"In no time it's over; the tourists, duly processed, hurry out into the sun. They feel lighter than air, they claim, freer than birds, drifting off into their various inventions of paradise as though oblivious to the million invisible filaments of connection, trivial or profound, which bind them one to the other and to the small green planet they call home."
This is from the story "Dolls, Dolls, Dolls, Dolls".
"It seemed to Hélène that her mother had childish notions about the magic of places. A field of oats was a field of oats. The blackberries they'd found along the coast path had the same beaded precision as those at home. Her mother had a way of making too much of things, always seeing secondary meanings, things that weren't really there, and her eyes watered embarrassingly when she spoke of these deeper meanings."
Pragmatic daughter, poet mother.
SASKATCHEWAN BOOK HAUL - BOOK #5
The first Carol Shields I ever read and still my favorite. Now I have this copy for my ever-expanding library in Tokyo. My signed copy is somewhere in storage at my parents' farm.
Various Miracles: Stories | 
