Over and over again, with book after book, I am awed by the prodigious artistry of Alice Hoffman and her ability to place the reader into any setting, time or place, and make them feel as though they are in the actual midst of the characters, perhaps as a concerned friend, but more likely as an unseen observer. Her writing is so evocative, so almost telepathically descriptive, that you feel you are there, whether it is in the garden of an old farmhouse near the waterfront somewhere on Cape Cod (as in this novel), in a remote village in war-torn France (The World That We Knew), or on the Caribbean island of St. Thomas (The Marriage of Opposites).
Blackbird House is a series of loosely connected stories that serve as chapters for what might be called the life of a home, first built during the British occupation of New England, by a fisherman for his wife. The house passes from family to family through purchases or bequests, but even as it and the times change, certain aspects of its occupants remain, whether it is in the turnips planted in the vegetable garden, or the mysterious white-feathered blackbird that continues to appear but can be seen only by some of those who reside there.
The house stands witness to two centuries-plus of love, tragedy, loyalty, betrayals and reconciliations. It represents the survival of the human spirit and its triumphs over all attempts by man or nature to tear it down or destroy it.
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