South of Superior

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More About This Book

Overview

A debut novel full of heart, in which love, friendship, and charity teach a young woman to live a bigger life.

When Madeline Stone walks away from Chicago and moves five hundred miles north to the coast of Lake Superior, in Michigan's Upper Peninsula, she isn't prepared for how much her life will change.

Charged with caring for an aging family friend, Madeline finds herself in the middle of beautiful nowhere with Gladys and Arbutus, two octogenarian sisters-one sharp and stubborn, the other sweeter than sunshine. As Madeline begins to experience the ways of the small, tight-knit town, she is drawn into the lives and dramas of its residents. It's a place where times are tough and debts run deep, but friendship, community, and compassion run deeper. As the story hurtles along-featuring a lost child, a dashed love, a car accident, a wedding, a fire, and a romantic reunion-Gladys, Arbutus, and the rest of the town teach Madeline more about life, love, and goodwill than she's learned in a lifetime.

A heartwarming novel, South of Superior explores the deep reward in caring for others, and shows how one who is poor in pocket can be rich in so many other ways, and how little it often takes to make someone happy.

Editorial Reviews

Publishers Weekly
In Airgood's charming yet uninspired debut, Madeline Stone takes a job caring for Gladys Hansen, the final companion of the grandfather she never knew, and Gladys's ailing sister in McAllaster, Mich. On the north coast of Lake Superior she finds "a wide, wild quiet, so spacious it seemed endless, and she wondered how it might change a person." Gladys, the younger, feistier of the two sisters, is desperate to hold onto the old ways even as modern life becomes too obvious to ignore. She's the bad cop to her sister's good, and Madeline finds it hard to adjust to her meanness. She also finds it discomfiting when locals comment on her resemblance to ancestors she never knew, and Gladys is less than forthcoming about the Stone family history. To help fill her days, Madeline takes a part-time job at the local pizzeria and becomes close to Paul, the owner, who has financial woes of his own. Over time, Madeline and Gladys make peace, and old secrets are revealed. An abandoned child that Madeline takes in finally allows Airgood to address her prevailing theme—the true nature of family. (June)
Kirkus Reviews

Madeline Stone goes back to her roots in rural Michigan and finds the missing bits of herself, in a heartwarming if drawn-out debut.

Matching pace to place, there's little urgency either in Airgood's novel or in McAllaster, the small town on the shore of Lake Superior for which 35-year-old Madeline impulsively, implausibly gives up life, work and a fiancé in Chicago. The reason given is to take care of sweet, elderly Arbutus and her cranky sister Gladys, who had been the "good friend" of Joe, Madeline's grandfather. When Madeline's druggie young mother abandoned her illegitimate baby, Joe could have taken the child in, but he refused, and Madeline was brought up by a kind stranger whose long, recently concluded battle with cancer has equipped her for taking care of the elderly. Finding friends, a little family and the attractive owner of the pizza parlor in McAllaster, Madeline also develops an ambition to take over Gladys' and Arbutus' decayed but lovely old hotel. Airgood uses scattered events (a court case, a fire, a traffic accident) to point out community values, the long play of rural history and therapeutic, neighborly good deeds. More sensitive, less sugary than similar books in the genre, this combination of romance and self-discovery ends, unsurprisingly, in a tidy, happy place.

Pleasant and comforting, like Gladys' cardamom rolls.

Product Details

  • ISBN-13: 9781594487934
  • Publisher: Penguin Group (USA) Incorporated
  • Publication date: 6/9/2011
  • Pages: 384
  • Sales rank: 40,701
  • Product dimensions: 8.34 (w) x 5.72 (h) x 1.25 (d)

Meet the Author

Ellen Airgood runs a diner in Grand Marais, Michigan. This is her first novel.
Customer Reviews
Average Rating 4
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  • Posted April 14, 2011

    more from this reviewer

    A winner

    Gladys Hanson sends a sympathy card to Madeline Stone following the death of Emmy the woman who raised the latter. Madeline's biological mother Jackie abandoned her when she was two years old and her late maternal grandfather Joe refused to raise her. Gloria also invites Madeline to move from Chicago to McAllister, Michigan to help her with her arthritic ailing sister Arbitus "Butte". Although Gladys was Joe's paramour, Madeline accepts leaving her job and boyfriend behind. Gladys proves unfriendly, but Butte makes her feel at home.

    At the general store, Madeline meets pizza parlor owner Paul Garceau who also cooks at the nearby prison. The sisters argue over seeing the mothballed Hotel Leppinen they own as they have no money. Gladys sends Madeline to the hotel to get something. Madeline loves the hotel and thinks of possibilities. She goes to the pizza shop and asks for a waitressing job. Paul hires her. Gladys is upset but Butte is pleased with Madeline obtaining a job. Single mom Randi dumps Grey on Madeline at the pizza shop, but fails to return. Madeline takes Grey home with her. Later Madeline learns from Mary about her Great Uncle Walter who lives in a home for simple minded people; she visits him. As Madeline tries to renovate the hotel, she angers seemingly everyone except Butte; so considers leaving.

    The key ensemble cast especially the heroine, her "great-aunts" and to a lesser degree her beloved is all developed while a sense of being in Michigan is a key element that anchors the plot. The reason Paul becomes angry with Madeline seems weak though critical. Still readers will enjoy South of Superior, as Madeline and the audience learn what family means.

    Harriet Klausner

    3 out of 3 people found this review helpful.

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  • Posted August 16, 2011

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    A must read for anyone who loves the southern shore of Lake Superior

    If your mother had abandoned you in a soup kitchen at age three and your grandfather had refused to raise you, what kind of adult would you be?
    How would you react when years after your grandfather's death, a stranger asks if you'd be interested in relocating to the isolated village where your he had made his home? Would a deep hidden anger and yearning for answers prompt you to leave behind a sophisticated fiance and the bustle of Chicago for a life as uncertain as the weather on the greatest of all lakes? Author Airgood has created a town peopled with strong, but flawed characters, each one adding to Madeline's unfolding understanding of her heritage and her future. Ellen Airgood's small town has outlived the grandeur of the mining and logging days, just as the real small towns that dot the UP's shoreline. You won't find the opulence of earlier times, but you'll find that "sisu" (Finnish for courage) still abounds.

    This book will offer much for book clubs to discuss, and as someone for whom Lake Superior has an almost mystical pull, South of Superior has demanded that I make yet one more trip to its shores.

    2 out of 2 people found this review helpful.

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  • Posted July 17, 2011

    Loved it.

    Remeniscent of the old TV show Northern Exposures, South of Superior is a tall drink of ice cold lemonade in an eccentric forgotten town where its inhabitants share a peculiar brand of small town love and devotion. Amazing read.

    2 out of 2 people found this review helpful.

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  • Anonymous

    Posted July 27, 2011

    Excellent!

    This is a perfect summer read! An excellent book, and the author leaves us wanting a sequel.

    1 out of 1 people found this review helpful.

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  • Anonymous

    Posted February 15, 2012

    Highly Recommend

    This was a nice book to sit back and relax with. It makes you appreciate the little things. I look forward to her writing another book.

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  • Posted January 16, 2012

    A wonderful surprise.

    Ellen is the kid sister of my best friend from high school, and so I bought this book to be "supportive." I began reading and found that I could not put it down. It was a wonderful surprise that the characters were solid and the story was compelling. I got involved with the story and the characters and really ended up caring what happened. Ellen's style is light and respectful, and I can see how the experience she has as the owner of a diner has made it's mark on her writing. She didn't press her characters to do things but allowed them to make their own decisions. She didn't judge. Her characters and story developed and blossomed in their own time, and the story was not too short or too long. I would highly recommend reading!

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  • Anonymous

    Posted November 22, 2011

    Entertaining but not great

    Airgood provides an good sense of place and a generally interesting story. However, characters and plot are too often superficial and implausible.

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  • Posted October 17, 2011

    more from this reviewer

    Very enjoyable book, true to the UP

    I really enjoyed getting to know all these characters and I am sorry the book is over. I am from the UP, so I had to read this. And I find it to be so true to the lives and interests and sheer difficulty of making a life in in the UP. Very well done.

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  • Posted September 29, 2011

    Absolutely loved it!

    It was a wonderful heartwarming tale about the hard lives of people in small towns in forgotten places and their relationships with everyone- friend and foe. The lake and countryside and homes were depicted so effortlessly they seemed like a main character in the book. I loved the mystery of Madeline's family and her relationship and how she came to terms with all of them. Gladys and many of the residents slowly, quietly feed information to Madeline as she learns about her grandfather and her mother and other family members changing many old images and perceptions she had grown up with. Gladys and Arbutus were sisters we all wish we could have, and the caring in their community for everyone's problems- make one wonder that maybe the bright lights and big cities aren't the answer to everyday life. It made me homesick for a place I never lived, but only visited for two weeks every summer as I grew up for years and years. My father's Swedish family is from the UP in Marquette, Houghton, Munising and other small towns in that general area. I loved the mystery of the woods that went on for ever, the cold dark beauty of Lake Superior, and the abundant small ponds and lakes for fishing, the logging trucks and iron ore boats so different from the hustle and bustle of living in the suburbs far away in southern Michigan and Ohio. The book captured all of it. I am buying up copies for all my relatives in the UP as well as my city friends for this charming and heartwarming story!

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    Posted February 4, 2012

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