The Knitting Circle: A Novel

by Ann Hood

Overview

"An intelligent, moving read" (Pages) and "a testament to women’s friendship and to Ann Hood’s talent" (Hilma Wolitzer).

Afterthe loss of her only child, Mary Baxter finds herself unable to read or write, the activities that used to be her primary source of comfort. She reluctantly joins a knitting circle as a way to fill her lonely days—not knowing it will change her life. As they teach Mary new knitting techniques, the women in the circle also reveal their own secrets of loss, love, and hope. With time, Mary is finally able to tell her own story of grief, and in so doing finds the spark of life again.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780393330441
Publisher:	Norton, W. W. & Company, Inc.
Publication date:	01/07/2008
Pages:	352
Sales rank:	520,597
Product dimensions:	5.50(w) x 8.10(h) x 1.00(d)

About the Author

Ann Hood is the author of eight previous books, including the best-selling memoir Comfort: A Journey Through
Grief and best-selling novels The Book That Matters Most and The Knitting Circle. She lives in Providence, Rhode Island.

Editorial Reviews

This book is rich in sensory detail…This book shines a light on women helping each other and the world one stitch at a time.

Jan Marin Tramontano - Albany Times Union

Hood’s words…pull you along, like a knitting pattern, one mesmerizing, settling click at a time, stitch by stitch, row by row, until you find yourself with something solid and real.

Peggy McMullen - The Oregonian

[Hood’s] portrait of Mary’s grief is so real and so raw. The unpredictable arc of it…gives Mary’s grief a three-dimensional humanity that a less familiar portraitist might have missed…The prose of The Knitting Circle is clear, even as Mary’s perspective is clouded by heartbreak, and the pace of the story is just right.”

Beth Schwartzapfel - Providence Journal

One can only admire Hood for the effort she takes in this book to describe an insupportable grief…Undeniably real. The lesson—that being willing to share our stories, we learn how to live—cannot be dismissed.

Julie Wittes Schlack - Boston Globe

Powerful and affecting.

John Marshal - Seattle Post-Intelligencer

I closed The Knitting Circle feeling uplifted, even cleansed. I felt as if I were seeing with fresh eyes, ready to forgive old hurts and entertain new thoughts.”

Marion Winik - Newsday

A heartbreaker.

Elissa Schappel - Vanity Fair

Acutely moving…The women’s tragedies unfurl like skeins of yarn rolling down a slope.

Allison Lynn - People

A wondrously simple book about something complicated: the nearly unendurable process of enduring a great loss. The novel, like knitting, seems to make itself up as it goes along, the threads bound and gathered into a whole.

Carrie Brown - Washington Post

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