A Family Place: A Man Returns to the Center of His Life

By Charles Gaines and Dave DiBenedetto

A memoir of building a cabin, and rebuilding a family, in Nova Scotia: “In the rich tradition of Thoreau’s Walden and Tracy Kidder’s House” (The New York Times).
 
In 1990, writer Charles Gaines and his artist wife, Patricia, bought 160 acres of wild land on the northeast coast of Nova Scotia. Eventually, they began to see the land as a place that might heal their recently battered marriage, and as an opportunity to take on a big, risky, long-term project instead of settling into the caution and gradual losses of middle-class middle age. Enlisting their children and their daughter’s carpenter boyfriend, they decided to build a cabin on the land the following summer, with their own hands, as a family venture.
 
This “heartwarming memoir” recounts that summer’s sometimes harrowing, sometimes hilarious events with passages of the family’s history that dramatize what is at stake for each of them in Nova Scotia (Publishers Weekly). Gaines describes the process of building a cabin while living in tents without electricity or running water, and the pleasures and limitations of a life so simplified that a week’s biggest social event is a bonfire. He draws a portrait of the small, generous Acadian community of farmers and lobster fishermen surrounding their land, and traces the history of that land to its original French-Acadian owner. And he tracks the mood of his family through the long, difficult summer—from initial enthusiasm to near mutiny, and finally to exhilaration and deep satisfaction at having built something that will last.
 
“Remarkable.” —Susan Cheever
 
“Weaving together details of construction and carpentry with personal revelations about marriage and midlife, the narrative works as both a factual account of housebuilding and a poetic testimony of love lost and found . . . A beautifully written memoir.” —Kirkus Reviews

• Language: English
• Publisher: Open Road Integrated Media
• Release date: Jul 25, 2017
• ISBN: 9781510717916

Reviews for A Family Place

[dandiercks · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Not being into body building or outdoor adventures and the like, I wasn’t familiar with Charles Gaines. I chose this book simply because the description of it sounded like something I would benefit from. Gaines, along with his family and friends, built a cabin on land he and his wife Patricia bought in Nova Scotia. The project was ostensibly an attempt to save their failing marriage. It turned out to be much more than that, although, it was successful in doing that. Gaines is obviously a gifted writer. This book is beautifully written. He’s also something of a philosopher. All of this comes in the outer shell of a true man’s man. He wrote probably the most famous body building story of all time, “Pumping Iron,” the documentary that catapulted Arnold Schwarzenegger to fame. Gaines has written numerous books, both fiction and nonfiction, many of them best sellers. He is also an inventor. Among his most famous inventions is the game of paintball. He certainly didn’t need to write this book; his legacy had been well established by that time and by the time it was reprinted and released 25 years later. He wrote this book for himself and for readers, like me, who might be inspired by it. I’m glad he did.

[formerenglishteacher · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Not being into body building or outdoor adventures and the like, I wasn’t familiar with Charles Gaines. I chose this book simply because the description of it sounded like something I would benefit from. Gaines, along with his family and friends, built a cabin on land he and his wife Patricia bought in Nova Scotia. The project was ostensibly an attempt to save their failing marriage. It turned out to be much more than that, although, it was successful in doing that. Gaines is obviously a gifted writer. This book is beautifully written. He’s also something of a philosopher. All of this comes in the outer shell of a true man’s man. He wrote probably the most famous body building story of all time, “Pumping Iron,” the documentary that catapulted Arnold Schwarzenegger to fame. Gaines has written numerous books, both fiction and nonfiction, many of them best sellers. He is also an inventor. Among his most famous inventions is the game of paintball. He certainly didn’t need to write this book; his legacy had been well established by that time and by the time it was reprinted and released 25 years later. He wrote this book for himself and for readers, like me, who might be inspired by it. I’m glad he did.