Twelve-year-old Pierre Roy, because of a head injury, suffers memory issues.  His father Claude has difficulty accepting the changes in his son while his mother Celine numbs herself with pills.  Their neighbour, Sandra Kimbrough, teaches Pierre how to play the violin, and he proves to have exceptional talent.  Music becomes his solace while life swirls around him.  

The narrative moves among Claude and Celine, Sandra and her husband Jim, and two other residents in Oslo:  Edna Sibley and her grandson Luc who has intellectual challenges.  All the adults have secrets which the reader gradually learns.  Connections among various characters are also revealed.  Another character who makes periodic appearances and whose perspective is given is a moose who roams the area around Oslo.

One cannot but feel a lot of sympathy for Pierre.  Because of an accident, he has difficulty remembering for even short periods of time.  As a result, he is bullied at school.  His parents are little help; they are more concerned about themselves.  Claude is despicable; when he first appears in the novel, he mulls over “the specific disappointments he felt with regard to his son”:  he thinks of Pierre as weak and hates that his son loves to read and play the violin.  For Claude, Pierre is “an embarrassment.”  In addition, Claude’s illegal activities and his behaviour in the past are deplorable.  Celine is very much an absent mother; she takes pills so she doesn’t have to face reality.  Not only does she neglect her son, but she is deceitful and disloyal to “the best person Celine had ever known.”  The moose’s care and concern for her calf exceeds the care Pierre receives from his parents. 

The book touches on a number of difficult topics:  physical violence, sexual violence, adultery, animal cruelty.  My issue is not the novel’s subject matter but its purpose.  What is it trying to say?  A theme could be the power of music.  Another could be the interconnectedness of the human and natural world because every time the two worlds collide, there are major consequences.  If the moose had been left alone, Pierre’s family might not have disintegrated.  Is the message that the natural world has much to teach humans?  Is the message that we need to focus on the present?  Things turn around when Claude takes responsibility for his actions.  Is that supposed to be a moral?  

The portrayal of the moose is not convincing.  I don’t believe in heaven for humans so have difficulty accepting a “risen-animal world.”  We are to accept that a moose would worry about the fate of a dead calf:  “Would he rise?  Would he ever enter the animal world beyond?”  It’s not clear why disposing of an animal in a dump means “her calf would rise.”  And then we are to believe that an animal can commit suicide?  The anthropomorphism just doesn’t work.  

What also does not work is the ending.  The epilogue offers too much of a happily-ever-after ending.    Edna solves everything for virtually everyone?  A moose “brought [Pierre] to understand the beauty of now”?  So the capture of an animal is acceptable if it inadvertently teaches someone to not worry about the past or the future but to see the value of the present?

I enjoyed the portrayal of life in rural Maine; the book is realistic in this respect.  However, the anthropomorphism of the moose doesn’t work, and the development of theme is scattered.  The overall effect is to leave the reader puzzled about what he/she just read.

Note:  I received an eARC from the publisher via NetGalley.

Oslo, Maine by Marcia Butler is a hard book to describe. It definy isn't what I thought it would be. 

A moose that seems to know who are the right humans to trust. A little boy, Pierre,  who gets hurt my the moose and loses his memory.. A mom who does.pills, a dad who works at the local mill, butchers meat illegally on the side and a son, Pierre, whoblikea to read. 

There was so much behind the scenes stuff that happens that does no become clear until the end and even then the ending seemed rushed. All in all, this book did not flow for me and was hard to get in to. 3⭐

A thoroughly delightful tale.

Pierre  is a shining star in a highly dysfunctional family.

Brilliant Storytelling !

Like stepping back in time to The Beans of Egypt, Maine, only this time it’s Pierre and his friends and family and a moose from Oslo, Maine.  The author realistically blends those ‘from away’ with the lifelong residents of Oslo to create a story arc of a pregnant moose, it’s ill-fated offspring, and pointless death and butchery told through the experience of various residents of Oslo.  Moving and original story-telling of intertwined lives and fates.  Tersely compelling.

I received an ARC of Oslo, Maine by Marcia Butler. #OsloMaine #NetGalley to review.

I wanted to like this tale of three families in a small Maine town who are linked to one another despite their economic and educational disparities,  It revolves in large part around Pierre, an adolescent who has lost his memory,  It failed for me, however, on several levels because I didn't like the characters (save Pierre and Luc) and the plot wasn't enough to carry me through.  Thanks to Netgalley for the ARC,  This one just struck me wrong- that's on me, not on the author, who presents a portrait of a group of people struggling to move forward,

I loved the way this story started and slowly unfolded, but ultimately Butler tried too hard to tie it all up neatly. It would've been infinitely better without the epilogue, or weaving some of the most crucial bits of it into the ending more effectively.

This book was extremely disappointing. It should have been a good one for me with small town vibes and fun characters that make you feel good. Not so. The best character in the book was the momma moose and they keep trying to kill her! Some of the characters were straight up unpleasant making you want to put the book down. It was a struggle to get through. So much it should of/could of been but wasn't.

Darker than I expected, and with a twist that caught me off guard (in a good way) this was a well planned and delivered novel about one small town and a few of it's interwoven families. Different and compelling,  it will stick with you. The focus on memories and the importance of the now were well done.

Wow. I had high hopes for this story about a rural town in Maine called Oslo. It’s about three ordinary families whose lives intersect with a gifted young boy, Pierre Roy. Plus, there’s a moose and her calf.

While the themes of this book are around memory loss, illness, trauma, love, lust and more, I was not drawn to the characters. Not even the moose. 

Based on the very positive reviews, I thought there would be more humor. More drama. More something. This one just wasn’t for me.

Special thanks to High-Bridge Audio for an advanced copy of the audio, narrated by Charlie Thurston, and to Central Avenue Publishing for the e-book.

I thought this book would have a feel good factor that it was sadly lacking. I usually love books set in small towns with all the wonderful odd ball characters that can normally be found. Not in this book though, some of the characters like Claude were really unpleasant. I also found the descriptions of cruelty to animals upsetting. My favourite character was the Mother Moose. This was a disappointing book for me.

Oslo, Maine is the type of small town were everyone knows your business or at least they think they do. This story focus's on Pierre Roy a young man who loses his memory due to an accident and the ramifications and impact on three different families. But that is all as the various have issuses that they are dealing with some as a result of this accident but one thing for sure they all want to keep this secrets hidden. I had some concerns for this book based on other reader ratings but i was pleasantly surprised how good this was. This story did a good job holding my attention and wanting to find out what happens next. So give this a read you will not be disappointed. Thank you to Central Avenue Publishing for an ARC for a fair and honest review.

I loved this book!  Kept me entertained, kept me laughing, and I didn't realize until hubby flicked on the lights that it was well past dinner time.  Pure pleasure

Oslo, Maine, was a bit hard for me to take. The characters were not as endearing as I had hoped, making the moose my favorite by far. Seeing that there were so many attempts on her life, I was left upset most times that I sat down to read. Not the greatest reading experience. Thank you, however, NetGalley for the advanced copy.

OSLO, MAINE, by Marcia Butler, has a giant beast that is driving force throughout the book, a moose.  Everything that happens in the book relates to the moose.  But the book is so much more than the moose, it is a story of flawed humanity, of wishes and fears and failures, of finding hope in life by taking chances, not hiding from them.  Pierre Roy, a twelve year old boy, is they other key cog in the book.  He has lost his memory due to an accident, and the people that he is closely associated with are all affected by his accident and it's aftermath each in their own way.  Forced to revaluate what is important in life, each person finds a way forward that isn't necessarily right or wrong, but it works for them.
   Butler creates a motley crew of characters, many of which are relatable to people that readers have come across in their lives..  A big theme throughout the book is pride.  Pride in appearance, pride in family, pride in morality, etc.   Butler seems to posit that we all have pride and it is how we carry that around with us is what's important, because so often pride can be someone's downfall.  The book takes a long time to get going and it seemed to meander around the town and the people well into the second half of the book, but as everyone starts to consider what's important to them, coupled with the stakes of the plot growing, the novel becomes quite exciting in the end.
   OSLO, MAINE has a little bit of everything: laughter, tears, hope, disappointment, but something it has more than anything else is heart.  From the setting, to the characters, to even the moose,  this book has a soul, one that cries, loves, and above all, questions the meaning of life.

I selected Oslo, Maine by Marcia Butler based solely on the cover. I thought the book might be a quaint story about a small community in Maine.  Unfortunately by the third paragraph I realized this wasn’t a book I would enjoy. I continued reading.  
The author uses changing perspectives to tell the story. We view the events through many different characters including a pregnant moose.  It may have been too many perspectives that was confusing. I really disliked the main character Claude. He mistreats animals and his family. It was when he shoots and kills a baby moose I decided to stop reading the book. 
I am not the target audience for this book. Perhaps there are others that might enjoy reading about a man who enjoys hunting animals out of season.

Oslo, Maine
Marcia Butler
March 2, 2021


Pierre Roy, son of Claude and Celine Roy was a preteen exploring with his father on their wooded acreage near Oslo, Maine.  Claude had hoped to teach Pierre the wonders of exploring the outdoors and perhaps the joy of hunting despite the boy’s disinterest in harming any wooded creatures.  Aside from working at the local mill, Claude was secretly trying to establish a business by selling animals he killed, cleaned and froze.  As Pierre had pointed out on their walk, hunting off season was illegal in Maine.  If they by chance hit an animal while practicing with the guns, a fine would result.  His father reminded Pierre they were to shoot only toward the sky as Pierre was learning to use the gun after all. Now  throughout the book we are advised of a moose, (introduced in the prologue), that wandered around the area.  She was due to give birth within the week and was tiring, in need of water and a place to rest.  In the process, she was captured and taken to the shelter where Claude slaughtered his beasts. This novel opens with Pierre and Claude discovering the massive creature attached to ropes within the metal shed.  
This story continues on with introducing the 3 families that were central characters in this plot..  Next door to the Roys, were Sandra and Jim Kimbough, musicians.  Sandra spent days teaching local student violin and some nights in the orchestra at the nearby town of Portland, Maine.  Not far down the road we find Edna Sibley and her grandson, Luc.  When Luc’s mother passed minutes passed his birth, Edna had taken on the mother/grandmother role in his life.  Not an easy task for the older woman but a necessary one.  Luc had his fair share of medical issues as well as being a bit slow.  Edna being concerned with her health asked Roy to help Luc address the manly needs that she could not help with.  Being a manager at the mill, he was able to get Luc work. It was Luc that Claude found to help him with his aside business.  
Oslo, Maine by Marcia Butler will be published on March 2, 2021 by Central Avenue Publishing in Canada.  I appreciate their allowing me to read and review Oslo, Maine via NetGalley.  I found Oslo to be a strange little town with equally odd folk who reside there.  I struggled initially with getting into the scenario but as I journeyed into the characters curious lives I persisted and found a completely different finish worth the amusing ride.

I usually love to read books that take place in New England since they often provide familiar surroundings and are more relatable to me than others. Oslo, Maine centers on the story of a small town in Maine where a young boy named Pierre suffers from an accident and has memory loss. The other characters are adults that have failed Pierre in some way, and each have their own secrets and struggles. The plot is somewhat unpredictable, but the characters are mundane. The biggest disappointment of this book is that the author is clearly talented and provides fantastic descriptions, but the characters come across as unlikeable and feel two dimensional. The only interesting point of view came from the moose whose suffering was heartbreaking. I will say that the book included descriptions of dead and butchered animals that were a little too graphic for my taste. At that point, Butler’s effective descriptions made me a little queasy while reading. Overall, I wish I enjoyed this book more, but it just did not hold my attention to the level that I would expect from a novel. If it was any longer I probably would have not finished it.

Osle, Maine by this new to me author is a stand-lone, not easy to put in a section book.
I read the blurb and was intrigued, but had a really hard time connecting with the story and the characters.
My favorite character so to speak is the moose, Claude makes a fabulous villain, the other characters are rather plain.
The writing is ok, all in all an ok read, 3,5 stars.

This book centers around a few characters in the town of Oslo, Maine but the only one I cared about was the mother moose. I had a really hard time getting through the scenes with Claude directing his toxic masculine thoughts at his “weak” son. The author did a great job of crafting authentic characters and the plot held my attention throughout  the entire story. This book just didn’t vibe with me. 

Thank you NetGalley and Central Avenue for the eARC.

𝐅𝐨𝐫 𝐚𝐥𝐥 𝐨𝐟 𝐎𝐬𝐥𝐨, 𝐏𝐢𝐞𝐫𝐫𝐞 𝐰𝐚𝐬 𝐚𝐧 𝐞𝐧𝐭𝐞𝐫𝐭𝐚𝐢𝐧𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐬𝐢𝐝𝐞𝐬𝐡𝐨𝐰. 𝐅𝐨𝐫 𝐂𝐥𝐚𝐮𝐝𝐞, 𝐚𝐧 𝐞𝐦𝐛𝐚𝐫𝐫𝐚𝐬𝐬𝐦𝐞𝐧𝐭.

This is one of those novels that makes you feel raw from the ugliness of some of the characters. Without a doubt they are flawed. If Pierre is an embarrassment to his father Claude, then others are disappointments, dragging their spouse into debt, and forced ‘thriftiness’, or meddlesome, busybodies trying to interfere in others’ lives. In the middle of this, a pregnant moose sets things in motion when she forages for food in town of Oslo. A prize for the trappers who make the happy discovery when they stumble upon her.

Pierre Roy, Claude and Celine’s 12-year-old son, has lost his memory after an accident. A bigger worry, considering he can’t even remember how his injury happened. A boy whose bookish ways, very intelligence and tenderness exudes weakness in Claude’s mind, who knows all too well without tough masculinity the boy doesn’t stand a chance in life. Celine spends her days in a moody, pill induced fog of escape, broken by the reality of her son’s injury. Raking over the facts of her husband’s incompetency, and his part in the accident, she spends time blaming herself, for being a failure as a mother, whose first and most important job is to protect their child from harm. She seeks comfort in others, including a friendship with a woman named Sandra Kimbrough, their neighbor. Sandra is a music teacher who further pushes her way into the Roy’s lives by teaching Pierre to play violin. It’s bad enough that Sandra and her husband Jim bought the land (many many years ago) Claude “as a born and bred Mainer”, should have had the chance to obtain but aligning herself with Celine is too much! He suspects her of corrupting his son with too many uppity ideas, and damn if the whole town doesn’t love Sandra too. Sandra isn’t Celine’s only friend, she seeks refuge and comfort in the arms of Jim.

Sandra sees potential in Pierre, giving him the gift of music to see him through life’s trials and tribulations. It isn’t music alone Pierre needs from her, and she can’t help but invest herself in the Roy family but she has problems of her own with her level-headed husband, and the many marital accommodations as he works to fix their home. Tired of being a professional musician, she enjoys teaching children but she doesn’t much like her husband attempting to be Mr. Fix It around their home, a place far more off the grid than they can manage. She misses hot water to bathe in, the simple pleasures they seem to have forsaken. Teaching children is her escape. Can she really be naïve enough to think music lessons will heal a child’s brain trauma? That she can fix his broken family? A childless woman what does she know of motherhood and the problems Celine is facing?

Pierre knows everything is going wrong. His brain trauma scares him, he just wants to recover his memories. One thing he is most certain of, he is the cause of everyone’s unhappiness. It is breaking him to watch his mother fall apart, not even caring about the basics like her hygiene. He misses the caring mother she used to be, the perfect mother who cooked meals and checked his homework. If only things could go back to the way the were before. He has been keeping little coded notes, using logic to remember, it is Sandra he shares these things with.

Edna loves her adult grandson Luc with ‘religious devotion’, despite his deficits. He works hard for Claude at the March, as his ‘pet project’. What Edna desires is a mentor for the boy, whose slowness and malleability is a perfect fit for the place. Luc’s mother died giving birth to him when she was only sixteen, no one understands hardship and pain more than Edna, the wealthy widow. All she wants is for her grandson to be safe when she is dead and gone, her wealthy upbringing hasn’t spared her suffering. Her wealth hasn’t exactly spared her grandson of ridicule either, known as the town’s simpleton. Since his birth, her state of being has been one of hypervigilance with a grandson no one has ever properly diagnosed. When he messes up, as he often does, she doesn’t know what to do, and his latest fiasco is tangled up in Claude. It doesn’t bode well for anyone.

As pieces of the puzzle come into place for Pierre, he wants to protect the fragility of the adults but remembering comes at a price. Memories to be hoarded and others to discard, how much safer it is in the cocoon of not knowing. Everyone has their secrets, and their reasons for protecting the truth, usually for the sake of their loved ones. Class doesn’t protect anyone from failure, loss, illness nor tragedy. Sometimes we don’t even know the secrets of our own story, as Claude learns. Some of the characters are brutish, with edges that only lessons can smooth, others are dedicated saints who can’t help but make the world better, but all of them are lost and through Pierre may well figure themselves out. Jim was my moment of humor, because with so many people moving to places that are somewhat off the grid, away from the city, they bite off so much more than they can chew and let’s face it the locals often are laughing at them or resenting their sucking up the land. Sandra is the long suffering wife you can’t help but shake your head at what she puts up with.

This novel has several stories to keep track of, but I had to know what happened in Pierre’s future and while Claude is the sort of overly proud man who puts a lot of stock in masculinity you are forced to take into account how he grew up. That is his world, as we read early on neither he nor Celine grew up in homes of education and privilege. His ugly thoughts about his son being different, a freak if you will, is more about him and how he will be judged and his manliness questioned, as the apple doesn’t fall far from the tree. This is how the world can be, sad to say. People get too caught up in worrying about the ever present eyes of society and its expectations on you, at the expense of happiness. Nothing gives away Claude more than that part of the novel, exposes who he is and why he behaves as he does. A real man’s man. The novel is also a peek into the lives of transplants and it is interesting, how regardless of decades spent in some places you are still just ‘from somewhere else’. It is a sad book, though it has spots of joy. The moose, aw the poor moose, that was the darkest spot of all and hard to stomach. Not everyone’s cup of tea, but it was engaging enough to keep me reading and there are moments that made my gut ache. I could relate to Edna and her devoted love for Luc. Some characters you love, some you despise but do they grow? I think with the epilogue the answer is yes.

Publication Date: March 2, 2021

Central Avenue Publishing