The Piano Man's Daughter - Softcover

Findley, Timothy

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0006485200 ISBN 13: 9780006485209

Publisher: Harper Perennial, 1999

Synopsis

Now an important title in the newly redesigned PerennialCanada series, Timothy Findley’s The Piano Man’s Daughter continues to be one of his most popular books ever. The novel’s reissue follows on the heels of Findley’s newest novel,Pilgrim, released in late 1999 and sure to attract even more new readers to the Findley fold.

A glorious reverberation of a time when change was reaching a crescendo and yet hope and renewal were always to be found, The Piano Man’s Daughter is the story of Lily Kilworth and her son Charlie, a young piano tuner, who must find answers to the questions that define his life. Who was his father? And, given the swirl of madness enveloping his mother, does he dare become a father himself?

Set at the turn of the century and inspired by the history of Findley’s own mother’s family, this is a remarkable novel that sings with love and loss, a wonderful burst of reading pleasure. 

About this title

Review:

As the story opens, Lily, the heroine of Timothy Findley's Victorian-Gothic-style novel as seen through the narrative of her son Charlie, is ending her days in an asylum; her life unfolds as a Dickensian tale of deprivation and struggle between the feminine and the coldly masculine, leading to that "madwoman in the attic" denouement. Yet Charlie is reclaiming his mother's life through his loving telling of her story. "She could break your heart with that riveting gaze," he says. Music, vaudeville, and silent movies resonate through the lives in the novel, set in turn-of-the-century Toronto. Findley is a best-selling and award-winning Canadian writer, author of The Wars and Famous Last Words.

From the Back Cover:

In 1939, piano tuner Charlie Kilworth ponders two questions: who was his father? and, given the madness that consumed his mother Lily, does he dare become a father himself? His quest reveals more than he imagined about Lily, herself the daughter of a piano player, and her colourful, tormented life amid the lively characters and rich sense of early-twentieth-century Toronto.

About this edition

• Publisher: Harper Perennial
• Publication date: 1999
• ISBN 10: 0006485200
• ISBN 13: 9780006485209
• Binding: Paperback
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 512