Saturday, July 25, 2015

Embracing the Seasons: Memories of a Country Garden - Gunilla Norris

Embracing the Seasons: Memories of a Country Garden
Gunilla Norris
BlueBridge, Jun 9 2015, $14.95
ISBN: 9781629190051

At Gunilla Norris’ farmhouse, frogs announce in song the arrival of spring.  Song birds join nature’s choir celebrating the rebirthing of life with Joy to the World (Three Dog Night).  Moving forward through the months, the peonies need stakes to support them as they show that spring has given way to summer.  Displaying the warmth of this season vines grow, cicadas click and black snakes crawl until the months culminate in a harvest.  Fall takes center stage with colorful leaves depicting this quarter that climaxes with Thanksgiving.  Finally dark winter brings cold and stormy weather yet also the beauty of the sculptured naked ash trees.  Late in the season the thaw begins and wildflowers start to bloom reminding readers that the frogs and birds will sing their song of spring.

Gunilla Norris celebrates life through the cycle of the seasons in this poetic memoir; as the author offers an uplifting look at the joys she found in nature’s constant changes at a country garden.  Though similar in philosophy and method to Ms. Norris’ A Mystic Garden, fans of lyrical meditations will appreciate reflections on Embracing the Seasons and do likewise with our personal fond contemplations (like skiing and sleighing down the hills of the Bronx in the 1960s winters).


Harriet Klausner

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