somehow it remains very readable (much easier that the Stone Diaries - which I gave up upon). The story line is slow to start, but in retrospect, this is one the novel's achievements and it actually gives a suspense to the latter half.

And yes, it's a love story, but not a cheesy one (despite the book's title), but one that is grounded in reality which gives real power to the words.

If you havent read Carol Shields before, this is a great place to start.

PERSEVERE, 26 Sep 2005
I did not find this book compelling reading but was happily able to put it down and pick it up when it suited. The protagonists did not meet until after the half-way mark and this was frustrating. I feel the scene was perhaps too well set although I still did not feel I knew the characters very well. Their relationship therefore was not well described. I did persevere and sailed through the second half and totally loved the ending. I am now going to read another one of the author's books to see if it holds my interest sooner as it was so well written. In all this story is frustrating, just as life usually is!

A beautiful story filled with raw emotion., 27 Aug 2001
A beautiful story of how even the most ordinary of peoples lives can be changed in an instant. Told with a raw emotion so powerful you cannot fail to be moved!

Good. But really that good?, 07 Aug 2000
Right. So Fay and Tom are both single. They both have a string of failed relationships behind them. They meet by chance and fall in love at first sight. Eventually, after yet another string of unforeseeable events, they get married. So far, so good. Whatever the poetic contents of the book, the story is less than original. The fact that the novel still makes for fascinating, compulsive reading is due to Carol Shield`s softly ironic style and her almost motherly understanding of human nature. However, the background of the characters somehow seems more interesting than what actually happens to them - Fay`s thesis on mermaids fascinated me more than her love affair with Tom, whose failed three marriages also carry a lot more content than him tying the knot with Fay. Of course, the different perspectives of love in all its shapes and forms is perfectly valid, especially in our day and age, and Shields brilliantly captures the essence of singledom - freedom, yes, but at what a price. But is marriage really the one and only answer? Where are the people that live perfectly valid lives on their own? (And I`m sure there are some of those out there. Why is it that all the books on modern singledom somehow end with the marriage - or at least relationship - knot?) This is only half the story, I`m sure. However, it is a great one and I thoroughly enjoyed it.

One of the sweetest books I have ever read, 25 Feb 1999
I have read this book about four times and each time it has made me cry. It is a sweet, lyrical, lovely book and I unreservedly recommend it.

Ugly Duckling Poetry, 13 Jul 2008
Mary Swann, a farmer's wife in rural Ontario, is murdered and dismembered by her possessive husband just before her first book of poetry is published. Years later, four different people - a feminist writer, an unscrupulous biographer, the local librarian who knew her and the man who published her poems - relive their connection to Swann as they travel to the first symposeum dedicated to her work.

This novel intelligently asks whether an uneducated person can create moving poetry, and how well we can know a literary figure, especially in this day and age when people are more concerened with building their careers on top of someone's work rather than finding the truth. Shields only misses a beat in the end, with a section written as a screenplay pastiche which underwhelms.

As a follow up, you might want to read Margaret Atwood's "Negotiating with the Dead", which is about the role of the author in the world, and which includes commentary on "Mary Swann" (Carold Shields was a good friend of Atwood's.)

never trust the teller, trust the tale, 09 Nov 2006
What was that? That was the rug - and it was taken from right under your feet, by the brilliant Carol shields. And it is uncomfortable, and uncompromising, and utterly, utterly compelling. As a Pulitzer winning author,who presumably knows better than you or I, what it feels like to be "written" and "re-written" and to have our intentions reshaped, retold - "no, I did not mean that at all, I did not say that, that was not what I meant..." Well, you get the gist. In a world of celebrity when what is said is bent, or not meant, when semantics becomes the murky world not of black or white, or even grey, but a darker world of black arts, when meaning strays from language, when the life becomes the work, the question remains for Shileds, for all of us : Who are we?
If you have lost anyone you have loved, you will understand this - that when someone has gone, they become open to any interpretation we put on them. They become public property. Why? Because they cannot speak for themselves. And so they become a myriad of contradictions. How different people remember them.
Shields does not merely open the can of worms of literary biography, but states the uncomfortable truth that all of us, in life (but especially in death,) are unknowable. She slowly erodes the "facts" relating to the fictional but poignant Mary Swann, be they retold in diaries, or photographs, or conversations, or poems, or memories. The things that root all of us in the here and now become open to doubt. The things we hope that count slowly disappear in the course of "Mary Swann", and Shields successfully illuminates the greater truth: that in our lifetimes, no one will ever get close to revealing who we are. The human spirit is unknowable.
And it is in that we become aware of our own sense of loneliness, of desolation, and equally that the lonely quest to know another leaves all of us feeling unconnected, and drives Shileds' characters apart.
Whether we are looking to escape, or to be found, or to find ourselves in another, all of us are constantly on a quest which ends with us tracing our own footsteps round in a circle, back to where we started from, knowing nothing, and wondering - who we are? Who any of us are?


A beautifully written book and a constant surprise., 14 Nov 2000
Mary Swann was a Canadian housewife with a brutal husband. She led a hard dull and monotonous life isolated from other people. Her only item of luxury was a Parker 51 fountain pen and her only treat was to borrow two books every fortnight from the limited local library. Edna Ferber was one of her favourites. Yet, she wrote poetry. Small beautifully crafted rhyming verses on shabby scraps of paper that she presented to a newspaper editor in a carrier bag.

Prepared to patronise, they were to his astonishment worthy of publishing. it was not to be Mary's destiny to see the printed book - her husband murdered her shortly after the visit to the editor's office, a visit marred by her anxiety about missing the bus home.

I am not giving away all the plot here! The book centres round four main characters who are obsessed with her: Frederic Cruzzi the newspaper editor, the lonely librarian Rose Hindmarch who 'knew her best', the obsessive and bitter Morton Jimroy and Sarah Maloney, a feminist writer. Had Mary Swann lived she would not have recognised herself as the person they prepare to present at the Mary Swann symposium that is the culmination of the book. She may not have even recognised some of her poems after Cruzzi's beloved wife mistakenly discards fish bones in the bag of her work causing the ink to run.

Mary Swann remains a shadowy figure and I must confess I would have liked an extra chapter that revealed more bout her life and death and the minor mysteries that were hinted at. For instance, to whom were the love poems written?

However, perhaps like a good meal it is best to leave the table wanting just a little more.

Gentle, Enjoyable Read, 10 Feb 2002
If you want action-packed, dramatic stuff, then Carol Shields is not for you. This is a gentle, balanced and very well-written story of a couple's self-imposed separation and the problems that causes in their relationship. One complaint - because the narrative all takes place in letter-form (and therefore retrospectively) it's hard to feel totally involved with the characters. But it's an enjoyable read, nevertheless.

Wonderfully written, charting the highs & lows of a marriage, 26 Sep 2000
Another piece of innovative writing from Carol Shields, this time in collaboration with Blanche Howard (who I hadn't heard of until I saw it and it seems all her books are out of print!). They really capture the ups and downs of a difficult time in this couple's marriage. I love Carol Shields' novels - if you tried to give a synopsis of the plot, it would seem fairly uneventful, but she has the most fantastic ability to dig beneath the surface and reveal outwardly 'ordinary' characters to be complex and often extraordinary. What else can I say! If you like Carol Shields, you will not be disappointed. If you have never read her, this isn't a bad one to start with and you have the joy of all those other wonderful books of hers to look forward to - I envy you!

Very amusing and insightful for age 35-40 marrieds with kids, 09 Aug 1999
This was one of the most insightful, comic and well-written books I've read in a long time. Perhaps it is the life stage I'm at but no, I think the brand of wry humor intermingled with thought-provoking observations about marriage, middle age, career, sex, and children would be engaging to anyone. I love the idea these two authors corresponded with each other as their characters such that the evolution of the story took place almost in real time with an element of fluidity and spontaneity that only this format could achieve. Many of the characters' observations made me laugh out loud while others left me waxing on a thought for days. Excellent, excellent, excellent, don't miss this one.

I Loved This Book, 08 Aug 1999
I did love this book--just finished and was curious to see what others thought. I think the two-author "letters" format worked well, and in some humorous cases, it almost seemed as if the authors were each trying to outdo each other in character. At the same time I found great depth and truth in the letters and the insights they provide into marriage, growth, change, separation, and general observations about gender differences.

a must for summer reading!, 26 Jun 1999
a unique and fun read! cleverly written in the form of a seperated husband and wife, this book moves the plot along quickly. i loved it! it is a shame it wasn't longer, as it was a private peek into a marriage that showed 'warts and all'. read it this summer...you'll pass it on!

This is the third short story collection from the prize-winning Canadian novelist Carol Shields. It is neatly enwrapped by two stories involving clothes: the title story, in which a cast of characters stride out into the day and "Dressing Down" about a nudist whose wife enjoys the comfort of layers. In "Dressing for the Carnival", a delightfully anti-climactic tale, Tamara dresses in yellow, without checking the weather, for "her clothes are the weather, as powerful in their sunniness as the strong, muzzy early morning light." Only X, an anonymous middle-aged man, stays indoors, dancing in his wife's nightie and watching "cycles of consolation and enhancement" from afar.

In "Dressing Down", the vigorous nudist and his wife separate and the story captures her final poignant gesture towards amends. In the hilarious "Invention", a husband is left behind when his wife finds fame after inventing the steering wheel muff and the narrator traces an ancestral line of inventors including a shepherd who discovered day-dreaming and others who developed the hyphen, word space and full-stop. This story brings together the main concerns of this collection: the investigation of long-term intimacies of people who inhabit "parallel weather systems" and a self-conscious teasing of the short story form. In "A Scarf", a failed writer who's eschewed "beginnings, middles and ends" for a feminist structure ends up removing her navel by plastic surgery after an unkind remark by her husband. Her friend fails to articulate the truth about a misunderstanding and realises that not one woman in her life "was going to get what we wanted..." and remained "too kind ... not knowing how to ask for what we don't even know we want." In "Ilk", a polished and wry spoof on academic musings about "buds of narrativity", a young untenured professor wonders where she stands on "narrative enclosures". A jammed vowel key in "Absence", forces the writer to complete the story without the use of this letter and creates a clever literary pun. One of the best stories is "Windows", in which two artists struggle against a new government tax on glass and have to paint in artificial light until they resolve their light-less gloom through art itself.

A provocative, tricky and often serious collection which asks profound questions of short fiction and love's mechanisms for survival.--Cherry Smyth

always brings me back, 21 Sep 2005
I am searching amazon in order to purchase Larry's Party -- again. I read this book over seven years ago, and no matter where I have gone, esp within England, memories of this book and of Larry's life come back to me. I want to reread this novel to keep it fresh. With the help of this novel, my ability to sucessfully manage a maze sped up considerably -- and Larry has always been there too. He is an inspiring character and a great representative of real life. Not many books have stuck in my mind like Larry's Party. Carol Shields is a brilliant writer and I have enjoyed all of her books.

Ambiguous..., 18 Apr 2001
Me and/or the book, take your pick. This is the first book I've read of the authors and I've read it in two days - not because I was absorbed but because I wanted to get through the thing. I've given it three stars because on the one hand it is extraordinarily brilliant but on the other hand there is something missing. I was once told that with regard to writing 'show' don't 'tell' and I'm afraid that is what she does. Larry does this, Larry does that, Larry feels happy, sad, whatever! Perhaps that's the problem - I don't know if her other books are written in the same fashion (and I have her short story collection to get through - which I'm half dreading, half hopeful) but I find it off-putting.

Also, you could argue that there is an incredible, underlying (even poignant) meaning to the book, but some will only find it pointless. Fine if you're already a fan but if this is your first choice of hers, don't be assured that it will inspire you to try more of her work. This is a really difficult book to comment on.

A good man is hard to find, 20 Aug 2000
Oh Larry, if only you existed in real life. Carol Shields gives us a tender portrait of a real guy, just trying to do right by himself and his life. And what an interesting guy he is. I loved every minute of this book, and even missed Larry when he was gone. Read it.

What starts out as humdrum becomes totally absorbing, 19 Aug 2000
I give this 4 stars only because I belive only the best book I've ever read should get five: I don't know what that is yet. This caught me by surpise. I'd bought it for a relative called Larry, without knowing anything about it or Carol Shields and then thought I'd better read it and see what I'd done (especially since one of the chapters has a vaguely suggestive title). What at the outset seemed to be a rather mundane and pretty low-key fictional biagraphy became gradually more and more gripping. It catches Larry's development from somewhat undereducated normality to the status of highly regarded expert in his field whilst never really feeling that he has changed within himself. He seems almost surprised to find that he has developed as much. This seems to me to be a normal experience as we grow older. This is a first class book.

Take a step back from how you usually read, 04 Jul 2000
"Larry's Party" is a very clever book; Carol Shields a very clever author.Plot aside, the entire arrangement and structure of the novel demands that the reader abandons old ways of dealing with and receiving fiction,truly taking the history of the form somewhere new. One of my contemporaries complained that the book was "rubbish...nothing happens". And that is the whole point. Nothing happens, yet everything does. Larry ages, marries, divorces, has an occupation- Larry lives, and just like in 'real life', Larry's story develops and progresses steadily and surely, with no intervention or added excitement from God, or in this fictive case, Ms Shields.

Fantastic, 28 May 2007
Brilliantly written, amazingly insightful, sumptous prose that describes the little things so well. And somehow it remains very readable (much easier that the Stone Diaries - which I gave up upon). The story line is slow to start, but in retrospect, this is one the novel's achievements and it actually gives a suspense to the latter half.

And yes, it's a love story, but not a cheesy one (despite the book's title), but one that is grounded in reality which gives real power to the words.

If you havent read Carol Shields before, this is a great place to start.

PERSEVERE, 26 Sep 2005
I did not find this book compelling reading but was happily able to put it down and pick it up when it suited. The protagonists did not meet until after the half-way mark and this was frustrating. I feel the scene was perhaps too well set although I still did not feel I knew the characters very well. Their relationship therefore was not well described. I did persevere and sailed through the second half and totally loved the ending. I am now going to read another one of the author's books to see if it holds my interest sooner as it was so well written. In all this story is frustrating, just as life usually is!

A beautiful story filled with raw emotion., 27 Aug 2001
A beautiful story of how even the most ordinary of peoples lives can be changed in an instant. Told with a raw emotion so powerful you cannot fail to be moved!

Good. But really that good?, 07 Aug 2000
Right. So Fay and Tom are both single. They both have a string of failed relationships behind them. They meet by chance and fall in love at first sight. Eventually, after yet another string of unforeseeable events, they get married. So far, so good. Whatever the poetic contents of the book, the story is less than original. The fact that the novel still makes for fascinating, compulsive reading is due to Carol Shield`s softly ironic style and her almost motherly understanding of human nature. However, the background of the characters somehow seems more interesting than what actually happens to them - Fay`s thesis on mermaids fascinated me more than her love affair with Tom, whose failed three marriages also carry a lot more content than him tying the knot with Fay. Of course, the different perspectives of love in all its shapes and forms is perfectly valid, especially in our day and age, and Shields brilliantly captures the essence of singledom - freedom, yes, but at what a price. But is marriage really the one and only answer? Where are the people that live perfectly valid lives on their own? (And I`m sure there are some of those out there. Why is it that all the books on modern singledom somehow end with the marriage - or at least relationship - knot?) This is only half the story, I`m sure. However, it is a great one and I thoroughly enjoyed it.

One of the sweetest books I have ever read, 25 Feb 1999
I have read this book about four times and each time it has made me cry. It is a sweet, lyrical, lovely book and I unreservedly recommend it.

Ugly Duckling Poetry, 13 Jul 2008
Mary Swann, a farmer's wife in rural Ontario, is murdered and dismembered by her possessive husband just before her first book of poetry is published. Years later, four different people - a feminist writer, an unscrupulous biographer, the local librarian who knew her and the man who published her poems - relive their connection to Swann as they travel to the first symposeum dedicated to her work.

This novel intelligently asks whether an uneducated person can create moving poetry, and how well we can know a literary figure, especially in this day and age when people are more concerened with building their careers on top of someone's work rather than finding the truth. Shields only misses a beat in the end, with a section written as a screenplay pastiche which underwhelms.

As a follow up, you might want to read Margaret Atwood's "Negotiating with the Dead", which is about the role of the author in the world, and which includes commentary on "Mary Swann" (Carold Shields was a good friend of Atwood's.)

never trust the teller, trust the tale, 09 Nov 2006
What was that? That was the rug - and it was taken from right under your feet, by the brilliant Carol shields. And it is uncomfortable, and uncompromising, and utterly, utterly compelling. As a Pulitzer winning author,who presumably knows better than you or I, what it feels like to be "written" and "re-written" and to have our intentions reshaped, retold - "no, I did not mean that at all, I did not say that, that was not what I meant..." Well, you get the gist. In a world of celebrity when what is said is bent, or not meant, when semantics becomes the murky world not of black or white, or even grey, but a darker world of black arts, when meaning strays from language, when the life becomes the work, the question remains for Shileds, for all of us : Who are we?
If you have lost anyone you have loved, you will understand this - that when someone has gone, they become open to any interpretation we put on them. They become public property. Why? Because they cannot speak for themselves. And so they become a myriad of contradictions. How different people remember them.
Shields does not merely open the can of worms of literary biography, but states the uncomfortable truth that all of us, in life (but especially in death,) are unknowable. She slowly erodes the "facts" relating to the fictional but poignant Mary Swann, be they retold in diaries, or photographs, or conversations, or poems, or memories. The things that root all of us in the here and now become open to doubt. The things we hope that count slowly disappear in the course of "Mary Swann", and Shields successfully illuminates the greater truth: that in our lifetimes, no one will ever get close to revealing who we are. The human spirit is unknowable.
And it is in that we become aware of our own sense of loneliness, of desolation, and equally that the lonely quest to know another leaves all of us feeling unconnected, and drives Shileds' characters apart.
Whether we are looking to escape, or to be found, or to find ourselves in another, all of us are constantly on a quest which ends with us tracing our own footsteps round in a circle, back to where we started from, knowing nothing, and wondering - who we are? Who any of us are?


A beautifully written book and a constant surprise., 14 Nov 2000
Mary Swann was a Canadian housewife with a brutal husband. She led a hard dull and monotonous life isolated from other people. Her only item of luxury was a Parker 51 fountain pen and her only treat was to borrow two books every fortnight from the limited local library. Edna Ferber was one of her favourites. Yet, she wrote poetry. Small beautifully crafted rhyming verses on shabby scraps of paper that she presented to a newspaper editor in a carrier bag.

Prepared to patronise, they were to his astonishment worthy of publishing. it was not to be Mary's destiny to see the printed book - her husband murdered her shortly after the visit to the editor's office, a visit marred by her anxiety about missing the bus home.

I am not giving away all the plot here! The book centres round four main characters who are obsessed with her: Frederic Cruzzi the newspaper editor, the lonely librarian Rose Hindmarch who 'knew her best', the obsessive and bitter Morton Jimroy and Sarah Maloney, a feminist writer. Had Mary Swann lived she would not have recognised herself as the person they prepare to present at the Mary Swann symposium that is the culmination of the book. She may not have even recognised some of her poems after Cruzzi's beloved wife mistakenly discards fish bones in the bag of her work causing the ink to run.

Mary Swann remains a shadowy figure and I must confess I would have liked an extra chapter that revealed more bout her life and death and the minor mysteries that were hinted at. For instance, to whom were the love poems written?

However, perhaps like a good meal it is best to leave the table wanting just a little more.

Gentle, Enjoyable Read, 10 Feb 2002
If you want action-packed, dramatic stuff, then Carol Shields is not for you. This is a gentle, balanced and very well-written story of a couple's self-imposed separation and the problems that causes in their relationship. One complaint - because the narrative all takes place in letter-form (and therefore retrospectively) it's hard to feel totally involved with the characters. But it's an enjoyable read, nevertheless.

Wonderfully written, charting the highs & lows of a marriage, 26 Sep 2000
Another piece of innovative writing from Carol Shields, this time in collaboration with Blanche Howard (who I hadn't heard of until I saw it and it seems all her books are out of print!). They really capture the ups and downs of a difficult time in this couple's marriage. I love Carol Shields' novels - if you tried to give a synopsis of the plot, it would seem fairly uneventful, but she has the most fantastic ability to dig beneath the surface and reveal outwardly 'ordinary' characters to be complex and often extraordinary. What else can I say! If you like Carol Shields, you will not be disappointed. If you have never read her, this isn't a bad one to start with and you have the joy of all those other wonderful books of hers to look forward to - I envy you!

Very amusing and insightful for age 35-40 marrieds with kids, 09 Aug 1999
This was one of the most insightful, comic and well-written books I've read in a long time. Perhaps it is the life stage I'm at but no, I think the brand of wry humor intermingled with thought-provoking observations about marriage, middle age, career, sex, and children would be engaging to anyone. I love the idea these two authors corresponded with each other as their characters such that the evolution of the story took place almost in real time with an element of fluidity and spontaneity that only this format could achieve. Many of the characters' observations made me laugh out loud while others left me waxing on a thought for days. Excellent, excellent, excellent, don't miss this one.

I Loved This Book, 08 Aug 1999
I did love this book--just finished and was curious to see what others thought. I think the two-author "letters" format worked well, and in some humorous cases, it almost seemed as if the authors were each trying to outdo each other in character. At the same time I found great depth and truth in the letters and the insights they provide into marriage, growth, change, separation, and general observations about gender differences.

a must for summer reading!, 26 Jun 1999
a unique and fun read! cleverly written in the form of a seperated husband and wife, this book moves the plot along quickly. i loved it! it is a shame it wasn't longer, as it was a private peek into a marriage that showed 'warts and all'. read it this summer...you'll pass it on!

Sam Guglani, Bristol, 09 Jul 2004
This book, as with all Carol Shields' work, is a beautiful picture of all life, a map of what it means to be human. The reviewer writing 'life is too short to waste on this..' is seemingly lacking life. Read it, read everything she wrote and risk a little life.

Life is too short to waste on this..., 01 May 2001
I don't like to write negative reviews if I can help it - but this time I just can't help it. I picked up 2 of her books in order to try this acclaimed writer - and this was the worse of them. I feel I have wasted my time and my money. The stories are vague and mostly pointless. I believe their intention is to make you stop and think... Go and think about doing something else instead...

An excellent collection of short stories, 20 Mar 2001
Carol Shields has a feminine eye for detail, and it is this that brings to life the characters and situations that make up the short stories of this book. Mostly set in Canada and North America, the stories present a philosophy of life that finds joy in the quotidian.

Yet another thoughtful, beautifully written book by CS, 29 Feb 2000
Carol Shields has a knack of making the humdrum of daily living into something beautiful. In my opinion, she is one of the best contemporary writers around today and she is probably hugely underrated. She writes intelligently, but her stories can also be warm and humourous. She is often compared to another fellow north American female writer, Anne Tyler, but in my book Carol Shields is far far superior.

This fictionalized autobiography of Daisy Goodwill Flett, captured in Daisy's vivacious yet reflective voice, has been winning over readers since its publication in 1995, when it won the Pulitzer Prize. After a youth marked by sudden death and loss, Daisy escapes into conventionality as a middle-class wife and mother. Years later she becomes a successful gardening columnist and experiences the kind of awakening that thousands of her contemporaries in mid-century yearned for but missed in alcoholism, marital infidelity and bridge clubs. The events of Daisy's life, however, are less compelling than her rich, vividly described inner life-- from her memories of her adoptive mother to her awareness of impending death. Shields' sensuous prose and her deft characterizations have made this, her sixth novel, her most successful yet.

always brings me back, 21 Sep 2005
I am searching amazon in order to purchase Larry's Party -- again. I read this book over seven years ago, and no matter where I have gone, esp within England, memories of this book and of Larry's life come back to me. I want to reread this novel to keep it fresh. With the help of this novel, my ability to sucessfully manage a maze sped up considerably -- and Larry has always been there too. He is an inspiring character and a great representative of real life. Not many books have stuck in my mind like Larry's Party. Carol Shields is a brilliant writer and I have enjoyed all of her books.

Ambiguous..., 18 Apr 2001
Me and/or the book, take your pick. This is the first book I've read of the authors and I've read it in two days - not because I was absorbed but because I wanted to get through the thing. I've given it three stars because on the one hand it is extraordinarily brilliant but on the other hand there is something missing. I was once told that with regard to writing 'show' don't 'tell' and I'm afraid that is what she does. Larry does this, Larry does that, Larry feels happy, sad, whatever! Perhaps that's the problem - I don't know if her other books are written in the same fashion (and I have her short story collection to get through - which I'm half dreading, half hopeful) but I find it off-putting.

Also, you could argue that there is an incredible, underlying (even poignant) meaning to the book, but some will only find it pointless. Fine if you're already a fan but if this is your first choice of hers, don't be assured that it will inspire you to try more of her work. This is a really difficult book to comment on.

A good man is hard to find, 20 Aug 2000
Oh Larry, if only you existed in real life. Carol Shields gives us a tender portrait of a real guy, just trying to do right by himself and his life. And what an interesting guy he is. I loved every minute of this book, and even missed Larry when he was gone. Read it.

What starts out as humdrum becomes totally absorbing, 19 Aug 2000
I give this 4 stars only because I belive only the best book I've ever read should get five: I don't know what that is yet. This caught me by surpise. I'd bought it for a relative called Larry, without knowing anything about it or Carol Shields and then thought I'd better read it and see what I'd done (especially since one of the chapters has a vaguely suggestive title). What at the outset seemed to be a rather mundane and pretty low-key fictional biagraphy became gradually more and more gripping. It catches Larry's development from somewhat undereducated normality to the status of highly regarded expert in his field whilst never really feeling that he has changed within himself. He seems almost surprised to find that he has developed as much. This seems to me to be a normal experience as we grow older. This is a first class book.

Take a step back from how you usually read, 04 Jul 2000
"Larry's Party" is a very clever book; Carol Shields a very clever author.Plot aside, the entire arrangement and structure of the novel demands that the reader abandons old ways of dealing with and receiving fiction,truly taking the history of the form somewhere new. One of my contemporaries complained that the book was "rubbish...nothing happens". And that is the whole point. Nothing happens, yet everything does. Larry ages, marries, divorces, has an occupation- Larry lives, and just like in 'real life', Larry's story develops and progresses steadily and surely, with no intervention or added excitement from God, or in this fictive case, Ms Shields.

Fantastic, 28 May 2007
Brilliantly written, amazingly insightful, sumptous prose that describes the little things so well. And somehow it remains very readable (much easier that the Stone Diaries - which I gave up upon). The story line is slow to start, but in retrospect, this is one the novel's achievements and it actually gives a suspense to the latter half.

And yes, it's a love story, but not a cheesy one (despite the book's title), but one that is grounded in reality which gives real power to the words.

If you havent read Carol Shields before, this is a great place to start.

PERSEVERE, 26 Sep 2005
I did not find this book compelling reading but was happily able to put it down and pick it up when it suited. The protagonists did not meet until after the half-way mark and this was frustrating. I feel the scene was perhaps too well set although I still did not feel I knew the characters very well. Their relationship therefore was not well described. I did persevere and sailed through the second half and totally loved the ending. I am now going to read another one of the author's books to see if it holds my interest sooner as it was so well written. In all this story is frustrating, just as life usually is!

A beautiful story filled with raw emotion., 27 Aug 2001
A beautiful story of how even the most ordinary of peoples lives can be changed in an instant. Told with a raw emotion so powerful you cannot fail to be moved!

Good. But really that good?, 07 Aug 2000
Right. So Fay and Tom are both single. They both have a string of failed relationships behind them. They meet by chance and fall in love at first sight. Eventually, after yet another string of unforeseeable events, they get married. So far, so good. Whatever the poetic contents of the book, the story is less than original. The fact that the novel still makes for fascinating, compulsive reading is due to Carol Shield`s softly ironic style and her almost motherly understanding of human nature. However, the background of the characters somehow seems more interesting than what actually happens to them - Fay`s thesis on mermaids fascinated me more than her love affair with Tom, whose failed three marriages also carry a lot more content than him tying the knot with Fay. Of course, the different perspectives of love in all its shapes and forms is perfectly valid, especially in our day and age, and Shields brilliantly captures the essence of singledom - freedom, yes, but at what a price. But is marriage really the one and only answer? Where are the people that live perfectly valid lives on their own? (And I`m sure there are some of those out there. Why is it that all the books on modern singledom somehow end with the marriage - or at least relationship - knot?) This is only half the story, I`m sure. However, it is a great one and I thoroughly enjoyed it.

One of the sweetest books I have ever read, 25 Feb 1999
I have read this book about four times and each time it has made me cry. It is a sweet, lyrical, lovely book and I unreservedly recommend it.

Ugly Duckling Poetry, 13 Jul 2008
Mary Swann, a farmer's wife in rural Ontario, is murdered and dismembered by her possessive husband just before her first book of poetry is published. Years later, four different people - a feminist writer, an unscrupulous biographer, the local librarian who knew her and the man who published her poems - relive their connection to Swann as they travel to the first symposeum dedicated to her work.

This novel intelligently asks whether an uneducated person can create moving poetry, and how well we can know a literary figure, especially in this day and age when people are more concerened with building their careers on top of someone's work rather than finding the truth. Shields only misses a beat in the end, with a section written as a screenplay pastiche which underwhelms.

As a follow up, you might want to read Margaret Atwood's "Negotiating with the Dead", which is about the role of the author in the world, and which includes commentary on "Mary Swann" (Carold Shields was a good friend of Atwood's.)

never trust the teller, trust the tale, 09 Nov 2006
What was that? That was the rug - and it was taken from right under your feet, by the brilliant Carol shields. And it is uncomfortable, and uncompromising, and utterly, utterly compelling. As a Pulitzer winning author,who presumably knows better than you or I, what it feels like to be "written" and "re-written" and to have our intentions reshaped, retold - "no, I did not mean that at all, I did not say that, that was not what I meant..." Well, you get the gist. In a world of celebrity when what is said is bent, or not meant, when semantics becomes the murky world not of black or white, or even grey, but a darker world of black arts, when meaning strays from language, when the life becomes the work, the question remains for Shileds, for all of us : Who are we?
If you have lost anyone you have loved, you will understand this - that when someone has gone, they become open to any interpretation we put on them. They become public property. Why? Because they cannot speak for themselves. And so they become a myriad of contradictions. How different people remember them.
Shields does not merely open the can of worms of literary biography, but states the uncomfortable truth that all of us, in life (but especially in death,) are unknowable. She slowly erodes the "facts" relating to the fictional but poignant Mary Swann, be they retold in diaries, or photographs, or conversations, or poems, or memories. The things that root all of us in the here and now become open to doubt. The things we hope that count slowly disappear in the course of "Mary Swann", and Shields successfully illuminates the greater truth: that in our lifetimes, no one will ever get close to revealing who we are. The human spirit is unknowable.
And it is in that we become aware of our own sense of loneliness, of desolation, and equally that the lonely quest to know another leaves all of us feeling unconnected, and drives Shileds' characters apart.
Whether we are looking to escape, or to be found, or to find ourselves in another, all of us are constantly on a quest which ends with us tracing our own footsteps round in a circle, back to where we started from, knowing nothing, and wondering - who we are? Who any of us are?


A beautifully written book and a constant surprise., 14 Nov 2000
Mary Swann was a Canadian housewife with a brutal husband. She led a hard dull and monotonous life isolated from other people. Her only item of luxury was a Parker 51 fountain pen and her only treat was to borrow two books every fortnight from the limited local library. Edna Ferber was one of her favourites. Yet, she wrote poetry. Small beautifully crafted rhyming verses on shabby scraps of paper that she presented to a newspaper editor in a carrier bag.

Prepared to patronise, they were to his astonishment worthy of publishing. it was not to be Mary's destiny to see the printed book - her husband murdered her shortly after the visit to the editor's office, a visit marred by her anxiety about missing the bus home.

I am not giving away all the plot here! The book centres round four main characters who are obsessed with her: Frederic Cruzzi the newspaper editor, the lonely librarian Rose Hindmarch who 'knew her best', the obsessive and bitter Morton Jimroy and Sarah Maloney, a feminist writer. Had Mary Swann lived she would not have recognised herself as the person they prepare to present at the Mary Swann symposium that is the culmination of the book. She may not have even recognised some of her poems after Cruzzi's beloved wife mistakenly discards fish bones in the bag of her work causing the ink to run.

Mary Swann remains a shadowy figure and I must confess I would have liked an extra chapter that revealed more bout her life and death and the minor mysteries that were hinted at. For instance, to whom were the love poems written?

However, perhaps like a good meal it is best to leave the table wanting just a little more.

Gentle, Enjoyable Read, 10 Feb 2002
If you want action-packed, dramatic stuff, then Carol Shields is not for you. This is a gentle, balanced and very well-written story of a couple's self-imposed separation and the problems that causes in their relationship. One complaint - because the narrative all takes place in letter-form (and therefore retrospectively) it's hard to feel totally involved with the characters. But it's an enjoyable read, nevertheless.

Wonderfully written, charting the highs & lows of a marriage, 26 Sep 2000
Another piece of innovative writing from Carol Shields, this time in collaboration with Blanche Howard (who I hadn't heard of until I saw it and it seems all her books are out of print!). They really capture the ups and downs of a difficult time in this couple's marriage. I love Carol Shields' novels - if you tried to give a synopsis of the plot, it would seem fairly uneventful, but she has the most fantastic ability to dig beneath the surface and reveal outwardly 'ordinary' characters to be complex and often extraordinary. What else can I say! If you like Carol Shields, you will not be disappointed. If you have never read her, this isn't a bad one to start with and you have the joy of all those other wonderful books of hers to look forward to - I envy you!

Very amusing and insightful for age 35-40 marrieds with kids, 09 Aug 1999
This was one of the most insightful, comic and well-written books I've read in a long time. Perhaps it is the life stage I'm at but no, I think the brand of wry humor intermingled with thought-provoking observations about marriage, middle age, career, sex, and children would be engaging to anyone. I love the idea these two authors corresponded with each other as their characters such that the evolution of the story took place almost in real time with an element of fluidity and spontaneity that only this format could achieve. Many of the characters' observations made me laugh out loud while others left me waxing on a thought for days. Excellent, excellent, excellent, don't miss this one.

I Loved This Book, 08 Aug 1999
I did love this book--just finished and was curious to see what others thought. I think the two-author "letters" format worked well, and in some humorous cases, it almost seemed as if the authors were each trying to outdo each other in character. At the same time I found great depth and truth in the letters and the insights they provide into marriage, growth, change, separation, and general observations about gender differences.

a must for summer reading!, 26 Jun 1999
a unique and fun read! cleverly written in the form of a seperated husband and wife, this book moves the plot along quickly. i loved it! it is a shame it wasn't longer, as it was a private peek into a marriage that showed 'warts and all'. read it this summer...you'll pass it on!

Sam Guglani, Bristol, 09 Jul 2004
This book, as with all Carol Shields' work, is a beautiful picture of all life, a map of what it means to be human. The reviewer writing 'life is too short to waste on this..' is seemingly lacking life. Read it, read everything she wrote and risk a little life.

Life is too short to waste on this..., 01 May 2001
I don't like to write negative reviews if I can help it - but this time I just can't help it. I picked up 2 of her books in order to try this acclaimed writer - and this was the worse of them. I feel I have wasted my time and my money. The stories are vague and mostly pointless. I believe their intention is to make you stop and think... Go and think about doing something else instead...

An excellent collection of short stories, 20 Mar 2001
Carol Shields has a feminine eye for detail, and it is this that brings to life the characters and situations that make up the short stories of this book. Mostly set in Canada and North America, the stories present a philosophy of life that finds joy in the quotidian.

Yet another thoughtful, beautifully written book by CS, 29 Feb 2000
Carol Shields has a knack of making the humdrum of daily living into something beautiful. In my opinion, she is one of the best contemporary writers around today and she is probably hugely underrated. She writes intelligently, but her stories can also be warm and humourous. She is often compared to another fellow north American female writer, Anne Tyler, but in my book Carol Shields is far far superior.

The Ultimate Book - Worthy of 6 stars!, 05 Aug 2007
The Stone Diaries is the biography of the fictional Daisy Goodwill. What makes Daisy Goodwill so remarkable is the fact she is so unremarkable. Once again we see Ms Shields celebrate the ordinary, engaging us in the remarkable events of an unremarkable person.

This book should be boring (no real plot other than the lives of a regular woman) but it isn't, although I did struggle with the first 90 pages. However, after that, I was hooked. The differing, inventive writing styles, the change of person and narrators, the engrossing, realistic characters make this unputdownable.

Th beauty of the prose should also be highlighted. Ms Shields has an incredible way with words and for the majority of the book I was inclined to read it aloud, to enjoy the sound of the words, the mesmerising rhythm - something most fiction I read lacks.

What makes this book so remarkable is how much I learnt from it, how much it had to offer me. In particular there is one phenomenal passage where daughter Alice, describes how she realises she has become a person she doesn't like. Alice details how one day she became annoyed with a crack on her ceiling and that day she rubbed it back, filled it, painted the ceiling and when she went to sleep that night the crack was gone, gone completely. From that she learns that it is possible to change.

Such a simple event but so beautifully told by Ms. Shields which manages to awaken a realisation in the reader. Of course we can change, of coure I can change.

This book is remarkable, I love it and if I could give it six stars I would. This is my ultimate book and every time I pick it up, every time I flick through it the feelings I had on my first reading (the warmth, the understanding) come back to greet me.

Ms Shields, thank you.

Superb!, 08 Feb 2005
I really enjoyed this book. It tells the story of one woman's life from the beginning through to her death at the end of the twentieth century. As always, Shields draws attention to the differences in attitudes between men and women and it is particularly interesting in this book how the events of the 20th century influenced and changed social relationships. It is a warm, incredibly well written book. I believe it to be Shield's finest.

Loveless Connections from Stony Surroundings, 18 Jul 2004
If one were to rate this book for its imaginative usages of stone-based imagery, metaphors, similes, and geography, this book would be clearly a five-star effort. If a reader is looking for an imaginative variety of writing styles all in one book, this is also a five-star effort, using wonderfully easy phrases. On the other hand, if you want to feel deeply connected to a story and its characters, this may not the book for you.

The book's format is a pseudo-biography of a Canadian woman told through a series of vignettes about her life. These start with her birth in 1905, continue with her childhood in 1916, describe her first marriage in 1927, falling in love at 31 in 1936, raising her children in 1947, pursuing a career as a gardening columnist from 1955-1964, experiencing a set-back in 1965, living into retirement in 1977, having health reversals in 1985, and eventually passing on. The book comes equipped with a family tree and family photographs to complete the biographical feel.

You can think of this book also like a series of short stories. In fact, many will enjoy the book more that way than as a fictionalized biography. For example, the birth is very compelling. The section about her writing career is quite amusing and fun to read as you follow through a series of letters.

As much as I loved the stone references, to me they turned the book into self-satire so much at times that it created too much emotional distance from the book. If the references had been cut back by about 60 percent, I think they would have been brilliant. As it was, I was looking for one such reference on every page (almost like Where's Waldo?) and would break out into giggles when I found the next one even if the material was supposed to be sad.

Toward the book's end, the references abated but the story still didn't move me. Perhaps it was just that the writer's craft was so well done that its sparkling jewels outshone the content of the story by too wide a margin. There was a similar gap between the story (often far-fetched well beyond kidding around) and the characters, with the story being more interesting than the characters. Even though you often get internal dialogue, the book remains like something that you are watching from a disinterested distance rather than living within and feeling connected to.

My great grandmother, Edith Foster, was a lot like Daisy, and also was born in rural, central Canada. She lived until I was about 19, and I well remember her stories about life on the plains of Canada and immigrating to the United States. The Stone Diaries, even with its exaggerated elements, seemed pale compared to the real challenges of those days . . . which this book often omits.

The best part of Daisy's development as a character is the evolution of her confusion of fact and fantasy. At several points, you will feel like you can no longer trust your own mind and have a good sense of what that situation must be like. Nicely done!

After you enjoy the aspects of The Stone Diaries that appeal to you, I suggest that you assemble a brief autobiography that you can share with your children and grandchildren. They will probably enjoy the kinds of details this book focuses on, because they will reflect on their own origins in compelling ways.

See the past and present clearly!

Loveless Connections from Stony Surroundings, 08 May 2004
If one were to rate this book for its imaginative usages of stone-based imagery, metaphors, similes, and geography, this book would be clearly a five-star effort. If a reader is looking for an imaginative variety of writing styles all in one book, this is also a five-star effort, using wonderfully easy phrases. On the other hand, if you want to feel deeply connected to a story and its characters, this may not the book for you.

The book's format is a pseudo-biography of a Canadian woman told through a series of vignettes about her life. These start with her birth in 1905, continue with her childhood in 1916, describe her first marriage in 1927, falling in love at 31 in 1936, raising her children in 1947, pursuing a career as a gardening columnist from 1955-1964, experiencing a set-back in 1965, living into retirement in 1977, having health reversals in 1985, and eventually passing on. The book comes equipped with a family tree and family photographs to complete the biographical feel.

You can think of this book also like a series of short stories. In fact, many will enjoy the book more that way than as a fictionalized biography. For example, the birth is very compelling. The section about her writing career is quite amusing and fun to read as you follow through a series of letters.

As much as I loved the stone references, to me they turned the book into self-satire so much at times that it created too much emotional distance from the book. If the references had been cut back by about 60 percent, I think they would have been brilliant. As it was, I was looking for one such reference on every page (almost like Where's Waldo?) and would break out into giggles when I found the next one even if the material was supposed to be sad.

Toward the book's end, the references abated but the story still didn't move me. Perhaps it was just that the writer's craft was so well done that its sparkling jewels outshone the content of the story by too wide a margin. There was a similar gap between the story (often far-fetched well beyond kidding around) and the characters, with the story being more interesting than the characters. Even though you often get internal dialogue, the book remains like something that you are watching from a disinterested distance rather than living within and feeling connected to.

My great grandmother, Edith Foster, was a lot like Daisy, and also was born in rural, central Canada. She lived until I was about 19, and I well remember her stories about life on the plains of Canada and immigrating to the United States. The Stone Diaries, even with its exaggerated elements, seemed pale compared to the real challenges of those days . . . which this book often omits.

The best part of Daisy's development as a character is the evolution of her confusion of fact and fantasy. At several points, you will feel like you can no longer trust your own mind and have a good sense of what that situation must be like. Nicely done!

After you enjoy the aspects of The Stone Diaries that appeal to you, I suggest that you assemble a brief autobiography that you can share with your children and grandchildren. They will probably enjoy the kinds of details this book focuses on, because they will reflect on their own origins in compelling ways.

See the past and present clearly!

Could Not Put it Down!, 01 Feb 2004
This was a great read. I dont agree with the other readers that you did not get to know Daisy. I felt at the end of the read that I knew her quite well. Someone got me this as a Christmas present and it is not a book I would of picked up in the shop. However this has turned out to be one of my favourite books. Def worth the read, found it very hard to put the book down and always wanted to knwo what happened next! I cannot recommend this book enough!