Featured Reading Guide
Mary Lawson
Crow Lake is that rare find, a first novel so quietly assured, so compelling, and with an emotional charge so perfectly controlled, that you sense at once that his is the real thing – a literary experience to relish, a book to lose yourself in, and a name to watch. Here is a gorgeous, slowburning story of families growing up and tearing each other apart in rural Northern Ontario, where tragedy and hardship are mirrored in the landscape. Centerstage are the Morrisons whose tragedy is insidious and divisive. Orphaned young, Kate Morrison was her older brother Matt’s prot-g-, her curious fascination…
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Mary Lawson was born and brought up in a farming community in Ontario. A distant relative of L. M. Montgomery, author of Anne of Green Gables, she came to England in 1968, is married with two grown-up sons and lives in Surrey.
topAbout the Book
Crow Lake is that rare find, a first novel so quietly assured, so compelling, and with an emotional charge so perfectly controlled, that you sense at once that his is the real thing – a literary experience to relish, a book to lose yourself in, and a name to watch. Here is a gorgeous, slowburning story of families growing up and tearing each other apart in rural Northern Ontario, where tragedy and hardship are mirrored in the landscape. Centerstage are the Morrisons whose tragedy is insidious and divisive. Orphaned young, Kate Morrison was her older brother Matt’s prot-g-, her curious fascination for pondlife fed by his passionate interest in the natural world. Now a zoologist, she can identify organisms under a microscope, but seems blind to the tragedy of her own emotional life. She thinks she’s outgrown her family, who were once her entire world – but she can’t seem to outgrow her childhood or lighten the weight of their mutual past.
topStarting Points for Discussion
- Discuss the way in which the author uses description of the landscape to mirror the tragedy and hardship in the novel.
- How does the isolation of the central characters in Crow Lake aid the Development of the story and exacerbate the tension between siblings?
- Explore ways in which the ponds can be seen as symbolic of the relationship between Matt and Kate. Do you think Kate’s choice of career reflects her desire to preserve the memories she has with her brother?
- As the story develops there is a shift in the balance of power between Matt and Luke, would it be true to say this is the cause of the sibling rivalry? How does the author develop the mood of tension which grows between then?
- In her adult life, the breakdown of the relationship Kate has with Matt influences her relationships with other men. Discuss the significance of Daniels character in the novel.
- The novel moves in it’s very early stages to tragedy, do you feel this is too soon in the story for such a pivotal incident to occur, or does it provide a dramatic introduction to the rest of the novel which deals with overcoming the disaster?
Other Books by Mary Lawson
The Other Side of the Bridge…
Two brothers, Arthur and Jake, are the sons of a local farmer in the mid-1930s,…
Suggested Further Reading
- Lake of Dead Languages ~ Carol Goodman
- Petty Details of So-and-So’s Life ~ Camilla Gibb
- A Student Of Weather ~ Elizabeth Hay
- The Secret History ~ Donna Tartt
- The Lovely Bones ~ Alice Sebold