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The HOLLOW GROUND A Novel Natalie S Harnett 9781250041982 Books

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The HOLLOW GROUND A Novel Natalie S Harnett 9781250041982 Books

What I really liked about The Hollow Ground are the places where it takes place. I've heard of underground coal mine fires and this story tells you what happens when a coal mine catches fire and how it affects the people who live and work near in the area. It's a mess, and in this story, young Brigid and her family must contend with the aftermath and the current mess the mine fires create in their lives.

Brigid's family is already struggling as they live with their aunt in Centereach. When Auntie falls into a sink hole caused by a mine fire, the family moves to Brigid's father's old family home in Barrendale to live with Grandma who Brigid's mother, Delores, hates and the feeling seem to be mutual on Grandma's side as well. Like Centereach, Barrendale is also a mining town and years ago there was an accident and the ground under Barrendale is also burning. There is a man who visits homes in the neighborhood in the middle of the night to do readings of the gases building up in the houses to monitor if they are safe for habitation.

Everyone in this family has secrets - from Grandma and Grandpa to Delores, who was dropped off at an orphanage by her stepmother when she was a child, to Brigid's father, Adrian, who has a crippled arm that was injured in a mining accident years ago in which his brother was killed.

As the story unfolds, Brigid must contend with living with a controlling grandma, the rocky relationship between her mother and father and the town that is slowly dying due to the fires. More and more areas of Barrendale become unstable and unlivable. Brigid also contends with the unraveling of the secrets that have been balled up and sealed for years.

This is an engaging read with a soap opera-ish base but a good, solid story nonetheless.


Tags : The HOLLOW GROUND: A Novel [Natalie S. Harnett] on Amazon.com. *FREE* shipping on qualifying offers. <b>Winner of the </b><b>2014 Appalachian Book of the Year Award in Fiction</b> <b>Winner of the John Gardner Fiction Book Award</b> <b>Longlisted for the 2016 International Dublin Literary Award </b> </i> </i> We walk on fire or air,Natalie S. Harnett,The HOLLOW GROUND: A Novel,Thomas Dunne Books,1250041988,Coming Of Age,Historical,Irish Americans;Fiction.,Mine fires;Pennsylvania;Fiction.,Young women;Fiction.,060101 St Martins Trade Fiction,AMERICAN HISTORICAL FICTION,Coal mine accidents,FICTION Coming of Age,FICTION Historical General,Fiction,Fiction - General,Fiction-Coming of Age,GENERAL,General Adult,Historical General,Irish Americans,Modern & contemporary fiction (post c 1945),Pennsylvania,United States,Young women,historical fiction; historical novels; coming of age; coal mining; appalachia; family life; dysfunctional families; contemporary novels; contemporary fiction; contemporary literature; 1960s; pennsylvania; historical mysteries; historical mystery novels

The HOLLOW GROUND A Novel Natalie S Harnett 9781250041982 Books Reviews

I wanted to like this book—a debut novel set in a part of the US rich in labor and ethnic history. But you won't learn much of that in Natalie Harnett's “The Hollow Ground,” which focuses on freak mine fires burning beneath Centralia and Carbondale, Pennsylvania, and on the sufferings of a dysfunctional Irish-American family.

Aside from inaccurate regional dialect, flat characterizations, and some minor factual errors, the THG’s most serious problem is that it breathes new life into old ethnic and cultural biases. It was surprising to see negative stereotypes resurrected—similar to those once used by mine owners to intimidate and control mineworkers—in a current novel picked up by a reputable publishing house and by a writer coming out of Columbia University’s writing program. Harnett’s prose style shows some talent, so it’s disappointing her book turns out to be little more than exploitative of a region and its people.

Coal miners English, German, Irish, Slavs, Italians and others, were often vilified in print by mine owners as “stupid, greedy, dangerous, drunken, low class,” etc., throughout the coal-mining era. Their poverty, imposed by mine owners’ wages, was even held against them. Such slurs were especially invoked when owners wanted to justify violence against miners trying to unionize for better pay and work conditions. Coal operators killed many miners in the labor wars of Pennsylvania. That is the history of the coal region—well documented. So it’s more than ironic that Harnett’s imagined mining family in the ravaged coal country are presented as ugly and ignorant characters with virtually no redeeming qualities—exception the abused (of course) child narrator. Coal operators couldn’t have said it better themselves.

Harnett’s book offers no real context to historical events that created the mining towns she uses as a backdrop to her story. So the average reader is left to guess that mining is a highly skilled activity and miners, although poor, were intelligent men—a fact proven by the great strides made in the coal regions by coal miners who formed unions, against heavy odds, that led to the first US workplace safety laws, child labor laws, etc. By contrast, in Harnett's coal region tale stereotypes similar to “the ignorant miner” “the dangerous, unethical underclass” “the drunken Irish” are on display once again—a fact that seems to have completely eluded the author and reviewers not familiar with American and labor history.

There are better works of literature and history for those interested in the Pennsylvania anthracite coal region. And in some parts of the THG Harnett seems to have borrowed freely from them without citation.

It’s fair to ask why Harnett decided to publish her story without a more thorough knowledge and understanding of her subject matter, since ignorance of one’s subject is not a sufficient excuse for a serious writer. Why didn't she just write about a dysfunctional family and leave out coal miners, the Irish, the Mollie Maguires, and the coal region? Why didn’t she just write about what she knows? The answer would seem to be that THG is a sort of *poverty porn an exploitation of a place and a group for marketability, that is, a culture and a people’s history and dignity may be subject to any distortion, or dismissed entirely, in favor of what sells books.

*From Wikipedia poverty porn is “‘any type of media, be it written, photographed or filmed, which exploits the Poor’s condition in order to generate the necessary sympathy for selling…[books].’”
Review courtesy of Dark Faerie Tales

Quick & Dirty A coming of age story with characters who treat each other terribly, a family curse that can’t be lifted while people can’t come to terms with the terrible things that have happened to them. Slow pacing and a child narrator may turn some people away from this story.

Opening Sentence We walk on fire or air, so Daddy liked to say.

The Review

The Hollow Ground is a novel that intrigued me from its synopsis, a family that has been cursed for generations, devastating coal mine fires and a girl who tries to take it upon herself to rid the family of the curse while trying to survive these unpredictable fires. The Hollow Ground while slow kept me reading only because I wanted to know the secrets of the family and how the curse would be resolved.

Brigid Howley’s family has a curse over them. After a fight with a priest over coal mining, the Howley family has been cursed with tragedy and unhappiness. The Howley’s live in Centrereach a town where coal fires have pretty much run everyone out of town. The Howley’s have been living with Brigid’s Auntie. Her Auntie suffers one of the most terrifying death’s I think I have ever read about. It definitely has me looking at the ground more carefully. After Auntie’s death, the family has no choice but to move in with the father’s parents. Brigid’s mother swore she would never go back to that mean woman’s home ever again.

The Howley’s are quite poor. They live with whomever can take them in. Brigid’s father, Adrian, had his arm crushed in a mining accident. He tries to work but the jobs usually don’t last long as he always does something to get fired. Brigid’s mother, Delores, supports the family with her job at the mill but it doesn’t give them enough money to get a place of their own.

After Brigid discovers a dead body, the family is never the same again. Deep dark secrets start to reveal themselves one piece at a time. Delores claimed that she married into the family curse but her own past just feeds the unhappiness of the curse. The rest of the family acts strangely. Brigid slowly begins to unravel the story that she believes is happening around her. She wants to know the truth but the grown-ups just lie to her and say things that they would to little children.

Brigid Howley is the eleven/twelve year old narrator of The Hollow Ground. The narrative is a bit childish reflecting the young narrator but in many ways she is more reliable and smarter than the grown-ups around her. Brigid asks all the right questions even though she might be scared to voice them at times because of the repercussions. She is also perceptive and knows how her parents act and think around her.

As to the writing style in The Hollow Ground, I never once forgot that she was a child. Her speech and actions always showcased her age. The writer also showcased the regional dialect and poor standing of the characters. Brigid’s mother never finished school and you could tell by the way she talked. Brigid’s father was supposed pretty smart. He didn’t talk too much but when he did, he didn’t come off uneducated, just a bit childish himself. Brigid was the only one who could pull off this story because the other characters were just too mean, selfish or childish. Even though Brigid had her moments, she was the sane one in the family.

The Hollow Ground is based off of true life events, which is why Auntie’s death terrifies me so much. The story is dark, terrible and unreliable, just like the surroundings where the family live. This isn’t a feel good story unless it makes you feel better about your own family. Brigid’s coming of age story isn’t HEA but more of a “happy enough”. If anything this story just upset me more over Brigid’s own situation and how terribly her own mother treated her. You know that saying, “What goes around comes around” definitely applied to this family. One thing that did surprise me was the paranormal aspect. I didn’t really expect that but I guess supernatural/spirituality would have to come into play when you are dealing with a curse that was started by a priest.

Overall, The Hollow Ground was an alright story for me. It felt slow in places and I wasn’t quite sure where the story was going until Brigid found the dead body. I do not regret reading this story at all. I just hate when I leave a story feeling depressed about how events played out.

Notable Scene

Beneath her hand the wedge moved to the letter H, then O, then W.

“How?” she said. “Why do you keep saying H-O-W? How what? Spirit, what are you trying to tell me? How it happened? How you got killed?”

“Maybe you shouldn’t ask it,” I said, breathing in gulps as if I desperately needed to catch my breath. As the wooden piece moved from L, then E, then Y, it felt like each letter branded a tender spot inside me and I flinched with the burn. “Don’t ask it any more,” I pleaded. “You don’t need to know.”

“L-E-Y?” she said and her tongue clucked with exasperation. “What is that? Lee? Lay? Finish the word, Spirit? L-E-Y, what?”

Again the wedge moved. This time it spelled HOWLEY.

I whimpered, looking helplessly from the board to the mirror above the dresser. I gripped the bedspread as if I was about to fall forward into the horrible place where we were headed.

“Okay,” Marisol said, “I get How. But what is L-E-Y. Lee? Lay? Tell me.”

I didn’t dare breathe, my eyes hurt like bits of salt were in them. When Marisol turned to me, all the angles of her face tensed. “How-lee?” she said. “How-lee?” But then recognition relaxed the muscles around her eyes and she stared at me with a look of amazed horror.

FTC Advisory St. Martin’s Griffin/Macmillan provided me with a copy of Hollow Ground. No goody bags, sponsorships, “material connections,” or bribes were exchanged for my review.
What I really liked about The Hollow Ground are the places where it takes place. I've heard of underground coal mine fires and this story tells you what happens when a coal mine catches fire and how it affects the people who live and work near in the area. It's a mess, and in this story, young Brigid and her family must contend with the aftermath and the current mess the mine fires create in their lives.

Brigid's family is already struggling as they live with their aunt in Centereach. When Auntie falls into a sink hole caused by a mine fire, the family moves to Brigid's father's old family home in Barrendale to live with Grandma who Brigid's mother, Delores, hates and the feeling seem to be mutual on Grandma's side as well. Like Centereach, Barrendale is also a mining town and years ago there was an accident and the ground under Barrendale is also burning. There is a man who visits homes in the neighborhood in the middle of the night to do readings of the gases building up in the houses to monitor if they are safe for habitation.

Everyone in this family has secrets - from Grandma and Grandpa to Delores, who was dropped off at an orphanage by her stepmother when she was a child, to Brigid's father, Adrian, who has a crippled arm that was injured in a mining accident years ago in which his brother was killed.

As the story unfolds, Brigid must contend with living with a controlling grandma, the rocky relationship between her mother and father and the town that is slowly dying due to the fires. More and more areas of Barrendale become unstable and unlivable. Brigid also contends with the unraveling of the secrets that have been balled up and sealed for years.

This is an engaging read with a soap opera-ish base but a good, solid story nonetheless.