A must read for book lovers of either gender. Through the story we get into the mind set of a young woman dealing with serious issues and - as the book jacket says, "delves into the complicated factors that set us on the road to self-discovery and show us how we can sometimes find the strength to endure the really hard things that happen. It also asks the most difficult of questions: How do we forgive? And most importantly, how do we forgive ourselves?"-from page 21"I stood in my yard and notiec...

I was surprised by how good the writing was; not over the top, not trying-too-hard, just good solid writing. I became interested initially because of the framework of the story: the filming of a movie set in Low-German speaking Mennonite community in Mexico. Obviously, this was based on the filming of Silent Light a great movie from a great, Mexican director of whom I am very fond, Carlos Reygadas (trailer here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=etIzLi...). Miriam Toews, the author here, was an act...

I had been disappointed with Miriam Toews most recent book (The Flying Troutmans) so I embarked on this read with lowered expectations and was delighted to find that the author is back on form. I was completely captivated by the character of Irma Voth. Toews has returned to what she writes about best...the effects of living in a family dominated by a bigoted and powerful father. In this case, she sets her action in a Mennonite community in Mexico and weaves into the story a group of filmmakers a...

My favourite of Miriam's books, although Swing Low was personally moving and brought on a sadness I was not prepared for.

Toews is adept at quiet irony and at mapping the travels we make inside our own hearts, especially as we move toward a truer understanding of other people, and this novel displays those skills in even greater measure. I find her protagonists authentic and moving, and their struggles to manage the need for connection with the knowledge that it often fails or can only be won after great forebearance rings true to me. This novel offers us an engaging central figure and demonstrates Toews' ability t...

In the last several years I have almost totally neglected the literature of my own country. When I moved away, I was disgruntled with the state of it (or maybe just too young, but it all seemed so dreary, depressing, lyrical and blah). I’ve decided its time to play catch up. So, after the masterly Two Solitudes got me enthused, I’m having an unofficial few months (maybe year? maybe lifetime?) of reading Canadian.This wasn’t obvious place to start. Miriam Toews is one of the best-known Canadian n...

To fully appreciate this book I recommend the reader first see this movie . The author played the role of the mother of the family in this movie. It is obvious that she has used her experience acting in this movie as the setting in which to place the first half of the story of this book. But this is a novel so there's no reason to consider this story anything other than Toews' imagination. (I have the DVD of the movie that I'm willing to loan out.)The beginning of the book is set in a rural c...

More people should read this novel about a young woman, Irma, and the complications of her life as a Mennonite in exile in Mexico. She's constrained by her father and then a husband, but when a film crew arrives in the village to make a crazy avant garde movie, her involvement in the filming changes her life. It is simply written, yet full of emotion and intellect. Recommended. I will be reading more Miriam Toews.

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Irma Voth deals with similar themes to the fantastic A Complicated Kindness. Engaging from the beginning, it is an incredibly strong novel, filled with female characters you end up rooting strongly for. There is a darkness to it which hasn't been as prominent in Toews' other work, and there isn't the wry humour here which I have almost come to expect from her novels. Regardless, Irma Voth is incredibly though-provoking, and overarchingly rather sad.

I really wanted to like this one. I truly did. The description of this novel, by new-to-me author Miriam Toews, sounded so different than anything else I'd read and seemed very intriguing.Irma Voth is 19, married, and living in a Mennonite community in Mexico. With the exception of her younger sister, Irma is pretty much estranged from her family. A filmmaker arrives in town to make a documentary and hires Irma as a translator. Irma befriends Marijke, an actress in the film and ...well, that wou...

Well, that's another terrific Toews novel done. This was a bit of a departure from the others, though. Being of Mennonite descent, she makes mention of Mennonites in all her books, in either the characters or the community she's writing about. And she's written all the novels I've read so far (that is, all but Puny Sorrows and Women Talking) with a sweet blend of comedy and melancholy. But in Irma Voth, Mennonites were very much the main focus of the book. And although there was lots of humour,

Mennonite Irma Voth had been kicked out of her home by her father when she fell in love with and married a Mexican man named Jorge. Her father arranged for them to stay in a nearby house, but Jorge was to work for him for free. A year later though, Jorge is tired of Irma and the whole arrangement and leaves. Around the same time, a film crew moves into another house nearby to shoot a movie about Mennonites. Irma's father isn't happy about it, and is especially angry when Irma herself chooses to

I adored this book! Toew's style is deceptively and disarmingly simple, but these people and places came alive for me.

Originally published at Book Browse: https://www.bookbrowse.com/mag/review...Author Miriam Toews has enjoyed modest success in her home country of Canada. Of Mennonite tradition and hailing from rural Manitoba, many of Toews's novels explore this way of life. She won the 2004 Governor General's Award for Fiction for A Complicated Kindness, and she was awarded the 2008 Writer's Trust Fiction Prize for her novel, The Flying Troutmans. All this to say, Toews has writerly chops.Irma Voth came about

Toews is a literary genius who writes with such a masterly command of the English language. A wizard of words! Her characters are always so complex and vivid despite her minimalist approach to writing. I found this story disturbing and quite sad, but she still managed to infuse it with her signature dark humour. Not my fave Toews book but it was a quick read and I would recommend. My fave line was the one about the protagonist sleeping in the barn like Jesus without the entourage or pressure to

This is the third Toews book I've read, and of the two I've read previously, I really loved A Complicated Kindness and liked A Boy of Good Breeding okay. So I had high hopes for Irma Voth, and I am more than happy with what I found. Like A Complicated Kindness, this one takes place within a Mennonite family. In this case, a Mennonite family that has relocated to Mexico from Canada.Note: The rest of this review has been withdrawn due to the changes in Goodreads policy and enforcement. You can rea...

At 19, Irma is ostracized and shunned from her family, living in isolation and despair. Her very strict Mennonite upbringing as a Canadian in Mexico leaves her dependent upon her father, who is the one who imposes the rejection and shunning. Her husband, leaves home for months on end, leaving Irma as alone as anyone can be on this planet: no home, no husband, no family, no friends, no community. When disaster strikes, Irma knows she must leave, for her own safety. To save her younger sister, Irm...

I initially didn't know what to think of this book- I will admit I wasn't automatically drawn in. I know nothing about Mennonites and, as the story progressed, found myself irritated with the presence of the hooligans and posers in the film crew and their related shenanigans. I guess it was the character of Irma, who simultaneously didn't believe in her abilities yet quietly refused to surrender to hopelessness, who kept me reading. When she reaches a point where she is willing to abandon the fa...

Miriam Toews' (pronounced "Taves", please) earlier books had a charming quirky humor to lighten the story but not this one. I think she intended the younger adolescent sister Aggie to provide some comic relief but she only screws things up. If you thought Toews portrayed a dour Mennonite existence before you ain't seen nothin' yet. Irma Voth is a nineteen year-old Mennonite girl transplanted from rural Manitoba to rural northern Mexico. Apparently, some ultra-conservative Mennonites started relo...