DROWNING RUTH by Christina Schwarz

Finished Tu 11/21/17 This was a trade paperback that Janny loaned me. It's a first novel and an Oprah selection.

Set in rural Wisconsin near Lake Naukawaukee between WWI and WWII

Two sisters- Amanda and Mathilda (Mattie); Amanda, trained as a nurse, awkward and domineering; Mattie outgoing, pretty and sweet.

Mattie marries Carl and they live on a small island in the lake. They have Ruth and then Carl leaves to fight in WWI. Moves back to family home off the island.

When he returns Ruth is four and he learns that Mattie has drowned. Doesn't really know the circumstances. A distant relation, Hilda, comes to the island to help raise Ruth. She leaves when Ruth becomes unmanageable.

Amanda has been hospitalized for depression (madness) and when she is released she comes to the island to help with Ruth.

In her teens, Ruth befriends Imogene. This girl is actually Amanda's daughter. Amanda was pregnant and went to live on the island with Ruth and Mattie when  Carl was in the war. Amanda gave the baby to a local woman saying that it was the child of a servant girl.

Ruth and Imogene's relationship is a mirror of Amanda's and Mattie's; Outgoing vs. Inward

I wasn't a big fan of the novel, but it's well written and the truncated structure wasn't too difficult. But, I found nearly all of the characters not too likeable. And, exactly how Mattie drowned was not that riveting (after all of the buildup- I thought that it would be a real game changer).


Copied from a review at Publishers Weekly-

"Ruth remembered drowning." The first sentence of this brilliantly understated psychological thriller leaps off the page and captures the reader's imagination. In Schwarz's debut novel, brutal Wisconsin weather and WWI drama color a tale of family rivalry, madness, secrets and obsessive love. By March 1919, Nurse Amanda Starkey has come undone. She convinces herself that her daily exposure to the wounded soldiers in the Milwaukee hospital where she works is the cause of her hallucinations, fainting spells and accidents. Amanda journeys home to the family farm in Nagawaukee, where her sister, Mathilda (Mattie), lives with her three-year-old daughter Ruth, awaiting the return of her war-injured husband, Carl Neumann. Mattie's ebullient welcome convinces Amanda she can mend there. But then Mattie drowns in the lake that surrounds the sisters' island house and, in a rush of confusion and anguish, Amanda assumes care of Ruth. After Carl comes home, Amanda and he manage to work together on the farm and parent Ruth, but their arrangement is strained: Amanda has a breakdown and recuperates at a sanatorium. As time passes, Ruth grows into an odd, guarded child who clings to perplexing memories of the night her mother drowned. Why does Amanda have that little circle of scars on her hand? What is Amanda's connection to Ruth's friend Imogene and why does she fear Imogene's marriage to Clement Owen's son? Schwarz deftly uses first-person narration to heighten the drama. Her prose is spare but bewitching, and she juggles the speakers and time periods with the surety of a seasoned novelist. Rather than attempting a trumped-up suspenseful finale, Schwarz ends her novel gently, underscoring the delicate power of her tale."