THE REMEMBERING
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5 Stars * * * * *
"THE REMEMBERING: Of Leather & Stone is an extraordinary achievement in historical fiction that will transport readers through time while touching their hearts."
Reviewed by K.C. Finn for Readers' Favorite
This gripping fact-based fictional account, composed of three personal journals written as if by Collins’ ancestors nearly two hundred years ago, contains their intimate, emotional stories, firsthand experiences, and traditions of old-world craftsmanship in a world being overtaken by technology.
Based on the legacies of two Boston Irish and Italian families, it is a perfect story for fans of historical Irish fiction by authors like Jean Grainger, Andrew Wareham, and Daisy O’Shea, fans of historical Italian fiction by Daniela Sacerdoti and Kate Quinn, and fans of historical biographical fiction and family sagas by writers like Mark Sullivan and Marie Benedict.
Forgotten by Time, Rediscovered by Fate
“A century after her birth, Jessie (Ambrosini) Collins is laid to rest beside her husband, Joseph Cornelius Collins, in St. Mary’s Cemetery in Milford, Massachusetts. Weeks later, while settling her estate, her children and grandchildren discover an old hope chest filled with the artifacts and memories of her life.
Among the curiosities and treasures is a tied bundle containing three handwritten journals, previously unknown to the family. In time, they would come to realize that what they held in their hands was the family legacy—pictures of life passed down by those who lived before—of how it was with them in their time.”
The Odyssey of Cornelius Collins
It is 1845 the first year of the Great Famine in Ireland when fourteen-year-old Cornelius Collins begins a harrowing seven-year struggle for survival. At twenty, he escapes to Liverpool, England, securing a one-way third-class passage aboard a “coffin ship” bound for America. Against all odds, he survives the forty-one-day Atlantic crossing on the packet ship Clara Wheeler, landing in Boston, Massachusetts.
There, he is processed and released into the streets alone to face the “land sharks” eager to take what little he possesses, including his life. Fate intervenes, and an Irish American welfare society helps him find work as a bootmaker in the town of Milford. Determined, Cornelius vows to save every penny and send it back to Ireland to support his family.
Of Leather & Stone
As the decades pass, a highly prized pink granite is discovered in Milford triggering a “granite rush” attracting skilled stonecutters from around the world, including Giuseppe Ambrosini, a master stonecutter from Lombardy, Italy, a region renowned for its stone craftsmen. He comes to America seeking his fortune in the pink granite quarries of Milford.
Generations of their two families live through the most radical shift in industrial technology in the history of civilization, the disastrous effects of the American Civil War, widespread labor upheavals, the total collapse of the American economy, and the Irish Rebellion.
These events profoundly affect them and their American-born children, who unite their two families in marriage at the height of the Roaring Twenties and in the aftermath of ‘the war to end all wars.’
The Remembering
There will be no great fortunes or inheritance, no monumental works of art or science left for future generations. Instead, there will be profound life lessons learned from a lifetime of cutting and shaping leather and stone in Milford’s workshops and quarries.
“Theirs is the common fate of common people: living their lives without fanfare, known only to those who worked with them and those who loved them, then forgotten by time—until one day, when they are remembered, and their names are spoken again by the living in THE REMEMBERING.”
Praise for this book
5 Stars * * * * *
Author Charles Paul Collins demonstrates remarkable skill in bringing historical America to vivid life through meticulous attention to detail and rich, evocative prose. I was immersed in the historical settings thanks to the multisensory detail, and the author's ability to weave together multiple generations of two families while maintaining distinct voices and personalities for each character. This shows masterful empathy and imagination.
I was deeply moved by how Collins captures the emotional depth of the immigrant experience, from the heartbreak of leaving home to the triumph of building a new life. It is beautifully told with narration that homes in on very poignant truths for specific characters at the right moment.
What I found most compelling was the author's ability to make the traditions and daily struggles of these families feel immediate and relevant, creating an intimate connection that spans centuries because we see them as real people, just like us.
Overall, The Remembering Of Leather & Stone is an extraordinary achievement in historical fiction that will transport readers through time while touching their hearts.
5 Stars * * * * *
Charles Paul Collins has traced his family through documents and heritage sites, but the official papers in the public domain told him little of their thought and lives. Thus, in The Remembering, he imagined how they felt and described their daily lives.
His description of Cornelius' journey on the coffin ship across the Atlantic is so realistic that I was there, experiencing the conditions he suffered, the seasickness, lice, and open sores. Many died on the journey. All were emaciated from the potato famine.
Much of the book is a historical account of life in America in the last century, a fascinating and informative read. The hardships, the integration, and the fellowship of the Irish and later Italian immigrants are all recounted through the eyes of the immigrants. It was an age of wars, major advances, industrialization, cars, flight, and the wireless.
The author takes the reader into the minds of his family as their characters leap off the pages. I cared about them and enjoyed their triumphs and sorrows. This is a history book and a family saga wrapped in a novel and is an excellent read.
"My overall impression is that your book does provide a detailed historical account of the time and places where your relatives lived and puts your family story into this context in a memorable way.
I think that your living relatives will appreciate what you wrote and gain a deeper feeling of connection to their roots."
Loved It! (4 Stars) * * * *
A genealogy or family saga written as if by the hand of the author's ancestors.
When his mother is buried, the author discovers a treasure in the attic—his ancestors' private journals, detailing their origins in the old country, their journeys to America, their lives and families. If we only knew how much our grandchildren would treasure such a thing, we would all do this.
This is a family saga or genealogy—a 'fact-based fictional account'. The tale is told in first person, as if from the pen of Cornelius Collins. In Part II, son Michael James picks up the pen. Then the other side of the family's tale is told, stonecutter Giuseppe Ambrosini.
Cornelius's odyssey begins with An Gorta Mór—the Irish Potato Famine, one of the worst tragedies in human history. Collins' descriptions of his ancestors' sufferings and the horrendous 'coffin ships' are harrowing.
I was moved by Cornelius' admission that the famine was so hard on him that his mind had forgotten everything that happened in his life before it.Though the journey on the 'coffin ship' is terrible, immigrants in those days were treated better than they are now. On arrival in Milford, Massachusetts, bootmaking capital of America, Cornelius is immediately given food, shelter and a job as a cordwainer (bootmaker), a sense of pride in himself. He marries, starts a family and becomes a US citizen.
I share the author's passion for genealogy research. Collins tells the story within the bigger human history in which his ancestors were players, bringing it home to his protagonists by quoting articles from the Milford Journal and the Framington Star of the time. We also learn in detail the processes of bootmaking and stonecutting.
The Collins and Ambrosini families go through the Civil War, the abolition of slavery, the establishment of the Irish Republic, a visit from PT Barnum's circus, the Great Depression, the misappropriation of the West from the native Americans, the invention of the telephone, votes for women, the sinking of the Titanic and WWI. Every year at Samhain (now Halloween) they hold a Cuimhneamh—'the Remembering'—ceremony of 'how it was with us in our time'.
The 'poor, tired, huddled masses' who braved all these hardships and risks to create a better life in the New World, theirs is a big story, one for all of us.