My Rating: 3 of 5 Stars
The setting for Saints of Big Harbour is small-town Cape Breton, NS in the early '80s. The main character is Guy Boucher - a teenage boy, being raised by his single-mother, who innocently finds himself in the middle of the small-town rumor mill.
The story is told from the point of view of many characters - Guy (of course); his overbearing, alcoholic uncle Isadore; Alison Mason, Guy's English teacher (and Isadore's drinking buddy); Corrine, the popular girl that Guy would like to have as his girlfriend; Pam, Corrine's best friend; and many others.
I'd have to say I liked this book, but certainly did not love it. The overall feel of the book I found to be a bit depressing. In the synopsis from the cover, "As the story unfolds, so does a rich and often funny portrait of a community...", and in reviews I've seen many references of "hilarious", but I did not find humor here. However, I did like Coady's style of writing, and found the way the story unfolded through the point of view of several characters to be interesting & kept me turning the pages.
This is my fourth book read for the 8th Annual Canadian Book Challenge.
Love the setting, have been to Cape Breton and it is lovely. The people there are so friendly. Could be their humor is just really different than ours. I'll look for this one!
ReplyDeleteI read this back in 2009 and liked it.
ReplyDeletehttp://www.teenaintoronto.com/2010/05/book-saints-of-big-harbour-2009-lynn.html