A Country Called Home

Starred review from June 23, 2008
A newly married couple abandon the comfort of upper-class Connecticut and stake their claim in 1960s Fife, Idaho, in Pulitzer-finalist Barnes's exquisite novel. Thomas and Helen Deracotte—he a young, poor doctor, she a stifled, monied rebel—buy an isolated farm sight unseen and arrive to find it a shambles. Upon arriving in the inhospitable wilderness, Thomas realizes that he would rather live off the land for their daily sustenance than open his own medical practice, and he hires Manny, a handsome teenage vagabond, to help around the farm. When Helen has baby girl Elise, Manny ingratiates himself further with the Deracottes and becomes a loving caretaker. But when the new mother begins to feel suffocated and overwhelmed, she returns to her rebellious ways and finds herself powerfully attracted to Manny. Their relationship has dire consequences for all involved—particularly for Helen and Elise, but nobody gets off easy. Barnes's descriptions of the rugged landscape are vivid, and the characters' sadness and desires are revealed with wrenching detail.

Starred review from August 15, 2008
Barnes's second novel (after "Finding Caruso") radiates compassion for characters struggling against dreadful odds. Thomas Deracotte, a physician by training, is an idealist whose single-minded vision takes him to a run-down farm in Idaho in a misguided move to live off the land. His wife, Helen, who married him in an act of rebellion against her wealthy family, is shocked by the brutal reality of life with Thomas; all he has to offer is a tent without plumbing or electricity. Even after baby Elise arrives, Helen is painfully lonely and longs for her family. Thomas delays setting up his medical practice because the townspeople still rely on the local pharmacist. His failure as both a doctor and a farmer drives him to abuse drugs he can easily obtain. Manny, the hired man, tries to keep the farm and the family together only to fall in love with Helen. Covering 17 years, Barnes's spellbinding story details personal tragedy and failed Sixties idealism but ends with the hope of a new generation. Highly recommended for all public libraries.Donna Bettencourt, Mesa Cty. P.L., Grand Junction, CO

Copyright 2008 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

Starred review from September 1, 2008
Even more than in her superb first novel, Finding Caruso (2003), Barnes channels the experiences chronicledin her indelible memoir, In the Wilderness (1996), into fiction latticed with mystery, animated by myth, spiked with menace, and rooted in the raw poetry of the Idaho landscape. This archetypal tale of paradise lost begins when Thomas Deracotte, a newly minted doctor, and his new wife, Helen, leave Connecticut for Idaho to start a rural practice and farm. The only smart thing they do is hire Manny, a self-reliant orphan of many trades. Deracotte has also had a rough life, unlike wealthy Helen, who defied her family to marry him. They are abysmally ignorant about farming, and Deracotte is no doctor. A daughter, Elise, is born. Bewitched by the land, Deracotte turns feral, and Helen despairs. Its up to Manny to run the show. The potential for tragedy is so intense, one seems to sense theapproach ofastalking predator in dense woods. Then, as Elise comes of age and struggles to understand her strange, haunted household and painful legacy, the great wheel of life turns and new sorrows are sown. Barnes ascends in this incandescent novel of sacrifice and devotion, wildness and civilization. Such anguish, such beauty.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2008, American Library Association.)