Book Review: Ellie and the Harpmaker by Hazel Prior

Ellie and the Harpmaker
by Hazel Prior (Prior)

Think of a much more sophisticated “Rain Man” and you have the Harp Maker of the title. And Ellie is the crux of the tale, a childless housewife whose chance discovery of the harp maker (Dan) and his work barn while on a walk in the woods of Exmoor, England awakens her from the subconscious complacency of her life. The book’s chapters alternate between Ellie’s and Dan’s sides of their joint/joined story. Author Prior does a lovely job of detailing each character’s thoughts, reactions, and emotions. The story is at once and the same time lyrical, fraught, complicated, and simple — the latter in a good way. Without giving too much away, what is “meant to be” happens. This 2019 publication is a charming and thoughtful first novel from harpist, and award-winning fiction writer, Hazel Prior.

 

(If you enjoy this, you may also wish to try How the Penguins Saved Veronica by Hazel Prior, Rise and Shine, Benedict Stone by Phaedra Patrick, The Rules of Love and Grammar by Mary Simses or A Man Called Ove by Frederick Backman.)

 

( official Hazel Prior web site )

 

Recommended by Becky W.C.
Walt Branch Library

 

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