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The Waters: A Novel Hardcover – January 9, 2024

by Bonnie Jo Campbell (Author)
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A TODAY Show #ReadWithJenna Book Club Selection • One of Oprah Daily's Most Anticipated Books of 2024 • One of the Chicago Review of Books's 12 Must-Read Books of January 2024 • Featured in Roxane Gay’s newsletter The Audacity • One of the Christian Science Monitor's Best Books of January

"If you loved Where the Crawdads Sing, you're going to love, and I'm saying love, our first read of 2024." ―Jenna Bush Hager, TODAY Show

A master of rural noir returns with a fierce, mesmerizing novel about exceptional women and the soul of a small town.

On an island in the Great Massasauga Swamp―an area known as “The Waters” to the residents of nearby Whiteheart, Michigan―herbalist and eccentric Hermine “Herself” Zook has healed the local women of their ailments for generations. As stubborn as her tonics are powerful, Herself inspires reverence and fear in the people of Whiteheart, and even in her own three estranged daughters. The youngest―the beautiful, inscrutable, and lazy Rose Thorn―has left her own daughter, eleven-year-old Dorothy “Donkey” Zook, to grow up wild.

Donkey spends her days searching for truths in the lush landscape and in her math books, waiting for her wayward mother and longing for a father, unaware that family secrets, passionate love, and violent men will flood through the swamp and upend her idyllic childhood. Rage simmers below the surface of this divided community, and those on both sides of the divide have closed their doors against the enemy. The only bridge across the waters is Rose Thorn.

With a “ruthless and precise eye for the details of the physical world” (Jane Smiley, New York Times Book Review), Bonnie Jo Campbell presents an elegant antidote to the dark side of masculinity, celebrating the resilience of nature and the brutality and sweetness of rural life.

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  1. Print length
    400 pages
  2. Language
    English
  3. Publisher
    W. W. Norton & Company
  4. Publication date
    January 9, 2024
  5. Dimensions
    6.4 x 1.3 x 9.4 inches
  6. ISBN-10
    0393248437
  7. ISBN-13
    978-0393248432
  8. See all details
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  1. “Be careful with hate,” Hermine said. “You can only sustain it at a price.”
    Highlighted by 105 Kindle readers
  2. It is said the island, where healing waters percolate to the surface, was a place where women shared one another’s dreams, a place where women did what they wanted.
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From the Publisher

From National Book Award Finalist and Bestselling Author of Once Upon a River Bonnie Jo Campbell
A Today Show #read with Jenna Book Club Selection
Bonnie Jo Campbell has quietly become one of our best writers Daniel Woodrell
American Salvage. Bonnie Jo Campbell Once Upon a River. Bonnie Jo Campbell Mothers, Tell Your Daughters. Bonnie Jo Cmapbell
American Salvage Once Upon a River Mothers, Tell Your Daughters
Customer Reviews
4.2 out of 5 stars
179
4.2 out of 5 stars
708
4.1 out of 5 stars
151
Price $11.87 $9.27 $18.34
Additional Books by Bonnie Jo Campbell “These short stories approach their subjects from an array of perspectives, but what they share is freshness, surprise, and a compulsion to plumb some absolute extremes of American existence.”―National Book Award citation "A demonstration of outstanding skills on the river of American literature." ―Entertainment Weekly From the author of National Book Award finalist American Salvage comes a dazzling and suspenseful new story collection.

Editorial Reviews

Review

"Bonnie Jo Campbell has quietly become one of our best writers. She brings news you haven’t heard before, and that’s why I read. Her new novel, The Waters, is written in prose strong and lyrical, and tells a story so deeply rooted in a specific place that the accumulation of details approaches the magical."
― Daniel Woodrell, author of Winter’s Bone

"Bonnie Jo Campbell’s The Waters is a novel, a living myth, and a place.… Imagine a mash-up of Flannery O’Connor and the Brothers Grimm, of Angela Carter’s reimagined fairy tales and William Faulkner’s gothic sublime. And yet, The Waters is all Bonnie Jo. If you’ve read her, you know what I mean, how she sees and evokes us, and this land we inhabit, covered in mayapples and dogwood, cuntshells and quickmuck, with a masterful, tender objectivity. The Waters is no utopia. It is muddy and bloody; it swallows us whole and effervesces into fog. It is the magic we’d inhabit if we still believed in magic, the dream we’d have if we could sleep."
― Diane Seuss, Pulitzer Prize–winning author of Frank: Sonnets

"The Waters will suck you into its muddy gut and not let go.… A powerful, fragrant, readable, almost edible novel. In The Waters, Bonnie Jo Campbell, who understands the women and men of the no-longer-prosperous rural Midwest better than anyone, dreams up a marshy Northwoods township where factual flora and fauna, soil quality and agricultural practice, demographics and religious affiliation somehow share a long, dotted, antic boundary line with Oz and The Blue Fairy Book, with märchen, folkways, and ancient myth."
― Jaimy Gordon, National Book Award–winning author of Lord of Misrule

"There are scenes of sadness and turmoil in Bonnie Jo Campbell’s superb new novel, but at its core is an abiding sense of wonder. We encounter that wonder in Campbell’s minute attentive-ness to her rural Michigan landscape as well as to her understanding of the complexities of the human heart. Nevertheless, for all the novel’s vividness, The Waters has an ethereal quality that we enter as if into a waking dream, and even after we turn the last page, we remain under its spell, enchanted"
― Ron Rash, author of Serena

"On a swampy island in Michigan, an outcast herbalist and her granddaughter contend with traumatic family secrets and an absent mother in this vividly drawn corner of rural America."
― New York Times Book Review

"For Campbell, the dose of pixie dust is thoroughly diluted in a stream of gritty reality; her style never leaves the loamy land behind[.] Once you get thoroughly sunk into the story, you’ll resent ever having to leave this matriarchal family that insists on preserving its own peculiar ways in a world determined to move on…Campbell’s most astonishing feat is bringing The Waters to a climax that abandons the fantasy of her “once upon a time” opening and yet eventually delivers us to a place of real magic we never could have anticipated."
― Ron Charles, Washington Post Book Review

"Campbell has been exploring hardship, especially the hardships that independent and exploratory women have to work through, for most of her writing career. She knows that unexpected misfortunes have to be put up with, and the question is always whether to do it your own way or to give in to the people around you and embark on a life you do not want…The Waters is a thought-provoking and readable exploration of eccentricity and of all different kinds of love―familial love, romantic love, love of knowledge, love of animals and love of one’s own environment, even when it is a difficult place to live."
― Jane Smiley, Los Angeles Times Book Review

"Campbell, who lives outside Kalamazoo, Michigan, is one of American fiction’s leading voices about rural life: the struggle to make a living, the beauty of the wild environment, the thorny and sometimes violent relationships between men and women, and the economic and industrial pressures that threaten everything…filled with vivid descriptions of the diverse flora of this wetlands, The Waters is a realistic novel with a strong thread of fairy tale running through it[.] The Waters builds toward an incredible climactic episode that addresses the great divide running through this imperiled community."
― Jim Higgins, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

"If you enjoy reading about strong, independent, purposeful women who thrive in the face of adversity and in spite of serious flaws, both personal and professional, this is a book for you[.] From lurking vengeful locals with firearms to deadly snakes protected by federal law, this tale moves irresistibly to an end that fulfills the promise of the rest of the book. It also addresses some trenchant current issues that appear in the news daily but are not, in fact new, but age-old problems that continue to baffle those with prospective solutions. It is a muscular and meaningful book that should be great book group material."
― Reading the West

"With its detailed portrayal of nature and its mystical elements, The Waters paints a vivid picture of life in a rural area."
― Julie Hinds, Detroit Free Press

"This is a verdant, gripping, and clarion saga of home, family, and womanhood, of meaningful work and metamorphosis, of poisons and antidotes, and the urgent need for us to heal and sustain the imperiled living world that heals and sustains us."
― Donna Seaman, Booklist (starred review)

"With an electrifying vocabulary all its own (here, cigarettes are coffin nails, and plant names roll off the tongue with ease), The Waters is a novel that is rife with enchantments―a classic in the making, introducing generations of heroines who are destined to be beloved."
― Michelle Schingler, Foreward (starred review)

"…one of the most important voices in American fiction. "
― Rebecca Jones Schinski, Book Riot

"Bonnie Jo Campbell is one of the chief practitioners of Midwestern Gothic, and the National Book Award finalist’s first novel in a dozen years is reason to rejoice. The Waters is an indelible portrait of rural Michigan and the women tough enough to live there, with writing so evocative it practically sprouts in your hands. Lush, brackish, and bracing, The Waters is not so much read as steeped in."
― The Christian Science Monitor

"I especially loved all the descriptive details…[The Waters] is a wonderful winter read that has you inspired for warmer springtime weather ahead."
― Victoria Giardina, New York Post

"Captivating…A novel that’s rife with enchantments―a classic in the making, introducing generations of heroines who are destined to be beloved."
― Michelle Anne Schingler, Foreword Reviews

About the Author

Bonnie Jo Campbell is the author of six works of fiction, including American Salvage, finalist for the National Book Award and the National Book Critics Circle Award, and Once Upon a River, a national bestseller. The recipient of a Guggenheim Fellowship, AWP’s Grace Paley Prize for Short Fiction, and a Pushcart Prize, she lives outside Kalamazoo, Michigan, with donkeys.

Product details

  • Publisher ‏ : ‎ W. W. Norton & Company (January 9, 2024)
  • Language ‏ : ‎ English
  • Hardcover ‏ : ‎ 400 pages
  • ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 0393248437
  • ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-0393248432
  • Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 1.5 pounds
  • Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 6.4 x 1.3 x 9.4 inches
  • Customer Reviews:

About the author

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Bonnie Jo Campbell

Bonnie Jo Campbell

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Campbell grew up on a small Michigan farm in a house her grandfather built. When she left home for the University of Chicago, her mother rented out her room; she has since hitchhiked across the U.S. and Canada, scaled the Swiss Alps on her bicycle, and traveled with the circus. She has led adventure tours in Russia and Eastern Europe. After earning a master's degree in mathematics, Campbell began writing fiction. She received her M.F.A. in creative writing from Western Michigan University, and now lives in Kalamazoo.

Her most recent book is the collection, American Salvage, about which Alan Cheuse, NPR reviewer has said, "In these stories about cold, lonely, meth-drenched, working-class Michigan life, there's a certain beauty reaching something like the sublimity of a D.H. Lawrence story." She is also the author of Women & Other Animals (University of Massachusetts, 2000), and the novel Q Road (Scribner, 2003). She has won the AWP award for short fictiona Pushcart prize, the Eudora Welty Prize (2009), and she was named a Barnes & Noble Great New Writer. Her fiction has recently been published in Southern Review, Kenyon Review, Alaska Review, Boulevard, and Witness. The New York Times has called her stories "Bitter but sweetened by humor," and Publisher's Weekly said Campbell details, "domestic worlds where Martha Stewart would fear to tread." She feeds donkeys and practices kobudo weapons arts in Kalamazoo, Michigan. Visit her website at www.bonniejocampbell.com

Customer reviews

3.9 out of 5 stars
3.9 out of 5
1,388 global ratings

Customers say

Customers find the storyline terrific and say it helps pass time. They also say the characters are cleverly created and unique. Opinions are mixed on the characters and readability, with some finding them clever and unique while others find them confusing.

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StorylineReadabilityCharactersStory pace
12 customers mention "Storyline"12 positive0 negative

Customers find the storyline fascinating, thought-provoking, and hard to put down. They also say the setting is unique and the story flows along beautifully at a fast pace. Overall, readers say the book is a great read that helps pass time.

"...The setting was unique. The story flowed along beautifully at a fast pace. There was never a dull moment. I adored Dorothy the most...." Read more

"...So I thought a good read would help. It certainly is a good read and it has helped pass my time in a positive way." Read more

"...I am so grateful for the recommendation, because this is a terrific novel, not what I expected, and quite unlike anything else I have read...." Read more

"...into the minds and hearts of the men and women of this strange and wonderful story!..." Read more

12 customers mention "Readability"6 positive6 negative

Customers are mixed about the readability of the book. Some mention that it's written well enough to have them feel a lot of emotions, while others say it'll stick with them. The narrator is one of the best, and the book is not a light read.

"...The narrator is one of the best I have ever had the pleasure of listening as I followed along with the book...." Read more

"...lead; that is about as far as I would go…..but really the writing was chaotic and all over the place with no clear direction...." Read more

"No spoilers here. This book was overflowing with descriptive words. A little hard to read but once I submerged myself into the story I was taken in...." Read more

"This book was difficult for me to read as it kept talking about the poisonous snake that was in the cupboard...." Read more

8 customers mention "Characters"4 positive4 negative

Customers have mixed opinions about the characters in the book. Some find them cleverly created and likable, while others find them confusing.

"...What a talented author Bonnie Jo Campbell is. The characters and their names were cleverly created. The setting was unique...." Read more

"...There were also SO many characters...." Read more

"...The characters were well written. This book was written well enough to have me feel a lot of emotions while reading. I would recommend this book" Read more

"...It’s a sad story, with very flawed characters who are endlessly stuck in their superstitious and uneducated beliefs and their relentless stubbornness..." Read more

3 customers mention "Story pace"0 positive3 negative

Customers find the story pace of the book painfully slow.

"This book is so painfully slow going that I kept falling asleep. I usually like descriptive writing styles, but this was ridiculous...." Read more

"I just could not get into this book at all! I found it slow and confusing...." Read more

"I just started The Waters so can’t say much yet. It has been a slow start but pushing forward. I believe will get better as I keep reading...." Read more

Award worthy
5 Stars
Award worthy
I savored the last 100 pages, not wanting it to end. And feel despondent knowing nothing I choose next will fill my heart the way this novel did. I don’t like reading reviews before reading a book, so I won’t give one here. But this is an abbreviated description of The Waters by Bonnie Jo Campbell:Set in rural Michigan, three very different daughters raised by a strong matriarch and a granddaughter named Donkey. Rich in symbolism, strong + lyrical prose, a feminist novel, gritty + beautiful, a light sprinkling of magical realism but NOT a light read and one that will stick with me.
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Top reviews from the United States

Kindle Customer
5.0 out of 5 stars Fascinating story
Reviewed in the United States on January 17, 2024
Verified Purchase
What a ride this story was! What a talented author Bonnie Jo Campbell is. The characters and their names were cleverly created. The setting was unique. The story flowed along beautifully at a fast pace. There was never a dull moment. I adored Dorothy the most. The tie in of The Wizard of Oz along with mention of other Oz books was most clever. As a teacher I loved that Dorothy and her mother loved books. I enjoyed the palindromes that were splashed throughout the book. Most of all I enjoyed the math wizard Dorothy was. Last,but not least,a book is never complete without a dog. The narrator is one of the best I have ever had the pleasure of listening as I followed along with the book. I will definitely read and listen to this book again
22 people found this helpful
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Chandra
4.0 out of 5 stars A little too descriptive but a wonderful story
Reviewed in the United States on February 3, 2024
Verified Purchase
No spoilers here. This book was overflowing with descriptive words. A little hard to read but once I submerged myself into the story I was taken in. The characters were well written. This book was written well enough to have me feel a lot of emotions while reading. I would recommend this book
7 people found this helpful
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Amy A.
3.0 out of 5 stars A complex matriarchal drama that takes imagery to a new level
Reviewed in the United States on April 3, 2024
Verified Purchase
📚 The Waters (🎧/📖)
✍ Bonnie Jo Campbell
📖 Fiction
⭐3/5

➡Just past the town of Whiteheart, Michigan where crops of white stalked celery used to flourish, on a secluded island in the Great Massasauga Swamp, sits Rose Cottage. Brimming with the secrets that generations of Zook family women have held, the cottage plays host to Hermine "Herself" Zook, her granddaughter "Donkey" and occasionally, her three daughters, Primrose, Molly and Rose Thorn. Written as an ode to the lush swamp and the unbreakable bond of women, The Waters is the chronicle of generations of Zook women doing their best to survive love, loss and each other.
◾
🎯 What I loved: This felt very reminiscent of something I would have read in a high school English class albeit filled with content that would sadly be censored today. I haven't yearned for my favorite AP Lang teacher to help me make sense of something in a long time but this definitely did it. I've heard this described as similar to Where The Crawdads Sing and while there were lots of depictions of nature and animals, there was definitely not an exciting murder mystery to tie it all together. There was, however, a fascinating female-dominated family with the crookedest family tree I've ever tried to draw, a town steeped in its own traditions trying to find its new identity in a post-farming era and just enough shocking alternative medicine to really rattle your senses. Despite not feeling a deep connection to any of the characters, the Zook family was certainly interesting and this in-depth portrait of rural Michigan was descriptively told with an eye for the land and the beauty of the culture there.

🙅‍♀️ What I didn't: This was honestly painful to read. Where I am typically a vivacious reader, I had to bribe myself to get through this book and could only take it in bite-sized pieces. Perhaps related, I've had some of the best naps of my life in the past two weeks. The descriptions of The Waters were so detailed that it felt like pages and pages would go by without anything but nature depictions that didn't contribute to the storyline. There were also SO many characters. The first few chapters described each person in the town of Whiteheart, Michigan in depth- many of whom were never spoken about in the book again- and even with diligent notetaking, I struggled to keep track of who was who. Suffice it to say, I can appreciate this as an intensely eloquent work of literary fiction but it wasn't the book for me.
◾
Read if you love:
*complex families with powerhouse matriarchs
*rural communities where place feels like a character
*vivid nature imagery
◾
See also: Where The Crawdads Sing, The Unmaking of June Farrow, Black Cake
6 people found this helpful
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Amylia Barnett
5.0 out of 5 stars Raw
Reviewed in the United States on June 24, 2024
Verified Purchase
When I was reading reviews to decide whether or not to read The Waters, I was almost deterred by a review that said nothing happened in this book. I couldn’t disagree more.

I was drawn into the description of the setting and the cast of female characters instantly. The strong female characters all have a complexity that moves the reader along with them. I don’t think they’re all particularly likable but they are very human and multi-faceted. I also particularly appreciated Titus’ character development and role.

Another thing I loved about this book is the author didn’t waste any words. All of her descriptions of characters and actions came back later to have meaning to the overall story. (ie Wild Will)

Though I particularly loath rattle snakes having grown up in West Texas where they are a consistent presence, Campbell’s use of them throughout led created intensity and suspense that unified the novel.

I’m glad I spent my time with these women, Titus, and the rattlesnakes (that’s really saying something).
One person found this helpful
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Denise Rassier
4.0 out of 5 stars A good read! I saw it recommended by Jenna on Hoda and Jenna Today show.
Reviewed in the United States on February 5, 2024
Verified Purchase
I needed to keep myself busy for a few weeks following my knee replacement surgery! So I thought a good read would help. It certainly is a good read and it has helped pass my time in a positive way.
8 people found this helpful
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Amazon Customer
2.0 out of 5 stars Good story but painfully slow going.
Reviewed in the United States on May 22, 2024
Verified Purchase
This book is so painfully slow going that I kept falling asleep. I usually like descriptive writing styles, but this was ridiculous. It’s a sad story, with very flawed characters who are endlessly stuck in their superstitious and uneducated beliefs and their relentless stubbornness. Thought provoking, but a real downer.
I was intrigued by the mathematical analogies and logic.
One person found this helpful
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KK
5.0 out of 5 stars Don’t miss this!
Reviewed in the United States on January 13, 2024
Verified Purchase
I found this book in one of the “Ten best books of 2023” lists, and approached it without great enthusiasm.
I am so grateful for the recommendation, because this is a terrific novel, not what I expected, and quite unlike anything else I have read. Other reviewers have given synopses of the plot, most of them rather unperceptive, so I won’t attempt one. I will just say that it would be hard to find a more lyrical, sustained and beautiful portrait of imperfect women struggling to understand their place in the natural world around them, and in the heartless world beyond that their menfolk created, and trying to hold on to each other when so many things conspire to separate them. I was quite stunned when I reached the end of this tale, and reluctant to return to the real world.
19 people found this helpful
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DA
3.0 out of 5 stars Slightly Bizarre Tale
Reviewed in the United States on June 28, 2024
Verified Purchase
Somewhat interesting but slightly bizarre tale about a remote Michigan farming community. Seems like it might be set in the bayous of Louisiana! There is no person in this story who acts remotely “normal” so it’s almost sci-fi. I finished the book because I was somewhat intrigued about where it was going, but I can’t say I enjoyed it. If you can deal with incest (“his daughter was his half-sister’s half sister”) and voodoo you might feel differently.
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Top reviews from other countries

Cliente Amazon
5.0 out of 5 stars Brilliant and relevant
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on March 20, 2024
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Great from beginning to end, lots of chapters to enjoy. I hope there's a sequel.
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