HOUSEWRIGHTS

A creaky first novel about a young woman strong enough to ignore convention in a 1920s town and to live and marry as she pleases.

Lily Willard is gratifyingly indifferent to the usual expectations of young women—she can’t cook or sew—but she’s not well served by Corrieveau’s storyline. A mixture of the mundane (building houses and dusting library shelves) and the mysterious (from time to time Lilly has visions or sees omens), it begins in May 1907. Lily is eight and lives on the family farm in Vermont, and she’s had two signs before breakfast that she can’t ignore: a usually fecund barn cat has produced only two kittens, and two swarms of insects are competing for space in a tree. Soon afterward she sees a strange wagon near her house and meets Abel Pritchard, the housewright (he builds houses from designs in books) who is there to put up the family’s new home. With him are his identical twin boys, Oren and Ian, the same age as Lily. Despite their impressive knowledge of carpentry, the twins, who will years later change Lily’s life, are more concepts than credible figures. As Lily teaches them to read, as well as to ride horses, the three become a close-knit trio. But when the house is finished, the boys leave and Lily forgets them—until one day in 1917. While Lily is working as a librarian, Oren Pritchard comes back to claim her as his bride. After they marry, Ian, shell-shocked while fighting in France, moves in with them. The three get along just fine until one evening when they drink too much at a local dance and start waltzing together—which causes a scandal. Lily’s solution—the marriage of Ian to local divorcée Hallie—causes only more trouble and tragedy, destroying the brothers’ closeness. But Lily is strong and knows how to fight for what matters, whatever it might cost.

Vivid period details, but an unconvincing plot and cardboard people.