This a series of essays about a real bed and breakfast owned by two bachelor brothers (Hector and Virgil) -- along with their parrot Mrs. Rochester and their cat Waffle) on an island off Vancouver, Canada. The exact whereabouts remain undisclosed. This author's prose is like poetry --his descriptions are magical. What a lovely book.

Their B&B is off the beaten track with not much to do except relax and enjoy reading a book from their library (or your own).

One favorite sentence in this book is when a character describes himself and his guests as "gentle, bookish, and ever so slightly confused." This book will be loved by people who feel they too are "gentle, bookish, and ever so slightly confused." It is truly a gentle book. It is relaxing, refreshing, and if you are a book lover you feel you are among friends while you read. For laugh out loud funny -- the characters discover music's effect on the rate that chickens lay eggs

Although I enjoyed this book, it was not nearly as good as the first book "Bachelor Brothers Bed and Breakfast." Still worth a read though.

This was the Costa Book of the Year (the former Whitbread Book Award), and it should win even more awards than that. Daringly, the author sets her work in Canada's frigid northern territory in the 19th century. As winter closes in on tiny Dove River, Mrs. Ross stumbles into the cabin of mysterious neighbor Laurent Jammet and finds him murdered. Distressingly, her adopted son Francis, something of an outsider himself, disappears at the same time. Francis is conveniently suspected of the deed, and the Company (which runs just about everything in this neck of the woods) sends Donald Moody to investigate. New to Canada, Donald struggles to find his way among the hardened settlers. Then another man, clearly native, is spotted in Jammet's cabin, arrested and beaten, and mysteriously released. In the ensuing mayhem, no one seems to have considered Mrs. Ross's devotion and resilience—she's gone to find her son. Plot summary cannot do justice to this complex and engrossing tale of human passion and folly, highlighted by the rigors of a wilderness being systematically despoiled. The characters are distinctive, their portraits startling and incisive, and the writing is fluid and beautifully detailed.

This was a novel that I could not put down and the characters were so beautifully depicted that I know each of them personally! A wonderful book and this is only this author's first novel. I can't wait to see what she comes up with next. A must read to any reader.

This book summarises thousands of studies done about pregnancy and birth. Surprisingly, many of the tests and procedures routinely offered to pregnant women have no basis in scientific fact. It is an indispensable tool for advocating for yourself and your child.

Some fascinating facts revealed:

-non-stress tests and fetal kick counts do not improve outcomes for babies; in fact in one study the babies who were treated by doctors who had access to non-stress test dat actually fared worse!
-there is no treatment that has proven effective for gestational diabetes, and most larger than average babies will be born to women who do not have GD
-over half of women who experience bleeding in pregnancy do not miscarry
-infant mortality is the same for hospital and home birth with a skilled caregiver
-between 50-70% of women who ae found to test positive for GD will test negative when they are retested

The book is relatively non-judgmental, but offers the pros and cons of various procedures.

It's hard to believe this book was written by the same author as "The Accordian Crimes". I found this story of a down-on-his-luck father very intriguing. The setting of the book was interesting also.

Library Journal:
Off the beaten track of contemporary American fiction in both style and setting, this remarkable second novel by the author should capture the attention of readers and critics. Huge, homely Quoyle works off and on for a newspaper. His cheating wife Petal is killed in a car crash while abandoning him and their two preschool daughters. Wallowing in grief, Quoyle agrees to accompany his elderly aunt and resettle in a remote Newfoundland fishing village. Memorable characters--gay aunt Agnis, difficult daughter Bunny, new love interest Wavey, many colorful locals in their new hometown--combine with dark stories of the Quoyle family's past and the staccato, often subjectless or verbless sentences (bound to make English teachers cringe) to create a powerful whole.

Kate Morrison relives childhood events in the small Canadian farming community of Crow Lake, Ont., during a family reunion. When Kate is only seven, her parents are killed in a car accident, and her 19-year-old brother, Luke, abandons academic success to keep the siblings together. Instead, it is Matt, 17 and brilliant, who reluctantly and guiltily agrees to finish high school and go on to college, all the while sharing in the care of Kate and her baby sister, Bo. The violent history of the neighboring Pye family intrudes into the Morrisons' lives, ruining Matt's plans, and it is ultimately Kate who escapes into an academic career.

The author spent much of this book dangling a carrot about what happened, what happened, what happened. In the end, the "carrot" was pretty much suspected all along so was no big surprise. The author did not connect the characters as close together as she tried and their relationship with their neighbors did not seem very important in the end.

With this collection of stories, Alice Munro has drawn upon some of her own family history to shape her narratives. However, she has added her own interpretation of events. As she states in her Foreward: "Their words & my words, a curious re-creation of lives, in a given setting that was as truthful as our notion of the past can ever be."

A series of related stories that combined together = anovel. They are told from the viewpoint of 6 year old Vanessa who describes herself as a "professional listener". She narrates the lives of her parents, grandparents, aunts & uncles during the depression years & beginning of WW2. There is no sentiment here, only facts & the cumulative effect of what happens can break the heart.