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The Hand That First Held Mine: A Novel

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Pub. Date:
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Language:
English
Description

From the best-selling author of Hamnet and The Marriage Portrait comes a spellbinding novel of two women connected across fifty years by art, love, betrayals, secrets, and motherhood.

"An exquisitely sensual tale of love, motherhood, and other forms of madness, The Hand That First Held Mine will unsettle, move, and haunt you." —Emma Donoghue, author of Room

Lexie Sinclair is plotting an extraordinary life for herself.

Hedged in by her parents' genteel country life, she plans her escape to London. There, she takes up with Innes Kent, a magazine editor who introduces her to the thrilling, underground world of bohemian, post-war Soho. She learns to be a reporter, to know art and artists, to embrace her life fully and with a deep love at the center of it. And when she finds herself pregnant, she doesn't hesitate to have the baby on her own.

Later, in present-day London, a young painter named Elina dizzily navigates the first weeks of motherhood. She doesn't recognize herself: she finds herself walking outside with no shoes; she goes to the restaurant for lunch at nine in the morning; she can't recall the small matter of giving birth. But for her boyfriend, Ted, fatherhood is calling up lost memories, with images he cannot place.

As Ted's memories become more disconcerting and more frequent, it seems that something might connect these two stories—these two women—something that becomes all the more heartbreaking and beautiful as they all hurtle toward its revelation.

Praised by The Washington Post as a "breathtaking, heart-breaking creation," The Hand That First Held Mine is a gorgeous and tenderly wrought story about the ways in which love and beauty bind us together. It is a gorgeous inquiry into the ways we make and unmake our lives, who we know ourselves to be, and how even our most accidental legacies connect us.

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ISBN:
9780547487274
9781483071732
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Grouping Information

Grouped Work ID3f0f5c68-d9c0-749f-7c20-f6151179b2b6
Grouping Titlehand that first held mine
Grouping Authormaggie ofarrell
Grouping Categorybook
Grouping LanguageEnglish (eng)
Last Grouping Update2023-12-08 08:34:13AM
Last Indexed2023-12-08 08:34:42AM

Solr Fields

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0
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author
O'Farrell, Maggie
author_display
O'Farrell, Maggie
available_at_aacpl
Online OverDrive Collection
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Online OverDrive Collection
display_description

From the best-selling author of Hamnet and The Marriage Portrait comes a spellbinding novel of two women connected across fifty years by art, love, betrayals, secrets, and motherhood.

"An exquisitely sensual tale of love, motherhood, and other forms of madness, The Hand That First Held Mine will unsettle, move, and haunt you." —Emma Donoghue, author of Room

Lexie Sinclair is plotting an extraordinary life for herself.

Hedged in by her parents' genteel country life, she plans her escape to London. There, she takes up with Innes Kent, a magazine editor who introduces her to the thrilling, underground world of bohemian, post-war Soho. She learns to be a reporter, to know art and artists, to embrace her life fully and with a deep love at the center of it. And when she finds herself pregnant, she doesn't hesitate to have the baby on her own.

Later, in present-day London, a young painter named Elina dizzily navigates the first weeks of motherhood. She doesn't recognize herself: she finds herself walking outside with no shoes; she goes to the restaurant for lunch at nine in the morning; she can't recall the small matter of giving birth. But for her boyfriend, Ted, fatherhood is calling up lost memories, with images he cannot place.

As Ted's memories become more disconcerting and more frequent, it seems that something might connect these two stories—these two women—something that becomes all the more heartbreaking and beautiful as they all hurtle toward its revelation.

Praised by The Washington Post as a "breathtaking, heart-breaking creation," The Hand That First Held Mine is a gorgeous and tenderly wrought story about the ways in which love and beauty bind us together. It is a gorgeous inquiry into the ways we make and unmake our lives, who we know ourselves to be, and how even our most accidental legacies connect us.

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eAudiobook
eBook
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Audio Books
eBook
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3f0f5c68-d9c0-749f-7c20-f6151179b2b6
isbn
9780547487274
9781483071732
last_indexed
2023-12-08T13:34:42.349Z
lexile_score
-1
literary_form
Fiction
literary_form_full
Fiction
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Online OverDrive
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Anne Arundel County Public Library Online
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Online OverDrive Collection
primary_isbn
9780547487274
publishDate
2010
2011
publisher
Blackstone Publishing
HarperCollins
recordtype
grouped_work
title_display
The Hand That First Held Mine A Novel
title_full
The Hand That First Held Mine A Novel
The Hand that First Held Mine
title_short
The Hand That First Held Mine
title_sub
A Novel
topic_facet
Fiction
Historical Fiction
Literature

Solr Details Tables

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