Harriet Wolf's Seventh Book of Wonders (Baggott) - Book Reviews

Book Reviews
Many things are hidden in Julianna Baggott's intricate, tenderhearted novel about a writer, her children and a legacy of loss. Love letters, folded into origami cranes that never take flight, are tucked under a mattress. A newborn child, mute and sallow, is spirited away from her mother and secreted in an institution. A young man supports himself as a professional hider of things, until he too must go into hiding. A wife is lost, a husband is lost, a mother is lost and so is a father. Indeed, an entire book, Harriet Wolf's seventh novel, has disappeared. And, like so many precious lost things, it may be hiding in plain sight. All this sounds somber. But in groping for what's lost, Baggott's characters also stumble across pleasure, joy—and recognition.
Dominique Browning - New York Times Book Review


[Recent] mania for literary treasures provides the perfect moment for Julianna Baggott's new novel, Harriet Wolf's Seventh Book of Wonders. In a daring bit of whimsy, Baggott has imagined what it would be like to have written a phenomenally popular series, a collection of novels that everyone has read.... [T]he chapters narrated in Tilton's fairy-like voice are the novel's most interesting and creative. Baggott conveys her fragmentary understanding of what's happening as she responds to the literal meaning of everything anyone says to her. This is easy to get wrong; the risk of mocking a young woman with special needs is high here, but Baggott captures Tilton's oddness and charm with real affection. Hearing her internal voice, we can tell that she enjoys a rich imagination, seeded long ago by her famous grandmother.... As a novel about learning to love and forgive, Harriet Wolf's Seventh Book of Wonders offers some sweet moments of reconciliation.
Ron Charles - Washington Post


Julianna Baggott can do anything with words. Anything, I tell you.... Wonders is deliberately, playfully strange. It has been made scrumptious with oddities of every conceivable sort....Baggott takes the time to speak truly-about love, about books, about fame, about what it is to be alive.
New York Journal of Books


Julianna Baggott's latest novel refuses to be confined to only one genre. Harriet Wolf's Seventh Book of Wonders is a captivating multigenerational family saga, a love story, and a mystery-tinged with a bit of fantasy.... Baggott's mesmerizing tale of the resilient ties of motherhood and the bonds between sisters will resonate with a wide variety of readers.
Bookpage


[A] bleak and gorgeous]y rendered dystopian tale.... Harriet Wolf is long dead, but rumors of a final, revelatory book left unpublished are still very much alive.... [A] narrative that delivers a powerful sense of the meaning of motherhood and the bonds between sisters.
Library Journal


[I]t falls to [Harriet Wolf's] family to puzzle out how to continue to live and love in a real world that is not as enchanting as that of her novels. Moments of heartbreak balance moments of hilarity in Baggott's ambitious portrait of a family created from equal parts secrecy and love.
Kirkus Reviews