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 Mystery still shrouds the fate of orphan children who disappeared from their birth places in the early to mid 1900s. Orphan trains, mail order child brides, and children of the dust bowl were never heard from again.The Stone Diaries by Pulitzer Prize winner Carol Shields is about abandonment and need loveof such an orphan. The family Stone is an orphanage surname for the children who were not adopted before they became of age. Mercy, one of the Stone children, eventually leaves the orphanage to marry Cuyler Goodwill. When Mercy dies in childbirth, her infant Daisy becomes the main character of the book.
Daisy, emotionally abandoned by her father, is abducted by Mercy's friend and neighbor Clarentine Flett and her son Barker. Shield's book has many strange but believable relationships. The descriptions of her characters are interesting. The book grows weak in the middle when Daisy is the "Green Thumb" for a gardening column. Shields' ending pulls the reader into the materialistic post-war era celebrated for its modernity in the US and Canada. Did I mention, the book begins in Canada and closess in the US? Included in the back of the book are recipes and a study guide.
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