Girl Giant
Kristen Den Hartog
(Author)
21,000+ Reviews
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Description
A critically acclaimed bestseller in Canada, The Girl Giant is "emotionally exquisite and heartfelt" (The Globe and Mail)--a gorgeous and moving literary novel about a girl whose affliction gives her the mysterious power to see into the dark secrets of her family's past and present. "Something good can come from even the most terrifying things. For eve y thing that is taken away, something else is given." Ruth Brennan is a giant, "a rare, organic blunder pressed into a dollhouse world," as she calls herself. Growing up in a small town, where even an ordinary person can't simply fade into the background, there is no hiding the fact that Ruth is different: she can see it in the eyes of everyone around her, even her own parents. James and Elspeth Brennan are emotionally at sea, struggling with the devastation wrought on their lives by World War II and with their unspoken terror that the daughter they love may, like so much else, one day be taken away from them. But fate works in strange ways, and Ruth finds that for all the things that go unsaid around her, she is nonetheless able to see deeply into the secret hearts of others--their past traumas, their present fears, and the people they might become, if only they have courage enough.
Product Details
Price
$15.99
Publisher
Simon & Schuster
Publish Date
June 12, 2012
Pages
240
Dimensions
5.11 X 7.42 X 0.67 inches | 0.37 pounds
Language
English
Type
Paperback
EAN/UPC
9781451656176
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About the Author
Kristen den Hartog's previous novels are Water Wings, The Perpetual Ending, which was a finalist for the Toronto Book Award, and Origin of Haloes. The Occupied Garden: A Family Memoir of War-torn Holland was written with her sister, Tracy Kasaboski, and was a Globe Notable Book of 2008. She lives in Toronto with her husband and daughter.
Reviews
"Gorgeously written and tremendously moving . . . More than a coming-of-age tale, this is the story of a whole family and the secrets that haunt each member. Every sentence sparkles."--Karen Thompson Walker, New York Times bestselling author of The Age of Miracles
"With exquisite insight and boundless imagination, Kristen den Hartog takes me inside the soul and body of a young giant, letting me experience her bliss, her shame, her wisdom. Heartbreaking and exhilarating."--Ursula Hegi, author of Children and Fire
"In a post-World War II Canada, a young girl quickly grows to seven feet tall. This absorbing novel chronicles the excruciating loneliness of her adolescence, the strains in her parents' marriage, and the development of her uniquely optimistic view toward life."--Real Simple
"'It certainly was something to feel my body elongating, opening out like the longest telescope that ever was, ' confides young Ruth Brennan in Kristen den Hartog's short yet ambitious The Girl Giant, a novel set in Canada after World War II about a deeply intuitive girl who grows to be more than seven feet tall."--Elle
"[A] delicately-drawn portrait...Innocent and dreamy, combining fairy tale and true giants in history, den Hartog's simple story offers a sweetly insightful mix of anguish and tenderness."--Kirkus Reviews
"Like Hilary Mantel's The Giant O'Brien and Ellen Bryson's The Transformation of Bartholomew Fortuno, den Hartog's lovingly fashioned narrative turns people often labeled as freaks into human beings with whom the reader can identify."--Library Journal
"Very intimate . . . Den Hartog paints a picture of ordinary lives simply trying to deal with their own demons while holding on to what they love. It is a lovely book written with tenderness for all the characters."--Louisville Courier-Journal
"Den Hartog's small-in-scale novel about an enormous girl . . . [r]eads like both an expanded bedtime story and a quiet, coming-of-age novel."--Booklist
"[A] beautifully written book about family, relationships, and accepting who we are in relation to the people we love. . . . In addition to being a beguiling story, The Girl Giant is beautifully written with a dreamy, poetic feel to it."--Belletrista.com
"James and Elspeth, an ordinary couple, become a spectacle when their daughter, Ruth, grows more than seven feet tall. With a delicate and lyrical touch, Kristen den Hartog forces the parents to confront their buried fears in [The Girl Giant], letting the intuitive Ruth navigate the often-scary world."--Elle (Canada)
"Den Hartog captures and amplifies the terrifying fascination all parents feel about their new child by placing Ruth at the centre of a family that teeters around her every issue (normalcy, beauty, growth, bullying, broken hearts, future hopes), all of which are monumentalized by the girl's size . . . emotionally exquisite and heartfelt, and captures the madness of parenting in an utterly unique twist on the first-person point of view."--The Globe and Mail
"[The Girl Giant]--inspired by Diane Arbus's 1970 photograph of an American giant and the 'triangle of mother, father, and child'--is a poignant coming-of-age story leavened by an endearing if vulnerable character whose world view is conveyed through inviting, effortless prose."--Brett Josef Grubisic, Vancouver Sun
"Breathtaking . . . den Hartog works wonders with both the mundane and the extraordinary--we've read accounts of storming the beaches of France during the Second World War before, but the author's recounting is vivid and freshly startling. She can move a reader to tears as well as to awe."--Winnipeg Free Press
"Both lyrical and appealingly nimble . . . an elegant, satisfying investigation of small-town Canadian life, teenage isolation, and the universal quest for acceptance. The fact that it stars a 7-foot-tall clairvoyant is almost beside the point."--Edmonton Journal
"A touching and atmospheric story."--Susan Swan, author of The Wives of Bath
"With exquisite insight and boundless imagination, Kristen den Hartog takes me inside the soul and body of a young giant, letting me experience her bliss, her shame, her wisdom. Heartbreaking and exhilarating."--Ursula Hegi, author of Children and Fire
"In a post-World War II Canada, a young girl quickly grows to seven feet tall. This absorbing novel chronicles the excruciating loneliness of her adolescence, the strains in her parents' marriage, and the development of her uniquely optimistic view toward life."--Real Simple
"'It certainly was something to feel my body elongating, opening out like the longest telescope that ever was, ' confides young Ruth Brennan in Kristen den Hartog's short yet ambitious The Girl Giant, a novel set in Canada after World War II about a deeply intuitive girl who grows to be more than seven feet tall."--Elle
"[A] delicately-drawn portrait...Innocent and dreamy, combining fairy tale and true giants in history, den Hartog's simple story offers a sweetly insightful mix of anguish and tenderness."--Kirkus Reviews
"Like Hilary Mantel's The Giant O'Brien and Ellen Bryson's The Transformation of Bartholomew Fortuno, den Hartog's lovingly fashioned narrative turns people often labeled as freaks into human beings with whom the reader can identify."--Library Journal
"Very intimate . . . Den Hartog paints a picture of ordinary lives simply trying to deal with their own demons while holding on to what they love. It is a lovely book written with tenderness for all the characters."--Louisville Courier-Journal
"Den Hartog's small-in-scale novel about an enormous girl . . . [r]eads like both an expanded bedtime story and a quiet, coming-of-age novel."--Booklist
"[A] beautifully written book about family, relationships, and accepting who we are in relation to the people we love. . . . In addition to being a beguiling story, The Girl Giant is beautifully written with a dreamy, poetic feel to it."--Belletrista.com
"James and Elspeth, an ordinary couple, become a spectacle when their daughter, Ruth, grows more than seven feet tall. With a delicate and lyrical touch, Kristen den Hartog forces the parents to confront their buried fears in [The Girl Giant], letting the intuitive Ruth navigate the often-scary world."--Elle (Canada)
"Den Hartog captures and amplifies the terrifying fascination all parents feel about their new child by placing Ruth at the centre of a family that teeters around her every issue (normalcy, beauty, growth, bullying, broken hearts, future hopes), all of which are monumentalized by the girl's size . . . emotionally exquisite and heartfelt, and captures the madness of parenting in an utterly unique twist on the first-person point of view."--The Globe and Mail
"[The Girl Giant]--inspired by Diane Arbus's 1970 photograph of an American giant and the 'triangle of mother, father, and child'--is a poignant coming-of-age story leavened by an endearing if vulnerable character whose world view is conveyed through inviting, effortless prose."--Brett Josef Grubisic, Vancouver Sun
"Breathtaking . . . den Hartog works wonders with both the mundane and the extraordinary--we've read accounts of storming the beaches of France during the Second World War before, but the author's recounting is vivid and freshly startling. She can move a reader to tears as well as to awe."--Winnipeg Free Press
"Both lyrical and appealingly nimble . . . an elegant, satisfying investigation of small-town Canadian life, teenage isolation, and the universal quest for acceptance. The fact that it stars a 7-foot-tall clairvoyant is almost beside the point."--Edmonton Journal
"A touching and atmospheric story."--Susan Swan, author of The Wives of Bath
