Some books have the power to remain with the reader forever;
The Drowned Village is such a book. If there is one lesson to be learned from
this story, it is that none of us can expect to have complete control over our
lives. There is always the possibility that we will be dealt an unexpected
blow, even an undeserving one, and even the most unfortunate among us must
continue to put one foot in front of the other and make the best from what we
have left.
Read the full review below or watch the video here or at https://youtu.be/fp03wQGuvX8.
Stella is ten years old in 1935 as she walks the Old Corpse
Road with her father, her younger sister and a funeral procession for her
mother. The family is poor, the father cobbling together the barest of income
by making repairs to neighbors’ equipment, such as bicycles. With his wife
gone, he must support his family while also babysitting three-year-old Jessie
while Stella is at school. When his elderly father requires assistance with his
most basic of needs, he must move him into his own home and care for him as well.
Added to this weight is the news that Brackendale Green, the English village in
which they live, will be completely demolished as a newly built dam is expected
to flood the village.
Through the course of this book, we see a motherless child
forced to grow up all too swiftly as catastrophic events beyond her control
cause her to lose everything she’s ever known. She blames herself through the
decades for being unable to stop these events, despite the fact that she was
only a child when they occurred.
As we flash forward to the present day, Stella is an elderly
woman urging her grown granddaughter Laura to visit the Lake District after an
unusual drought has left the lakebed dry, exposing the village for the first
time in decades. There are secrets hidden in the ruins, secrets that have
haunted Stella for an entire lifetime and now, too frail to go herself, it is
up to Laura to uncover them and set things right. Laura is rebounding from a
disastrous relationship and needs a break from her job and caring for her
grandmother. What she will find in the drowned village will change not only her
grandmother’s life but also her own.
The Lake District with its condemned village, inspired by
the real Haweswater reservoir and Mardale Valley, comes alive. I could feel the
heaviness as Stella walked along the Old Corpse Road, could picture the variety
of characters in the village—both friend and foe—and I felt as though I had
been transported back in time. The characters are so multi-dimensional that I
realized I was intentionally slowing down my reading because I did not want the
book to end. And when it did, I found myself dreaming about Stella, her father
and her sister.
The Drowned Village by Kathleen McGurl is a classic. I highly recommend it.
