Book #44: Year of Wonders

Title: Year of Wonders


Author: Geraldine Brooks


We see 1666, the year that her village (Eyam, in the north of England) was seized by Plague through Anna Frith's eyes in Geraldine Brooks's novel Year of Wonders. It reminded me a lot of The Scarlet Letter, probably because the protagonist is a solitary woman whose main interactions are with a minister who has lost his marbles. However, I think it's lighter in tone (if you can call a book where more than half the people die light in tone) than The Scarlet Letter, possibly because Brooks is a century and a half further removed from Puritanism than Hawthorne.


As I read some reviews of Year of Wonders, Brooks's position as a 21st-century female (and her projection of her own views on Anna Frith) was a cause of consternation for many readers. It didn't bother me. I was reading the book for enjoyment and escapement, not really for education. In fact, I really liked the book, although I agree with readers that the end seemed a bit silly and unlikely.


--originally published 7/9/06