Bookish Thoughts: North of Here by Laurel Saville

North of Here by Laurel Saville

Lake Union Publishing, 2016

Fiction; 257 pgs

From Goodreads: 

The sounds of unexpected tragedies—a roll of thunder, the crash of metal on metal—leave Miranda in shock amid the ruins of her broken family.  

As she searches for new meaning in her life, Miranda finds quiet refuge with her family’s handyman, Dix, in his cabin in the dark forests of the Adirondack Mountains. Dix is kind, dependable, and good with an ax—the right man to help the sheltered Miranda heal—but ultimately, her sadness creates a void even Dix can’t fill.  

When a man from her distant past turns up, the handsome idealist now known as Darius, he offers Miranda a chance to do meaningful work at The Source, a secluded property filled with his nature worshipers. Miranda feels this charismatic guru is the key to remaking her life, but her grief and desire for love also create an opportunity for his deception. And in her desperate quest to find herself after losing almost everything, Miranda and Dix could pay a higher price than they ever imagined.

Every Tuesday Diane from Bibliophile By the Sea First Chapter First Paragraph Tuesday Intros, where participants share the first paragraph (or a few) of a book they are reading or thinking about reading soon. It is also where I share my first impressions about the book I am sharing.

As Miranda moved through the house, putting away a load of laundry, picking up the glass her mother left in the living room the previous night, straightening the magazines on the coffee table, removing a few dead flowers from a vase, she found herself glancing out of each window, her view of him coming and going, her perspective on him a bit different from each vantage point. He was like a man inside a kaleidoscope to her, fractured bits and pieces coming together and moving apart and then coming together again in a slightly different form.

Every Tuesday, Jenn from A Daily Rhythm hosts Teaser Tuesdays at which time participants grab their current read, open to a random page, and share a couple or more "teaser" sentences from that page while avoiding any spoilers.

Teaser from 50% on my Kinde:

Then he smiled and his entire demeanor altered, an actor slipping into character. Somewhere deep inside her, Miranda recognized that he was giving a performance, and yet she did not care. It didn't seem to matter. She was willingly transfixed by the play.

What do you think? Would you keep reading? 


My Bookish Thoughts: 

I found North of Here . . . unexpected. The above description is a fitting one, but the novel took a turn I  hadn't expected--I feel it's safe to say that without spoiling anything.  This really is a novel about the characters in many ways, about the way their lives interconnect, and the consequences of their actions and inactions.

Although it is never said, Miranda is clearly depressed, feeling helpless and lost after everything she has been through. Raised in wealth, she has never wanted for anything. With all that now gone, she is forced to re-evaluate her life, only she is not in the mental frame to do it. She doesn't know what she wants, not really. She isn't sure what she needs. Laurel Saville has created a character in which her feelings, her grief and sense of hopelessness, seem so very real. She is like a wounded bird you cannot resist but want to help.

I liked Dix instantly. I am not at all like him myself, but I wish I was. He gets things done. He fixes things. He respects the land and lives a relatively simple life. People think of him as just another local, uneducated and simple. They would be wrong. He is the local handyman who goes out of his way to help Miranda, taking her under his wing. Perhaps his biggest strength and also his biggest weakness is that he takes things as they are and doesn't often ask questions or sweat the small stuff. While admirable on one hand, it makes one wonder if it also meant a lost opportunity or two.

Then there is David, aka Darius, who is lost in his own way. Dropping out of college, he wanders aimlessly in search of a purpose. He stumbles on land and envisions building a life there--not just for himself, but for wounded people and troubled teens. Armed with the knowledge he has gained from self-help books and his own ego, he is sure he is the one who can save them. His good looks and charisma made me wary of him, but not so the other characters in the novel.

Sally was more of an enigma to me. I did not much care for her at first. She is a social worker by trade, and owns the land Darius wants to buy.  She decides to stay on in the house with Darius, saying she wants to make sure he pays the mortgage. Perhaps loneliness drives her initially. That and Darius's good looks. I was disappointed in her as the novel continued, in her complacency particularly. She isn't dumb. She knows how the real world works, is a bit hardened because of her experiences, and obviously has a heart. By the end of the novel, she redeemed herself somewhat in my eyes.

As the novel progresses, the relationships of the characters evolve, and not always in the best or even expected ways. Perhaps this is what makes them so very human and real. You see Miranda's depression grow worse and her need to fill a void in her life grow. She ostracizes the one person who offers her a safe haven, turning instead to the false promise of The Source, the community Darius has put together which is made up of women and the occasional teen or two.

The novel is told in third person, divided into three sections. The narrative winds slowly along at times and speeds up at others, jumping days and weeks ahead. This sometimes can bother me in novels, but I felt it worked well in this one.  I found North of Here to be a quiet and unassuming novel, as well as quite compelling. I became emotionally invested in the characters and their stories. I have so many questions on finishing the book--about the characters, about the choices they made. I can see this one being a good one for a book club. There's certainly a lot here to discuss.


To learn more about Laurel Saville and her work, please visit the author's website. She can also be found on Goodreads, Twitter, and Facebook.

I hope you will check out what others had to say about North of Here on the TLC Book Tours route!

Many thanks to the TLC Book Tours for the opportunity to be a part of this book tour. I selected this book as part of Amazon's First Program for Prime Members.

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© 2016, Wendy Runyon of Musings of a Bookish Kitty. All Rights Reserved. If you're reading this on a site other than Musings of a Bookish Kitty or Wendy's feed, be aware that this post has been stolen and is used without permission.