Author | Kent Haruf |
---|---|
Country | United States |
Language | English |
Genre | Fiction |
Publisher | Alfred A. Knopf |
Publication date | October 1999 |
Media type | Print (hardback & paperback) |
Pages | 301 [1] |
ISBN | 0-375-40618-2 |
OCLC | 41272953 |
813/.54 21 | |
LC Class | PS3558.A716 P58 1999 |
Plainsong is a novel by Kent Haruf. [1] Set in the fictional town of Holt, Colorado, it tells the interlocking stories of some of the inhabitants. The title comes from a type of unadorned music sung in Christian churches, and is a reference to both the Great Plains setting and the simple style of the writing.
The novel was adapted in 2004 into a Hallmark Hall of Fame TV movie on CBS. [2] It is the first of a trilogy, the remaining two novels being Eventide and Benediction.
The book follows several stories of families in a small town in eastern Colorado. Maggie is the link between many of the other characters and strands of the novel. She introduces Victoria to the McPheron brothers, and has a romantic relationship with Tom.
The New York Times called it "a novel so foursquare, so delicate and lovely, that it has the power to exalt the reader." [1] and Salon described reading the book as "like being in an expertly piloted small plane, finding yourself flying low and smooth over the suddenly wondrous world below". Plainsong won the Mountains & Plains Booksellers Award, the Maria Thomas Award in Fiction, and was a finalist for the National Book Award, the Los Angeles Times Book Prize, and The New Yorker Book Award.
The Tie That Binds is a novel by Kent Haruf. Written in 1984, the novel is Haruf's first major work, receiving a Whiting Award and a special Hemingway Foundation/PEN citation. It is the story of 80-year-old Edith Goodnough of Holt County, Colorado, as told to an unnamed inquirer on a Sunday afternoon in the spring of 1977 by her 50-year-old neighbor.
To Kill a Mockingbird is a novel by the American author Harper Lee. It was published in June 1960 and became instantly successful. In the United States, it is widely read in high schools and middle schools. To Kill a Mockingbird has become a classic of modern American literature; a year after its release, it won the Pulitzer Prize. The plot and characters are loosely based on Lee's observations of her family, her neighbors and an event that occurred near her hometown of Monroeville, Alabama, in 1936, when she was ten.
The History of Tom Jones, a Foundling, often known simply as Tom Jones, is a comic novel by English playwright and novelist Henry Fielding. It is a Bildungsroman and a picaresque novel. It was first published on 28 February 1749 in London and is among the earliest English works to be classified as a novel. It is the earliest novel mentioned by W. Somerset Maugham in his 1948 book Great Novelists and Their Novels among the ten best novels of the world.
The Blind Assassin is a novel by the Canadian writer Margaret Atwood. It was first published by McClelland and Stewart in 2000. The book is set in the fictional Ontario town of Port Ticonderoga and in Toronto. It is narrated from the present day, referring to previous events that span the twentieth century but mostly the 1930s and 1940s. It is a work of historical fiction with the major events of Canadian history forming an important backdrop, for example, the On-to-Ottawa Trek and a 1934 Communist rally at Maple Leaf Gardens. Greater verisimilitude is given by a series of newspaper articles commenting on events and on the novel's characters from a distance.
The Mill on the Floss is a novel by English author George Eliot, first published in three volumes on 4 April 1860 by William Blackwood and Sons. The first American edition was published by Harper & Brothers, Publishers, New York.
Meg Tilly is a Canadian-American actress and writer.
Fay Weldon was an English author, essayist and playwright.
One True Thing is a 1998 American drama film directed by Carl Franklin. It tells the story of a woman in her 20s who is forced to put her life on hold in order to care for her mother, who is dying of cancer. The script was adapted by Karen Croner from the novel by Anna Quindlen, with the story being based on Quindlen's own struggle with the death of her mother, Prudence Pantano Quindlen, from ovarian cancer in 1972.
Sarah, Plain and Tall is a children's book written by Patricia MacLachlan and the winner of the 1986 Newbery Medal, the 1986 Scott O'Dell Award for Historical Fiction, and the 1986 Golden Kite Award. It explores themes of loneliness, abandonment, and coping with change.
Adam Mars-Jones is a British novelist and literary and film critic.
Alan Kent Haruf was an American novelist.
Mary McGarry Morris is an American novelist, short story author and playwright from New England. She uses its towns as settings for her works. In 1991, Michiko Kakutani of The New York Times described Morris as "one of the most skillful new writers at work in America today"; The Washington Post has described her as a "superb storyteller"; and The Miami Herald has called her "one of our finest American writers".
Thomas Andrew Stechschulte was an American film and television actor. His most prominent role may have been that of the presidential candidate Robert Arthur in The Manchurian Candidate. He has also had guest appearances on the television series Law & Order, Law & Order: Criminal Intent, and Mrs. Columbo.
Jane Gillson Langton was an American author of children's literature and mystery novels. She also illustrated her novels.
Mister Pip (2006) is a novel by Lloyd Jones, a New Zealand author. It is named after the chief character in, and shaped by the plot of Charles Dickens' novel Great Expectations. The novel was adapted into the film Mr. Pip in 2012.
Damian Leighton Barr is a Scottish writer and broadcaster. He is the creator and host of the Literary Salon, which started at Shoreditch House in 2008, and he hosts live literary events worldwide. In 2014 and 2015, he presented several editions of the BBC Radio 4 cultural programme Front Row. He has hosted several television series including Shelf Isolation and most recently The Big Scottish Book Club for BBC Scotland. He is the author of the 2013 memoir Maggie & Me, about his 1980s childhood in the west of Scotland, and the 2019 novel You Will Be Safe Here, set in South Africa in 1901 and now. He is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts (FRSA).
NOS4A2 is the third novel by American author Joe Hill, son of authors Stephen and Tabitha King. The book was published on April 30, 2013 through William Morrow and Company, and has since been adapted to a television series. NOS4A2 is a horror novel about a woman trying to save her son from a vicious, supernatural killer.
Benediction is a play by Eric Schmiedl, based on the novel Benediction by Kent Haruf, about a small fictional town called Holt, Colorado. There is an old man named Dad Louis, and the story is around him. He ends up dying from cancer.
Our Souls at Night is a 2017 American romantic drama film directed by Ritesh Batra and written by Scott Neustadter and Michael H. Weber. It is based on the novel of the same name by Kent Haruf. The film stars Robert Redford, Jane Fonda, Matthias Schoenaerts, and Judy Greer. It had its world premiere at the Venice Film Festival on September 1, 2017. It was released on September 29, 2017 by Netflix. It marked the fourth collaboration between Fonda and Redford, having previously starred in The Chase, Barefoot in the Park, and The Electric Horseman although they were in five films together. Redford appeared as an uncredited basketball player in Tall Story, starring Fonda and Anthony Perkins.