Our endless numbered days - bookrastinating.com

386 pages

English language

Published Nov. 12, 2015

ISBN:: 978-1-941040-01-0
OCLC Number:: 886485064

"Peggy Hillcoat is eight years old when her survivalist father, James, takes her from their home in London to a remote hut in the woods and tells her that the rest of the world has been destroyed. Deep in the wilderness, Peggy and James make a life for themselves. They repair the hut, bathe in water from the river, hunt and gather food in the summers and almost starve in the harsh winters. They mark their days only by the sun and the seasons. When Peggy finds a pair of boots in the forest and begins a search for their owner, she unwittingly unravels the series of events that brought her to the woods and, in doing so, discovers the strength she needs to go back to the home and mother she thought she'd lost. After Peggy's return to civilization, her mother begins to learn the truth of her escape, …

"Peggy Hillcoat is eight years old when her survivalist father, James, takes her from their home in London to a remote hut in the woods and tells her that the rest of the world has been destroyed. Deep in the wilderness, Peggy and James make a life for themselves. They repair the hut, bathe in water from the river, hunt and gather food in the summers and almost starve in the harsh winters. They mark their days only by the sun and the seasons. When Peggy finds a pair of boots in the forest and begins a search for their owner, she unwittingly unravels the series of events that brought her to the woods and, in doing so, discovers the strength she needs to go back to the home and mother she thought she'd lost. After Peggy's return to civilization, her mother begins to learn the truth of her escape, of what happened to James on the last night out in the woods, and of the secret that Peggy has carried with her ever since"--

9 editions

Dubi reviewed Our Endless Numbered Days by Claire Fuller

Review of 'Our Endless Numbered Days' on 'Goodreads'

5 stars

Wow, what an emotional ride! The book starts slow -- really slow, too slow for me, actually. 15% in and I was almost ready to give up on it, but soon enough the book picks up and become a roiling story of an innocent caught within the web of lies weaved around her.
Peggy Hillcoat lives in London with her German pianist mother and her survivalist ("retreater") father, when one day while her mother is away on the road, her father decides to take her on a vacation in a cabin in the woods that she knows as "die Hutte". But upon arrival at the cabin after weeks of hiking, Peggy realizes her father has no plans of ever going back. She spends the next 9 years living with her father in a remote cabin, believing the world outside their little corner has been destroyed in a cataclysm.
The book …

Wow, what an emotional ride! The book starts slow -- really slow, too slow for me, actually. 15% in and I was almost ready to give up on it, but soon enough the book picks up and become a roiling story of an innocent caught within the web of lies weaved around her.
Peggy Hillcoat lives in London with her German pianist mother and her survivalist ("retreater") father, when one day while her mother is away on the road, her father decides to take her on a vacation in a cabin in the woods that she knows as "die Hutte". But upon arrival at the cabin after weeks of hiking, Peggy realizes her father has no plans of ever going back. She spends the next 9 years living with her father in a remote cabin, believing the world outside their little corner has been destroyed in a cataclysm.
The book oscillates between the post-apocalyptic narrative dictated by her father and the true story as the reader knows is it - the book starts off with Peggy back at home. Peggy's ways of coping with her situation, both physically and psychologically, make for an emotional read that surpasses so much of the literature out these days which attempts to achieve a similar effect using much cruder tools.
Fuller's writing is precise, patient and clever. It's quite amazing for a debut, and I look forward to her next book.

Jarulf

rated it

Jan. 1, 2018

Jarulf

rated it

Jan. 1, 2018

Subjects

Fathers and daughters
Family secrets
Wilderness
Fiction