Book Of The Month February, 2010
The Day the Falls Stood StillCathy Marie Buchanan
Bess Heath is born to a life of privilege, one bound by Edwardian convention and a duty to marry well.But in 1915, on the verge of her eighteenth birthday, she returns home from school to an unfamiliar scene the elegance of the life she once knew has vanished, her father is a broken man, jobless and losing hope, and her mother is struggling to keep the family afloat. Isabel, the lively, charismatic sister Bess has always relied on is almost unrecognisable. Her engagement called off, she languishes in her bedroom, brooding and refusing to eat. And all the while the society Bess has always known faces its own transition one where the magnificence of Niagara Falls is threatened by the power companies that seek to harness its power for themselves. Forced into an early adulthood, Bess finds solace with riverman Tom Cole, against her family s strong objections. He is not from their world. Rough-hewn and guileless, Tom has as uncanny knack for reading the Niagara s whims and a reputation for daring rescues on the river. He understands better than anyone the awesome and potentially devastating power of the falls and consoles her through a tragedy that nearly ruins her. But as their lives become more fully entwined, Bess is forced to make a painful choice between what she wants and what is best for her family
What We Think
Kate Elton, Publisher Century & Arrow on The Day the Falls Stood Still:
The Day The Falls Stood Still is an epic love story as rich, spellbinding and majestic as the falls themselves, bringing us a heroine who sees across class boundaries and falls for a good man when she finds him. It is also an absorbing historical chronicle. Loosely based on actual events surrounding the life of legendary Niagara riverman William ‘Red’ Hill, it portrays a time when daredevils shot the river rapids in barrels and great industrial fortunes were made and lost as quickly as lives disappeared. It is also a story in which men fish, trap, and invent; it’s a book about resilience, community, and pulling together in troubled and changing times.
I absolutely fell in love with this satisfyingly substantial novel, which follows Bess through from being a naive, protected, privileged teenage girl to a wife and mother, supporting her family in a world changed forever by the First World War. Both period and place are fantastically well drawn, she’s a wonderful heroine, and I defy anyone not to cry buckets at the end.