Whitethorn Woods

by Maeve Binchy

Hardcover, 2007

Call number

FIC BIN

Collection

Publication

Knopf (2007), Edition: First Edition, 352 pages

Description

Fiction. Literature. HTML:A New York Times Bestseller "Love, longing, and rich scenes of daily life.... What could be sweeter than a trip to an Irish village packed with robust native characters." â??The Christian Science Monitor When a new highway threatens to bypass the town of Rossmore and cut through Whitethorn Woods, everyone has a passionate opinion about whether the town will benefit or suffer. But young Father Flynn is most concerned with the fate of St. Annâ??s Well, which is set at the edge of the woods and slated for destruction. People have been coming to St. Annâ??s for generations to share their dreams and fears, and speak their prayers. Some believe it to be a place of true spiritual power, demanding protection; others think itâ??s a mere magnet for superstitions, easily sacrificed.   Father Flynn listens to all those caught up in the conflict, as the men and women of Whitethorn Woods must decide between the traditions of the past and the promises of… (more)

User reviews

LibraryThing member jen.e.moore
I see what people like about her: this book was like curling up with a blanket and a hot cup of tea. Almost entirely forgettable, but a deeply pleasant way to spend an afternoon.

I have but one complaint: in all the dozens of people's lives described, there is one murderer, one wife-beater, and not
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a single gay person. I am quite sure that there are more gay people than murderers in rural towns in Ireland.
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LibraryThing member cindyloumn
I was a bit disappointed in this book. Usually I LOVE her books. It's almost like a book of short stories, about all these people connected some how to Whitehorn and St Ann's well, which is suppose to answer prayers, make miricles. So at times it was hard to keep track of allll these many stories
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and all these characters. The last chapter she tried to tie all of the charcters stories up, but not all.
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LibraryThing member cindyloumn
I was a bit disappointed in this book It's almost like a book a short stories, with all these people connected somehow to Whitehorn, and St Ann's well. So at times with all the stories it was hard to keep track of all these characters. And there were alot of them! So it got really complicated. The
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last chapter she sort of tied up alot the stories though. But did leave some open. could be for more stories????
5/7/07
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LibraryThing member pennykaplan
Many, many people with connections to the village of Whitethorn Woods tell their interconnected stories
LibraryThing member latorreliliana
I kept waiting for one story to have some depth. No sooner do I get a profile of one character, she moves on to the next. Too many story lines. If I wanted a book of short stories I would have picked one. Very light read.
LibraryThing member hklibrarian
Talk about mediocre--that pretty much describes this book. I hadn't read one of Maeve's books in awhile and thought I would give her another chance. Sheesh! It was disjointed, predictable, and full of the miserable people going about their hopeless lives. Hell, if I wanted that sort of thing I
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would just watch the news every nite.
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LibraryThing member gardentoad
Because of the short story set up, this didn't have a lot of depth, but it was an enjoyable read.
LibraryThing member RoseCityReader
Instead of her usual saga, Maeve Binchy presents Whitethorn Woods as a collection of paired short stories sandwiched between sections of unifying narrative. The stories all involve people somehow connected with the Irish town of Rossmore and St. Anne’s Well located in the nearby Whitethorn Woods.
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Pilgrims visit the well and its shrine to ask St. Anne (the mother of the Virgin Mary) for help in all sorts of matters, but particularly regarding marriage and children.

Each story is told in two parts, from the perspective of two different narrators. The characters in all the stories are intertwined – sometimes substantially, sometimes only tangentially. Lengthy sections at the beginning, middle, and end involve the local priest and his family and tie the book together, as does the debate over building a by-pass through the Woods and tearing down the shrine.

Like all of Binchy’s books, this is not a thrill-a-minute page turner. But the characters are well-formed and their stories are deftly told. A good read.
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LibraryThing member WillowOne
This book is about the small town of Rossmore, Ireland and the decision of its people to allow or disallow a new road to be built bypassing their town and going straight through St. Ann's Well. The well is a place that people from all over the world come to pray at. The book touches on the Church
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and how there are two fields of thought one being that you should not pray to a "false god" and the other being if the people think it works, leave well enough alone. The book is very fragmented and not in a style of writing I prefer. You start by reading 1 chapter of story and then 5 chapters of individual character profiles, then another chapter of story and several more character profile chapters. It does not have enough total, all-encompassing storyline for my likes and I found myself constantly putting it down. I finally after 1 month gave up halfway into the book. I am now passing it on to my sister, maybe she can get through it.
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LibraryThing member wcath
As the section headings indicate, Maeve Binchy's most recent book is all about "The Road, The Woods and the Well." The Road in question is a new bypass around the town of Rossmore, Ireland. The Woods are the Whitethorn Woods of the title which the proposed road will go right through. And the Well ,
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located within Whitethorn Woods, is a shrine to St. Anne that will be completely destroyed if the road is built.

St. Anne's Well has touched many people over the years. There is great disagreement as to the holy and/or magical properties of the cave and it's ancient statue. The whitethorn bushes at its entrance are adorned with the petitions of it's visitors. Prayers and pictures, bits of paper pinned to the branches by the hundreds. The bypass is progress - the new, the convenient. The well is history, the mystical, the ancient. One will surely destroy the other if it is allowed to come to pass.

The story is told by many voices, each chapter a different character. All have some link to the town of Rossmore. Some live there, some were born there, some have visited and some have done desperate things there. Each character's bit of the story leads in some way to the next snippet. The chapters are also organized in pairs where the consecutive chapters are a husband and wife or a brother and sister or friends and you are privileged with two viewpoints of roughly the same story. The whole thing sounds like a very complicated way to tell a story. The delightful thing is that it is not at all a complicated or difficult way to read a story. I found that as each person's bit of the story unfolded, I had no problem remembering their relationship to previous characters and tales. The story almost blooms in the mind, each piece adding to the whole picture at a comfortable, easy pace, jolted here and there with the staccato of shocking enlightenments. It is Maeve Binchy at her best.
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LibraryThing member RoseMarion
Whitethorn Woods is a fascinating story. It may sound boring on paper--a story about residents of an Irish town that is home to a special well. However, this book is anything but boring!

The people of Rossmore, Ireland pray to St. Ann's Well for healings, blessings, and relationship advice. As they
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pray, their lives are opened to the readers. These are the stories of everyday men and women who are looking for acceptance, love, and joy. Intrique and humor permeates this whole novel which cleverly links many of the characters together. You will definitely laugh out loud many times reading this book.

The ending is perfect and settles the story well. I highly recommend this book to anyone interested in Irish living or really just anyone who wants to laugh and laugh! :)
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LibraryThing member diane1970
Characters lives of a small town in Ireland interweave through a proposed by-pass that will modernize the town, opposed by characters who find it disturbing to lose the trademark of the town...a holy shrine of Mary that will be destroyed by the bypass who's blessings have helped their lives.
LibraryThing member Cecilturtle
Whitethorn Woods is presented as a novel but is in fact a delightful collection of short stories linked by a shrine to St Ann which weaves in the fore or back ground. Each story presents various characters, teenagers, single moms, kindly fathers, retired folks and much more to create a rich and
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endearing tapestry of humanity.
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LibraryThing member judithann
Unfortunately, this is one of the worst Maeve Binchy books I have read (and I read most of them). The writing is easy and pleasant, but I really did not like the build-up of the book: first there are short stories, always in pairs, about two people looking at the same issue from their own point of
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view (so, that's interesting). However, this goes on and on with different people every time. All of them has some connection with a small Irish town, Rossmore, but only sometimes people from one story are mentioned again in a different one, in passing. Then in the end, "it all comes together", where most (?) people are briefly mentioned again, with a good ending to their story. However, by then, I had more or less forgotten what most of these people's stories were, so that meant the end wasn't as good as it could have been. I should also mention that I am not a great short story fan, and I could only just bring up enough patience to finish the whole book. That said, the other books of Maeve Binchy I have always found a pleasure to read, so my not-so-like of this book is a one-off.
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LibraryThing member mangochris
This isn't so much a novel as a series of very loosely connected short stories. The stories come in pairs, with the second one, told from another point of view, illuminating or expanding upon the first one. Though I haven't been too enthralled with Binchy's more recent works, in Whitethorn Woods,
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she's back at what she does so well - telling the stories of very ordinary people, their loves and tragedies and heartbreaks, in her poignant yet grounded, down-to-earth style. Her characters frequently have quietly unhappy lives, but they also frequently have lives filled with great, and often unexpected, friendships, families, and loves. Her skilled handling of this juxtaposition is what makes Binchy such a comforting read.The large number of characters can be confusing at times, and those who want an actual novel might be better served by going back to her earlier works.
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LibraryThing member mojacobs
NIce and easy cosy stories about the people of a small town in Ireland. Still good enough, but not vintage Binchy in my opinion. A bit too much sweetness and light...
LibraryThing member phoenixcomet
This is the first Maeve Binchy novel I've read. I vacillated between wanting to read more and wishing the book would end - I believe the latter sentiment held more strong. Basically the novel was a series of short stories strung together by the idea that a road was to be built through the local
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town. Some townies wanted the road, others did not. Once one story would be told, the next tended to build on the last with characters and events, but periodically new characters were introduced.
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LibraryThing member AineMcG
Really enjoyed this book. This is a comfort to read, I enjoyed the fact that not every single character was linked to every story, but there was enough overlap to tie all the stories through. It reads like a book of short stories with the odd character overlapping - it's a great snap shot of a
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small town and the people that are either from it or live in in. Really enjoyed reading this book. If you're a fan of any of Meave's previous books this will not disappoint.
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LibraryThing member moonshineandrosefire
A proposed highway through the quiet Irish town of Rossmore will mean the destruction of St. Ann's Well - a shrine supposed to deliver healing, husbands and other miracles - located in Whitethorn Woods. The shrine is located in Father Brian Flynn's parish, St Augustine's.

As a fracas erupts between
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the people who want the highway and believers who want the shrine preserved, Fr. Flynn finds himself in the middle of the issue not sure where he stands in an increasingly secular Ireland. He goes to the shrine to pray to God to show him what position is right. What follows are the stories of Neddy Nolan, a not so simple mentally challenged man, 60-something Vera who finds love on a trip meant for much younger people and James, whose wife of 26 years is dying.

Linked into these stories are stories of mental illness, alcoholism, incest, greed, the joys of being single and struggles of career women. The good and bad sides of people are shown. I really liked this book although it was a simple plot. It was sweet and endearing anyway. I give it an A+!
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LibraryThing member Bcteagirl
This is a fun and light book. Like many of her books, this book consisted of short stories of various characters whose lives seem to cross in unexpected ways. Somehow all there lives involve a small town in Ireland and a St. Anne's well where people make various pilgrimages. The story starts with
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an introduction to the village priest, a younger fellow who is sure the well is not linked with St. Anne and verging on Pagan but is too nice to do anything but grit his teeth about it. Then a new road is proposed that would plow through Whitethorn woods and the well, dividing the town. There were characters you felt very comfortable with, and a few characters you loved to hate. A light comfortable read for during the holiday season, without being too overly 'chicklitish'.
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LibraryThing member jlapac
This books is similar in style to other of Binchy's books and reminds me quite a bit of The Lilac Bus or has the same feeling as the Lilac Bus. In this book, the local small village, whose main street is crammed with traffic all the time, is faced with the changes that will come about if a planned
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highway bypass goes forward. Many different characters are explored. All are connected to the village, but not all the stories about individuals have to do with the bypass. I like reading the different points of view as presented in the book. Binchy can reallypick upt he details of people's lives and one thing I like about her books is the way she includes minor details that are important to the character, but other people don't notice. I think we all have those details, or secrets, in our lives.
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LibraryThing member pattysp
Good for listening.....many short stories connected.
LibraryThing member BONS
Father Brian Flynn is quite the interesting character in this one. The small village may have a bypass built near it which would help with traffic but the towns special jewel "the wishing well" that is held with such spiritual regard will be a risk. I so enjoy the chapters being different yet it
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all being intertwined.
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LibraryThing member SueinCyprus
This is written as a series of interlinked short stories, each cleverly told from two perspectives. Yet they build together to form a whole complex novel, featuring the question of whether or not to build a new road through a sleepy Irish town, destroying some ancient woods and a sacred
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pseudo-Catholic shrine.

Very well written, lovely characters (if a little confusing at times with the sheer number) and quite moving in one or two places.
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LibraryThing member turtlesleap
Binchy presents an aggregation of short stories and vignettes about the interlocking lives of people living in a small town in Ireland. The stories range from moving to mundane but her writing is consistently pleasant and readable and the character development is good enough to carry through even
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those stories that are simple or less engaging. Good book.
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Awards

Irish Book Award (Nominee — Popular Fiction — 2007)

Pages

352

ISBN

0307265781 / 9780307265784
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