Northeaster: A Story of Courage and Survival in the Blizzard of 1952

by Cathie Pelletier Narrated by Morgan Bailey Keaton

Overview

For many, the past few years have been defined by climate disaster. Stories about once-in-a-lifetime hurricanes, floods, fires, droughts, and even snowstorms are now commonplace. But dramatic weather events are not new and Northeaster, Cathie Pelletier's breathtaking account of the 1952 snowstorm that blanketed New England, offers a valuable reminder about nature's capacity for destruction as well as insight into the human instinct for preservation.



Northeaster weaves together a rich cast of characters whose lives were uprooted and endangered by the storm. Housewives and lobstermen, loggers and soldiers were all trapped as snow piled in drifts twenty feet high. The storm smothered hundreds of travelers in their cars, covered entire towns, and broke ships in half. In the midst of the blizzard's chaos, there were remarkable acts of heroism and courageous generosities. Doctors braved the storm to help deliver babies. Ordinary people kept their wits while buried in their cars, and others made their way out of forests to find kindhearted strangers willing to take them in.



It's likely that none of us know how we would handle a confrontation with a blizzard or other natural disaster. But Northeaster shows that we have it inside to fight for survival in some of the harshest conditions that nature has to offer.

Editorial Reviews

Bernd Heinrich

"Northeaster is an amazing piece of work, giving us a riveting story. The storm is the framework, but the picture it holds is of the characters themselves, how they lived their lives, how they faced adversity. Incredibly, not only can this scenario happen again. One day it will."

Stewart O’Nan

"If there’s a snowier book than Northeaster, I don’t know it. With its rich cast of fishermen, woodsmen, millworkers and plain old small-town Mainers, Cathie Pelletier’s dramatic re-creation of the great blizzard of ‘52 isn’t simply a fast-paced disaster narrative about the workings of fate, but a paean to a long-lost way of life."

The Wall Street Journal

Cathie Pelletier anatomizes this two-day tempest in Northeaster, a historical re-creation of personal experiences so dramatic that they have lingered for decades in local and family lore. It’s touching to see the faces of real people who went through the ordeal.

The Last Winter and Northland - Porter Fox

"Northeaster is a meticulously researched, compassionate, and all too real account of the interface between megastorm and human civilization, a tragedy that is too often reduced to numbers and statistics. Set in America's last frontierland, the state of Maine, Cathie Pelletier cracks open the door to victims's lives before the storm and the immeasurable loss they suffered after it."

Booklist

In this excellent example of narrative nonfiction, Pelletier follows several families, many of whom experienced tragedy or hardship during the storm. Pelletier also delves into the physical destruction that the storm left in its wake and the science of blizzards. This book will appeal to readers of narrative nonfiction and climate nonfiction in particular.

null null

Cathie Pelletier anatomizes this two-day tempest in Northeaster, a historical re-creation of personal experiences so dramatic that they have lingered for decades in local and family lore. It’s touching to see the faces of real people who went through the ordeal.

Booklist

In this excellent example of narrative nonfiction, Pelletier follows several families, many of whom experienced tragedy or hardship during the storm. Pelletier also delves into the physical destruction that the storm left in its wake and the science of blizzards. This book will appeal to readers of narrative nonfiction and climate nonfiction in particular.

–Booklist

In this excellent example of narrative nonfiction, Pelletier follows several families, many of whom experienced tragedy or hardship during the storm. Pelletier also delves into the physical destruction that the storm left in its wake and the science of blizzards. This book will appeal to readers of narrative nonfiction and climate nonfiction in particular.

Library Journal

12/01/2022

In 1952 for four days—February 16 to 19—a torrential blizzard immobilized most of New England. Temperatures fell well below zero, and snowdrifts piled 20 feet high. Three dozen people died that week, six from Pelletier's home state of Maine. In the ragged seas off Cape Cod, 60-foot breakers and 80-mile-per-hour winds broke the backs of two tankers, the size of football fields, in half. The Coast Guard rescue of the crewmen made national headlines, memorialized in the movie The Finest Hours. But the news on the ground was just as fraught. Pelletier (The Funeral Makers), with her well-honed novelist's gifts, tells that story exceptionally well, building it out of the narratives of several Mainers and how they survived…or didn't. One spent 36 hours in a car buried beneath a snowdrift before being found. Another had to be transported to a hospital on a toboggan to give birth. Four didn't make it through the storm. The tales are, as she notes, footnotes in a larger drama. Human and real, their stories convey how chaos can disrupt the most ordered plans. VERDICT This vividly told tale should attract history buffs and anyone who loves a good story.—David Keymer

DECEMBER 2023 - AudioFile

On February 17-18, 1952, a blizzard occurred in New England that dropped 20 feet of snow into the state of Maine. Narrator Morgan Bailey Keaton gives listeners a bird's-eye view of the effect this deluge had on the lives of many different people before the dawn of sophisticated weather equipment. Keaton gives an outstanding performance using emotions that audiences would not expect to hear in a true account of this disaster. She performs the dialogue of each character and captures the urgency and pain of Mainers as they hope against hope that they'll all stay safe from the monster storm. It's a compelling story that may remind some New Englanders of their experiences in '78. E.E.S. © AudioFile 2023, Portland, Maine

Product Details

BN ID:	2940159385123
Publisher:	Tantor Audio
Publication date:	12/19/2023
Edition description:	Unabridged

Videos