Arcadia by Lauren Groff (2012-10-02)

I'm reading this book for a book club. I am halfway and I'm not sure I can slog all the way through it! It reads like poetry written in prose form. For me it's very slow reading, trying to decifer what the author means by the cutsie names, long sentences and descriptions, why certain things are capitalized, etc. I am a logical person but I don't think I am close minded. I don't like to fight my way through a book by an author who, IMO, is showing off. I don't like the content, either. There is a lot about drugs, sex and crime in the book, and it's written like someone high on drugs--maybe that's intentional. (I've never experienced drugs.) If communes are or were really like this, then they are much worse than I thought. If one has the determination to get through it, I think there is an unintentional underlying message that even the author doesn't understand.

I purchased this book for a bookclub selection and boy was I totally dissapointed. Aweful,disgusting and I read 3/4 of the book then that was enough. Our bookclub members were also very dissapointed in it also. I would never recommend it to anyone and if you are a bookclub and looking at this title, please select another book. There are so many great books out there right now with some of the best up and coming new authors, try them!

I absolutely LOVED the first half or two-thirds of the story, when Bit was growing up in the commune with his friends and learning about the world at large and HIS world in particular. I thought Groff nailed it - the commune was universally recognizable for what it was, yet never seemed trite or predictable. And within that world, the characters were drawn clearly and specifically. She moved the story along beautifully, so that I scarcely noticed the passage of time.

But the novel ground to a halt once Bit became an adult in the city. I came galloping eagerly out of the first part of the book, and hung with it pretty well during his time as a professor and his troubling non-relationship with Sylvie. But oh my god, the story hangs up dreadfully somewhere in there and becomes annoyingly lyrical as all action nearly stops and Bit becomes almost a non-entity. I am in the final chapters of the book and almost can't stand to read it anymore. I hate to abandon a book I've enjoyed as much as the earlier part of this one, but I'm not sure I can slog through the conclusion. Such a bummer.

I shouldn't write anything about this as have just received it and haven't read it yet. The narrator in my Book Club has recommended it and I like anything that she does! Looking forward to this one.

I haven't read a novel this involving and moving in a very long time. It's so good that I don't even want to say much about it; it stands on its own, as its own statement. I will say that for me the most impressive thing about the book is its vision. Spanning 40 years or so, it holds a taut center line, so that no matter where the characters go or what they do, the line keeps them in a defined orbit around the core of the book.

Lauren Groff is more than 20 years younger than I am. As I write this, I'm about the same age as the main character in the last third or so of the book. It's almost miraculous to me that someone who hasn't yet reached this age can so accurately peg the combination of nostalgia, bitterness, and regret of looking back at childhood, living in the present, and being uncertain about the future. There's more than a whiff of Peter Pan and Never Never Land in the story, and I mean that in a good way. On top of that achievement, Groff has also constructed a perfectly convincing bridge from a time most of her readers clearly remember to a time we can only imagine.

This is a quiet novel, without drama and histrionics. It's also highly literate and intelligent. Read it. You'll be glad you did.

Actually my fascination lies with cults, but a commune is close enough. Hippie commune, to be precise, but what other kind is there. This is the story of such a place told through the eyes on the first child to be born there as we follow him though his wild formative Arcadia years and then later, more confirmative, years. Or really this is a story of a man from birth to middle age, whose life has been formed, informed and indelibly colored by his youth spent in a commune. Strikingly bookended by the near utopia of the 70s and the near dystopia of 2018, there's a life, and entire life of choices and loves and struggles and it is told with such a patient poignancy that its impossible not to become engaged. Arcadia as a physical place takes up only about half of the book, but as a state of mind it prevails and permeates throughout, perceived by its former members/denizens/survivors as a bucolic idyll the name suggests or quite the opposite. A tale of aspirations and ramifications, dream juxtaposed to real life, flawed humanity and its desire to achieve a sort of grace. It's a fascinating read and the writing itself is an absolute thing of beauty, but at the same time it's a very quiet and sad story, heavily narrated, ethereally worded and, I would imagine, not for everyone. For the right mood and mindset, though, it's absolutely lovely.

Oh, Lauren Groff. Your purple prose. Your absence of quotation marks. Your writing is actually quite beautiful, but that isn't good enough for you, apparently. What does it mean for a girl to have a "sweet cupcake face" anyway?

I went back and forth between feeling like this book was a total slog and finding it utterly compelling. This is my second Lauren Groff book. With Fates and Furies, I loathed the first half and loved the second half. With Arcadia, my emotions didn't reach such extremes, but my experience was the exact opposite: I enjoyed the second half much more than the first half.

Arcadia presents us with the life of Bit, born in an idyllic commune in the middle of the woods in the 1970s. It follows him from childhood through adulthood, as he is eventually forced to assimilate in the outside world.

He falls in love, experiences life-altering tragedy, has a child of his own and ultimately finds himself returning to the commune years later, as if it were part of his destiny.

Arcadia is about a utopian dream—at its best, its worst and everything in between. It's about life, and what matters most within it: family, love, community. It's a complete, fulfilling story with remarkable beauty and depth if you're willing to endure Groff's ostentatious prose.

We read books to be entertained, to be informed, to have a laugh, to escape the day-to-day. And then, every now and then, we stumble across a book that we read at just the right moment in our lives for us to be bewitched, transported and transformed.

That just happened to me while reading Arcadia by Lauren Groff. This isn't a new novel--it was first published by Hyperion in 2012--and the fact of the matter is that I tried reading it four separate times before I finally was able to become absorbed by this book. That's what it feels like, once you get into the rhythm of the language: as if you're falling down a well or crossing through some sort of foggy membrane and entering another dimension entirely, your entire being surrounded by Groff's magical imagery.

The story revolves around Bit, who is a very young boy when the novel opens, living with his parents in a commune in the 1970's, and traces his life as the commune rises and falls, and as he has to make his way in the world after this Utopian dream shatters. The language in the novel is dreamy and complex, especially in the first half of the novel, when we are trapped in Bit's perspective as a child and can only glean from snatches of conversation what's going on around him. I was fully expecting the language to become simpler as Bit aged out of the commune and, in the second half of the book, is an adult living and working and parenting a young child of his own. Instead, the language grew even more lush, with image after image that floored me. By the end of the novel, I was weeping not only for Bit's personal losses--and there are many--but also for the loss of our nation's innocence--an innocence that once allowed us, as children of the 1960's and 1970's, to truly believe we could be in harmony with each other and with nature instead of in continual conflict. It was a good cry--I don't mean to imply that the book is depressing. The emotions Groff provokes are complicated and cleansing. You will wake from the dream of Arcadia, as Bit does, determined to do whatever you can to stay more fully present in your life and aware of the magic of everyday things.

Lauren Groff is an excellent writer. I was taken in by her characters, her settings, the intricacies of her descriptions and use of language and the emotional tautness of many scenes and situations. The realism was not helped by her venture into the future (which makes this sci-fi/speculative fiction, BTW, and not literary fiction as it is). I wish she had written the book she promised to write and should have written. It would have been spectacular.

I give it 3 Stars because of all of the above, and for its many flaws.

This is not the book she should have published. This is two books, and neither is sufficient unto itself.
1) There was too much of the boy and not enough of the man, Bit; for all that Groff devoted, so many sections (PARTS), to his adult life, we know very little about him as an adult.
2) There was too little of his mother, Hannah, for her to have dominated the last section as she does (no spoilers, here). If Groff wanted Hannah to be a main character, along with Bit, we needed to see things more from her perspective earlier on and more frequently. Instead, huge chunks of her life (and Bit's, really) are just left out. This made me feel less affected by the last section than I believe Groff intended, because she didn't succeed in making me care about Hannah enough.
3) There should have been more story, more involvement on her part with the minor characters (even one or two) than just a passing line or two to update us on their status in each Part. They seemed more like props than people with so little going on after Part I for each of them, trotted in to make a point about Bit but not 3-D. I realize that is the problem with having so many characters, but she managed it so well in Part I, and then it all just fell apart.

The above suggestions are intended to improve the book as it is. However, I do not think the book as it is is a good structure for her actual stories.

I wished she had actually written a book about Arcadia, as the title and blurb suggest, and not tried to take Bit and the others into future decades, and not so many of those decades, either. Certainly, no one needed the futuristic element at all. It doesn't even belong in her style or story.

First, we should have seen/heard more about Arcadia's leader, Handy, and how his decline occurred. Having Handy's life happen mostly "off-stage" makes no sense when the point of her book IS the community experience and history. A series of scenes in which Bit was overhearing or hiding around Handy could have allowed her to keep his perspective while showing the readers more.

Groff should have decided (or been helped to decide) to focus the second half of the book on what life was like for the children and teens who left Arcadia (Part II would have been the best part to expand and leave the others out entirely),as a nice balance to a much-expanded Part I. This would have helped her to stick to the purported purpose of her book: describe Arcadia and its impact on the residents during and after its hey-days.

I think she got distracted by wanting to know/show more about Bit's later life but then didn't really do it well. She should have saved all that for a sequel and then written more about others as well. As it is, there were many sidetracks that did not add to the story and took up space. The stories of his teaching career and almost-problem with one student were unnecessary and unimportant for this volume, and would have needed more detail for a sequel.

Groff needed a firm, kind, caring editor to remind her of her purpose and help her stick to it. I would have loved to have read THAT book, or even both books.

The story follows the life of Bit (Ridley Stone), a child born to hippies who grows up in a New York commune in the 1970s. It is told in the first person, in four sections that cover the bulk of his life and take him from earliest childhood into the future (literally; the last section is set in a dystopian few-years-from-now). As the title *Arcadia* should give you a clue, it’s about idealism, idylls, and the unattainability of both.

The language is simultaneously direct and poetic—an unusual and, for me, splendid combination. Example: “Time comes to him one morning, stealing in. One moment he is looking at the lion puppet on his hand that he’s flapping about to amuse Eden’s russet potato of a baby, and the next he understands something he never knew to question.” (I found that quote by opening the book at random; it’s that full of wonder and delight.) Every page offers unexpected imagery like that “russet potato of a baby,” and the metaphors are vivid but also mysterious, sending your mind spinning off into speculation.

The characters are similarly alive—except, to a minor degree, Bit himself, who is a bit elusive, mutable as we all are when seen from the inside over a long period of time. If I had one criticism of the book, it’s that Bit sees too much at too young an age; but I was willing to go along with that fiction for the sake of a cohesive point of view in the story. From the inside of Bit, you feel all the beauty and the peril of his life; he is tragic and transcendent and ultimately finds the joy in small things.

Brad Kessler has said, “Wherever the notion of paradise exists, so does the idea that it was lost.” Arcadia—the literal one of the story and all Arcadias anywhere—is one of those lost paradises, so precious to the human heart and yet so slippery. This book was given to me as a gift by someone I have lost, and the sense of personal loss mingled with the losses in the book, making it very hard for me to read. But worth it.

An involving, lyrical novel, Arcadia is the story of a commune of 'the free people' in upstate New York, told through the character of the first child born into the community, Bit Stone. We see Arcadia grow and then thrive, largely through the efforts of Bit's parents and a handful of other free people who truly embrace the principles on which Arcadia is founded. Bit introduces us to the many colorful characters of Arcadia, first through the eyes of a child, and later through the eyes of an unworldly but somewhat mature adolescent . Inevitably, the commune is destroyed by too many interlopers and the fall from grace of its charismatic leader, Handy. One by one the free people abandon or are banished from Arcadia. What will happen to them, and especially Bit, in the real world?

The novel is beautifully written. People and locations are portrayed keenly, vividly. Tenderness, love, beauty, pain. It's all here, and more.

I bought this book at The Babbling Book in Haines, Alaska (great store, if you're ever in the neighborhood) because I had already read and enjoyd Lauren Groff's other book, The Monsters of Templeton. This book didn't disappoint.

This is the story of Bit, born in the 1970s in a hippie commune in western New York state. The commune consists of several old buses and lean-tos on a beautiful piece of land, with a hulking mansion in sorry disrepair. Soon the hippies get to work restoring the mansion so they can have heat and sturdy shelter. The commune grows beyond its means, and eventually Bit must learn how to adapt to the outside world as he moves to New York City.

The writing is so good, you are in the commune. You are there, feeling the damp chill on your bare arms, studying your friends' prominent ribs, growing vegetables and eating a vegan diet, running barefoot in the cold, greasy mud, bathing once per week. Wondering at some of the established practices our society endorses and supports. Hoping you never have to leave Arcadia and venture out into the unknown.

There will always be space on my shelf for a Lauren Groff book.

There are times when Lauren Groff's novel threatens to disintegrate into fairy dust. This child's eye view of growing up in a large commune (similar to the one run by Stephen Gaskin in Tennessee) and the consequences it entails, is purposefully given the sheen of a fantasy novel by its author. To emphasize the idyllic nature of the commune, removed so completely from the American mainstream, Groff shutters her prose like a bell jar, muffling it by using a stream of description with no noisy dialogue in quotes. Thus, the reader experiences the tribal, hive-like existence of the commune as smoothly as if it was being traced by the movements of a honey bee.

Naturally, this quietly paced writing isn't going to be everyone's cup of (chamomile?) tea, but Groff writes so marvelously that, although I was tempted to abandon the book a few times, I never could quite let go. The author gives a largely positive spin to the communal lifestyle. Although she describes the decrepit, sorry state of the property the group is trying to inhabit and rebuild, and the undertow of disenchantment that the commune always faces, most of the time the tone is almost merry, like the folk tales surrounding Paul Bunyan's lumberjack camp. There is a wild assortment of characters, but the main focus is on the almost elfin child, "Bit" (AKA "Ridley Stone") and his mother Hannah. ( The magical child and his struggles into adulthood with his utopian mother also reminded me a little of "The World According to Garp".) Groff also includes a few Amish characters to compare and contrast another "utopian" group on the periphery.

Some of the book put me off, including Groff's emphasis on a SARI epidemic (how long has it been since anyone's thought about that?), but by and large the quality of the sensitive and highly descriptive writing cleanses any deficiencies.

Certainly any reader who has tried a hand at writing will appreciate the delicate feat that Lauren Groff has pulled off... a whimsical, fanciful, and (for the most part)totally involving tale, and the creation of a world unto itself.

I also appreciated that Groff ended it within 300 pages.... anything much longer would have probably turned into a major bore.

An involving, lyrical novel, Arcadia is the story of a commune of 'the free people' in upstate New York, told through the character of the first child born into the community, Bit Stone. We see Arcadia grow and then thrive, largely through the efforts of Bit's parents and a handful of other free people who truly embrace the principles on which Arcadia is founded. Bit introduces us to the many colorful characters of Arcadia, first through the eyes of a child, and later through the eyes of an unworldly but somewhat mature adolescent . Inevitably, the commune is destroyed by too many interlopers and the fall from grace of its charismatic leader, Handy. One by one the free people abandon or are banished from Arcadia. What will happen to them, and especially Bit, in the real world?

The novel is beautifully written. People and locations are portrayed keenly, vividly. Tenderness, love, beauty, pain. It's all here, and more.

I bought this book at The Babbling Book in Haines, Alaska (great store, if you're ever in the neighborhood) because I had already read and enjoyd Lauren Groff's other book, The Monsters of Templeton. This book didn't disappoint.

This is the story of Bit, born in the 1970s in a hippie commune in western New York state. The commune consists of several old buses and lean-tos on a beautiful piece of land, with a hulking mansion in sorry disrepair. Soon the hippies get to work restoring the mansion so they can have heat and sturdy shelter. The commune grows beyond its means, and eventually Bit must learn how to adapt to the outside world as he moves to New York City.

The writing is so good, you are in the commune. You are there, feeling the damp chill on your bare arms, studying your friends' prominent ribs, growing vegetables and eating a vegan diet, running barefoot in the cold, greasy mud, bathing once per week. Wondering at some of the established practices our society endorses and supports. Hoping you never have to leave Arcadia and venture out into the unknown.

There will always be space on my shelf for a Lauren Groff book.

There are times when Lauren Groff's novel threatens to disintegrate into fairy dust. This child's eye view of growing up in a large commune (similar to the one run by Stephen Gaskin in Tennessee) and the consequences it entails, is purposefully given the sheen of a fantasy novel by its author. To emphasize the idyllic nature of the commune, removed so completely from the American mainstream, Groff shutters her prose like a bell jar, muffling it by using a stream of description with no noisy dialogue in quotes. Thus, the reader experiences the tribal, hive-like existence of the commune as smoothly as if it was being traced by the movements of a honey bee.

Naturally, this quietly paced writing isn't going to be everyone's cup of (chamomile?) tea, but Groff writes so marvelously that, although I was tempted to abandon the book a few times, I never could quite let go. The author gives a largely positive spin to the communal lifestyle. Although she describes the decrepit, sorry state of the property the group is trying to inhabit and rebuild, and the undertow of disenchantment that the commune always faces, most of the time the tone is almost merry, like the folk tales surrounding Paul Bunyan's lumberjack camp. There is a wild assortment of characters, but the main focus is on the almost elfin child, "Bit" (AKA "Ridley Stone") and his mother Hannah. ( The magical child and his struggles into adulthood with his utopian mother also reminded me a little of "The World According to Garp".) Groff also includes a few Amish characters to compare and contrast another "utopian" group on the periphery.

Some of the book put me off, including Groff's emphasis on a SARI epidemic (how long has it been since anyone's thought about that?), but by and large the quality of the sensitive and highly descriptive writing cleanses any deficiencies.

Certainly any reader who has tried a hand at writing will appreciate the delicate feat that Lauren Groff has pulled off... a whimsical, fanciful, and (for the most part)totally involving tale, and the creation of a world unto itself.

I also appreciated that Groff ended it within 300 pages.... anything much longer would have probably turned into a major bore.

Author Groff explores the question of how values and friendships formed in one environment shape a life lived in one with opposing ethics and cultures. Manners and mores if you will. Can the two worlds be reconciled?

The diminutive Bit Stone is born into the communal compound of Arcadia from hippie parents. The values imprinted there during his formative years are presumably those of a nonhierarchical structure, voluntary cooperation for the common good, the abandonment of private property, love, love, love, and a nonjudgmental idealism and optimism as to human potential. Even pets are prohibited, as that constitutes animal slavery! Of course, like most such utopian communities, the ugly truth of human nature intrudes. Bit witnesses the corrosive effects of slackers, people who selfishly cling to private possessions, jealously, others assuming positions of authority with special privileges, rampant drug use, and free love run amok. The inevitable collapse is not unexpected.

Bit and other fugitives from Arcadia experience with varying degrees of success a dystopian outside world of political and environmental dysfunction brought about by right-wing Republican polices. (At least that seemed to be a subcontext, but you'll have to ask the author.) Regardless, the contrast is stark, and any preachiness aside, Bit decries the moral and societal failings of life on the outside, while forgetting that he and the other Arcadians were always hungry.

Bit reconciles these cultures by recognizing what was probably the most valuable feature of the Arcadian world; namely, enduring bonds of friendship forged by a common experience, while also finally acknowledging the naiveté of that world. He loses his self-pity by applying those lessons to his present circumstances. The secret ingredient, dare I say it, is love or at least it's possibility.

This is an oft times lyrically written account of an evolving life filled with intriguing and idiosyncratic characters, especially the commune dwellers. Details of life in Arcadia are described in a nonjudgmental manner, but are nevertheless fascinating. These people took their philosophy seriously! The last part of the book dragged somewhat, but by then you're well beyond the point of no return.

Groff creates a fictional world so vivid that I actually felt grief when I turned the last page and that world closed down. I loved the way she moved from the near-utopia of early Arcadia, with all its nascent hope, through the seam-stretched Arcadia of disillusionment and hunger, and then, jumping years, into Bit's adulthood -- and two different phases of that. Hannah and Abe and Astrid all became people that I knew. The landscapes of Arcadia and of New York City were mapped with an emotional precision that made the whole book sing with a sense of place. And the language! This book was everything I look for in a novel -- tragic and funny, at once, incisive and deeply resonate. Human, in the best, best way.

Favorite quotes:

"He sees it clearly, now, how time is flexible, a rubber band. It can stretch long and be clumped tight, can be knotted and folded over itself, and all the while it is endless, a loop."

"Pay attention, he thinks. Not to the grand gesture, but to the passing breath."

Lauren Groff is a writer with a strong --- if sometimes quirky --- sense of history. Her debut novel, THE MONSTERS OF TEMPLETON, examined the history of Cooperstown, New York, through the experience of one young woman looking for her own past. Her story collection, DELICATE EDIBLE BIRDS, ranged widely over American and world history, from the 1918 influenza epidemic to the 1970s women's movement to the Nazi invasions in World War II. Now, in ARCADIA, Groff takes lessons from a particular moment in recent history and applies them to our present and future.

That moment in history is the 1970s of communal living, of idealistic Utopian communities. The place is one commune in particular, the Arcadia of the novel's title. When we first meet Ridley Stone (known to all as "Bit" for his small stature), he is five years old, the son of Hannah and Abe, two of the original residents of this tight-knit community. Bit knows that his mother is often nearly paralyzed with sadness, but that, like the seasons, she always comes back to him: "He sees it clearly, now, how time is flexible, a rubber band. It can stretch long and be clumped tight, can be knotted and folded over itself, and all the while it is endless, a loop.... The year will end, another one will begin, will end.... Summer Hannah will take over from Winter Hannah with a slowly crisping voice and a new pair of dungarees."

Bit is aware that his father has a complicated relationship with Handy, the commune's charismatic leader. But mostly, he recognizes that he is surrounded by adults who look out for each other and care for him, that he is in a place of beauty and safety, even if it's getting crowded and there's never enough food or quite enough heat. He knows he is loved.

The above quote is particularly relevant to the structure of Groff's novel as a whole, which also seems to treat time as a rubber band to stretch out and clump up at will, a technique that may frustrate some readers but will delight others who enjoy both lingering in the moments Groff chooses to dwell on and filling in the gaps in time she leaves between them. The first gap jumps from Bit's young childhood to his teenage years, as Arcadia seems to have also outgrown its innocent origins. We leave a terrified Bit as he leaves Arcadia with his parents: "They go around a bend he has never been around, a house he has never seen; all is doubly new, sick with newness."

Groff then, probably wisely, skips forward again, twice --- once to show Bit as a new father himself, living in New York City in a continual attempt to find the sense of community, of closeness, he knew in Arcadia as a child. And, finally, we skip ahead to the near future, when a variety of circumstances lead Bit to return to Arcadia, wondering what remains of the place --- and the people, including himself --- he once knew.

Groff does ask her readers to make a lot of leaps in this novel, but she more than rewards those willing to make this trip with her. ARCADIA is far more than a portrait of a "fringe" community or a saga of corruption and lost innocence. It's an extended conversation --- one in which the reader is an active participant --- on the fragility of nature, the power and necessity of connection, and the dual human compulsion to preserve and destroy both.

Reviewed by Norah Piehl

There are some books that you mourn the ending of as you come to the final pages. Arcadia was not one of those books for me. It is a testament to the author that I made it to the end at all. If you decide to read Arcadia (and I recommend you do, for Lauren Groff is an amazing writer), be prepared to struggle. But also be prepared to be moved profoundly by a story of true depth and power.

The Arcadia that Lauren Groff imagines is a 1970's hippie commune populated with full, rounded characters that are eerily recognizable, even today. Each of them transcend their defined roles of `idealist' or `trippie' or `guru' or `midwife'. Each of them is complex, human, and real. We experience this profoundly disturbing place through the experiences of tender, open-hearted Bit (the Littlest `Bit' of a Hippie), as we follow him from age 5 to adulthood. The subtle tension between the actual events, which are horrifying at times, and Bit's perception of them leaves the reader as vulnerable and exposed as Bit. Because of this tension (which felt strangely like fingers on a chalkboard to me), I struggled to get through the first half of the book. I found that once the screeching stopped, however, the story was incredibly beautiful, deeply meaningful, and resoundingly true.

Even though Arcadia is widely acclaimed and comes highly recommended by readers and industry experts, I still found Arcadia difficult to read and, on some levels, flawed. Part of the difficulty stemmed from the unreliable narrator, to be sure, which is not necessarily a bad thing. The timeline of the story stretches too far into the future to maintain the intensity of the plot, and the scope widens to include world events that throw the novel off-center. Groff sets up all the elements and conflicts she needs early in the story, and dabbling in the larger themes of 9/11 and world contagions only serves to dilute the solid reality of the world she so carefully created in the first half of the book.

Groff deserves to be praised for her prowess as a writer. She has the uncanny ability to strip away the filters between the reader and the text until the events of the story are uncomfortably close. Flaws and all, Arcadia is worth reading. Just don't expect it to be easy.

You can book recommendations and other reviews on my blog:
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There are books I've read that resonate long after they have been finished. Arcadia will be one of them. Arcadia was recommended in NY Times Books Editor Janet Maislin's Best Books of 2012 article, and while I don't usually follow many suggestions, in this case, reading the blurb struck in inner chord.

The author found the unusual combination of a lyrical writing voice and perfect pacing in a story filled with multiple levels of emotion, discord and one of the most evocative settings I've read in recent fiction. Her characters were all completely imperfect. I felt I knew them personally. Arcadia is the story of a young boy growing into manhood in and through his Vegan commune upbringing. Ms. Gross has presented one of the most generous, even-handed portrayals of the spirit of the utopian ideals that founded communal experiments all over this country in the 1960s and 70s. Setting the book in upstate New York, long a hothouse of utopian villages and communities, was a perfect decision. Her sense of place is seamlessly integrated into her writing, and the lack of info-dumping made for a noticeably quick read.

Having lived myself, in a commune in the West in the early 1970s, her story line contained many scenes that seemed to spring right out of my own experiences. In many ways, Arcadia became a personal journey for me as well. There were many mistakes made in the scramble to produce a new world and a better way to cement true community, Many are still ongoing, and this book, in all its loving attention to detail and its deep understanding of how young boys become men, reminds us of the rewards that taking risks can provide. It is one of the best novels I've read in some time, so I would recommend it to anyone who appreciates a well-told, deeply emotional story and has an interest in those times and how they still live on today in the lives of all us old, ex-hippies.

I was drawn to this tale of blissed-out hippies forming a commune in New York state. Great cover, with its 60s-era typeface and little idyllic cutouts: a butterfly covered with blooms, a mother lifting her baby to pluck a fruit from a tree, young children giving each other flowers. But it makes me wonder about the darker underbelly of communal living. This book offers both: the wonder and idealism, and the slow collapse as the community grows and changes.

These self-proclaimed Free People buy a chunk of land and a dilapidated mansion, christened Arcadia, where they intend to live as equals, grow food, and dwell beyond the Outside. Their motto is "Equality, Love, Work, Openness to the Needs of Others."
Every place in the compound has a name, always capitalized: the Gatehouse, the Family Quonsets, the Singleton Tent, the Free Store, the Henhouse (for women, not chickens), the Sheeps Meadow (and many more); and there are sub-groups of Free People, their labels also capitalized: the Scavengers, Pregnant Ladies, Ados (adolescents), the original Caravaners, etc. You start to get the sense that this little free love commune has as many divisions and labels as the Outside. The kidlets run free through the woods, swim in the pond, and do Tutorials according to their interests. They seem Happy. But they are also hungry all the time, their teeth are rotten, and they often indulge in many of the same drugs the older Free People do. Arcadia may not be the Eden they set out to create after all.

As more people learn about the commune and flock there, it grows beyond its space, and beyond its stated intention of parity. Friction is brewing, and a tragedy during their annual Cockaigne Day, which seems like a massive drug party complete with acid in the punch, brings a rift that shreds the community.

The protagonist is young Bit Stone, the first child of Arcadia. The book is told in sections, one when Bit is five, one when he is a teenager, one when he is a young adult, and one, a jump into a dystopian near-future, when he is an older adult. Despite what the jacket copy offers, about half of the novel takes place after the Free People scatter, although it's clear that Bit carries Arcadia wherever he goes.

Groff's writing is rich, sometimes overtly so. I sometimes grew tired of all the lush language and metaphors. But it's beautiful, no doubt. Her characters are developed and believable, especially Bit, his mother Hannah, daughter Grete, and the midwife Astrid. Although not stated outright, the story seems to start circa 1973. One child, pretending to be a horse, insists on being called Secretariat all that summer. Another child mimics Nixon's "I am not a crook" stance, making peace signs with her hands like that famous image many of saw on our televisions. But how do these young kidlets living on their TV-less commune know anything about Nixon, about Secretariat? Beyond a few of these incongruities, the author does give a realistic slice of communal living during that era. The story carried me along, and I found myself sniffling or crying outright more than once.

A child of a 60s commune returns in 2018 to attend his mother's death near where he was born. Arcadia reflects the reality of communes and other collective families in the 60s and 70s where too often the freedom of no rules or self-governance became the grind of economic, intellectual, sexual and political poverty. Leadership by the charismatic rather than those with practical experience doomed most. At the edges of Arcadia, children are equally ignored and exploited. When the commune collapses, the children of the Arcadian diaspora remain connected to each other, often in tragedy. Bit, born prematurely to the most well-grounded of the Arcadians, is a precocious learner who conflates a book of Grimm's fairy tales with his woodland community, keeping his silence in the hope it will save his mother--and speaking aloud at a time that coincides with his father's irredeemable turning point. He marries with unreasonable hope within the scattered family, ultimately waiting until almost the last moment to be centered enough to experience the genuine love of a woman who is neither his mother nor his child.

Sense of place drives this novel as much as, potentially more than, character development. The transformation of key characters takes place "off-stage." The first section of the book when Bit is five is one of the singularly most depressing tasks of reading I have ever undertaken. The emerging chaos and scattering of the community are self-fulfilling. There is a golden glow of reconciliation in the closing section where I'm not convinced sufficient foundation has been laid.

The story is vague at first, the how and why opaque as the amoeba grows, as the characters take shape and as the outline of what's going on takes its own time to form.

It begins before the protagonist is even born. Little Bit is the first child born to a group on caravan that eventually becomes a commune. He knows the memory took place before his birth -- a group of women, including his mother, washing clothes in a cold river, people singing old folk songs, a bonfire and a small caravan on the move toward their eventual home. Before the skeptical reader gives up, know that Bit knows he knows the story because it has been told to him so many times that it feels as real to him as something he actually did experience. So is Bit's own story. He is, after all, "the first Arcadian ever" and his story "is another story so retold that everyone owns it".

This communal passing on of a story is the key to Arcadia, the latest novel by Lauren Groff. So is the sense that, while the novel takes place from the 1960s to the next decade, it is timeless, a tale the Grimm Brothers may have heard to pass along: "The forest is dark and deep and pushes so heavily on Bit that he must run away from the gnarled trunks, from the groans of the wind in the branches." The forest and the outdoors are as much Bit's world as the commune.

Young Bit disappears into the forest during a time his mother, Hannah, suffers from depression. He knows he is not her prince, but he still is on a quest to save her. Bit is living in a fairy tale.

He stays in a fairy tale for his entire life, as Groff fits what could really happen to a child born in a commune in 1968 through the glory days and the downfall, through the love and through the drugs, through the opting out of society and becoming a destination for partiers, into a "once upon a time" framework. Until that fairy tale quest, and even with the occasional fairy tale reference, the early Arcadia often feels like a rewrite of T.C. Boyle's Drop City, written with a child protagonist instead of the adult hippies. Other children's parents fight, the whole commune goes hungry and the ego of the ironically named leader, Handy, is on early display. It's not going to work, as all utopian societies turn out to not work.

But with that quest, Groff's intent emerges and shines through for the rest of the novel. Like the tale of the primordal creature who lived in deep waters in her debut novel, The Monsters of Templeton, Arcadia's strength is from the power of storytelling as an ancient activity. Bit's parents are the kindly center of the tale -- the capable and loving Hannah and Abe. They know how to do things. Their emotions are real. Their dreams are both within reach and beyond the scope of humans with normal foibles and failings.

Handy's children, and those of the other original Arcadia settlers, like Bit, grow up removed from normal society. They don't eat processed food or meat. They don't watch TV. They see childbirth and naked adults, and smoking pot is the norm. Groff delivers all these facts without embellishment and without judgment. This is simply their world.

The fall from grace is a slow-moving one. One character has a literal fall but continues to try to make the dream real. Others fall figuratively but their actions turn the dream into a nightmare and the community falls apart.

Groff, instead of next showing how Bit adjusts to life on the outside, next shows us Bit as an adult, as a father with his path already chosen. While some readers might want to see Bit's journey, this is a writing choice that proves to be a good one. Instead of watching Bit cope with civilization in a coming-of-age story, we know that he already came of age before he left Arcadia. Even though where he lives has changed (and all the children of Arcadia end up living in big cities, not wanting to be isolated), Bit remains true to himself. He lives with quiet integrity as the days go past. There is one incident where most writers would have Bit commit an act of folly. But instead of having to mutter "Oh dear, Little Bit, don't do it", the reader can instead see that Bit remains true to himself, to the way he was raised. It's sweet and one of the reasons to treasure Groff's writing so much. She knows how to make those little, lovely moments of humanity come alive.

It's only when both personal losses and a society crisis in the near future (a very plausible crisis) merge that Bit comes to his own turning point. But rather than an action to take or not take, Bit's turning point is how he feels. The key to his decision lies in the small moments of life. Even as a young child, the small noticings are important to him, as when he picks an icicle: "Inside again, he licks it down to nothing, eating winter itself, the captured woodsmoke and sleepy hush and aching cleanness of ice. His parents sleep on. All day, the secret icicle sits inside him, his own thing, a blade of cold; and it makes Bit feel brave to think of it."

Capturing the small moments of noticing is a talent Groff possesses in abundance. Toward the end of the novel, it is in being able to recall these small moments, that the ability to turn a moment into a memory that can be recalled as a story, that the beauty of fairy tales at their homiest shines:

He sits in the rocking chair beside her. The women's noises fill the house at his back. He will make raspberry jam in his head, he decides; he hasn't done any preserving since he was a boy. He closes his eyes. At first he forgets steps, has to backtrack to squeeze the lemons, clean the berries, measure out the sugar, pluck the glass jars from the boiling water. But when he relaxes, things go vibrant. He feels the furry warmth of fresh raspberries in his fingers, and the smell rises up, sweet and tingling, made even brighter by memory.

When things appear at their worst, Bit and the readers of his story are reminded we've survived bad things before. Maybe we will this time as well.

I read this book as a book club selection. At the onset, the expectation of being swept away by the story and immersed in the wonders of the 60's was high. I didn't expect a psychedelic trip, but a gentle walk along a calm stream. To my dismay that isn't what the pages held for me. Along my journey, I kept tripping over a plethora of commas that seemed to be scattered willy nilly throughout the prose. As the beginning section of the book was written from a young boy's POV, I expected the exaggerated use of commas - as well as the lack of quotation marks - to dissipate as the novel progressed. "Is someone speaking dialog here," I had to ask myself more than a few times. Sadly this did not happen. Although I did enjoy the book, the reading was a struggle. Most of the time, I felt like a hiker lost in the woods of an overgrown forest tripping over one root after another. On a positive note, there are some really beautiful images created by flowing delicate prose. It was these diamonds that I came across in the story that made the reading worth the trek.

This novel tells the story of Ridley Sorrel Stone, nicknamed Bit - "the littlest bit of a hippie ever made!" when he is the first baby born to a group of travelling hippies, who finally establish a commune centred around the grounds of a decaying mansion called Arcadia House. Bit is the son of Abe and Hannah and the group is led by the charismatic musician Handy. This is the time of Vietnam and what begins as a few dozen idealists grows and establishes itself. To my mind, the parts set during Bit's childhood are the most fascinating, because, of course, people being human nothing can remain as idealistic as it sounds. Abe challenges Handy's authority, Hannah suffers depression, there is hunger, cold, lack of housing, drugs, hardship and hard work. However, this extreme isolation is not always seen as negative. Although the author shows the rise and downfall of Arcadia, it is obvious that Bit does not see the experience as something to run from and he carries many of the dreams and aspirations of his younger years into his adulthood, along with 'family' ties to others from the commune.

In reality, this is a family saga of sorts, with the community providing Bit with the family he needs into his adulthood - with all its ups and downs, problems and difficulties. I enjoyed this novel a lot and wished, in fact, that it had been longer. Bit is a wonderful character, so sweet and kind, and it is really refreshing to have a central male character represented in this unstereotypical way - neither macho, nor violent, but sensitive and gentle. Interesting take on a social experiment and would be an ideal book for reading groups, with much to discuss.

Maybe I just love books about communes and utopias too much, but this is the second novel about an intentional society that I have read and absolutely loved this year. (Second may not seem like much, but there's just so many novels about the subject - sarcasm intended.) Onwards to some of the many things I loved about Arcadia:

1) The setting is so realistic, yet the story has a somewhat magical quality to it. It takes a pretty great author to make the gritty, poor community of Arcadia actually seem nice and ideal for a significant portion of the time. Granted, if the story was told from another character's viewpoint, the place wouldn't seem so great.

2) Only half of the book actually takes place at the commune. I thought the novel would fall flat after that, but it never even came close. Groff's look at how the characters mature and adapt after they leave "utopia" is as fascinating (and well-written) as her examination of the community.

3) Groff's writing is amazing (see above about realistic vs. magical feel, life-after-utopia, etc.), and her novel becomes a bit of a genre-bender and incorporates some pretty cool stuff into the storyline. The plot as seen through five-year-old Bit's eyes is infused with details from the Grimms' stories. There are several references to other legends, utopian novels and attempts, and related subjects. The ending edges towards the apocalyptic in a realistic way rather fit for the inhabitants of a commune such as Arcadia, and the conclusion is a perfect blend of the bittersweet and the hopeful.

So...go read this book! The subject is unique, the writing is exemplary, the characters are great, the plot is well-developed - what more is there to want?

Disclaimer: I received my copy of this book from the publisher in return for an honest review.

I've never not wanted a book to end as much as I didn't want Lauren Groff's absurdly good tale about a hippie commune in upstate New York to end. In four sections chronicling four distinct times in the life of our protagonist Bit, the novel is told in brief, dazzling, poetic snippets that are so alive, so evocative, you're almost surprised you can't actually taste what these characters are eating or smell what they're smelling.

But you can feel what they're feeling -- and that's one of the qualities of this novel that gave me that feeling in my stomach I can't explain, but only get when I've read a novel I really love. This is a novel you read (and savor) as much for the writing as for the story. Both are fantastic.

We start in the mid 70s when Bit is five years old. Arcadia is in its formative years (like Bit), and we see the struggles and successes of creating a "utopian society," and the potential pitfalls of shielding children like Bit and his friend Helle, the daughter of the commune's founder/de facto leader Handy, from the Outside. Next we see Bit as a teenager, now in love with the tragic Helle -- who bears more than a passing literary resemblance to Jenny from Forrest Gump. Helle has spent time on the Outside and has acquired a wild streak, now thinking that her and Bit's parents' dream of a communal utopia is misguided and naive.

Indeed, as we move on to the final two sections -- Bit in his late 30s in modern times, now with a child and sad story, and then Bit in his mid-50s in the future, caring for his aging mother Hannah (his symbol of constancy and love) -- one of the constant themes of the story is how expectations or intentions (even the best ones) often clash with harsh reality. Life can be disappointing, even for the most noble.

One of my favorite -- and perhaps most heartbreaking -- passages in the book describes Bit seeing a fat woman sitting on a bench in a train station, crying. Bit is appalled that no one will stop to comfort her, to ask her what's wrong. So he walks towards her, and notices a sign that says "crying woman" and a hat for donations; a weird piece of performance art. But Bit realizes that life is cruelest when it tricks you into sympathizing, but as a result of something that's not genuine.

The inside flap blurb for Arcadia alludes to Groff as "one of our most accomplished literary artists," which sounds a little high-falutin, bordering on pretentious. But I can't think of a better way to describe this novel than as a literary work of art. It's absolutely incredible -- not just one of my favorite of the year, my favorite in a long, long time. Five stars.

Before you move to pick up a copy of "Arcadia," you will read rave reviews praising author Lauren Groff for her lyrical prose, her stunning descriptions of life within a free-thinking commune, the depth of her characters and the arc of her story.

They're all true.

The story of Bit Stone and his family, central figures in the upstate New York commune, is, by turns, painful and joyful, beautiful and excruciatingly difficult. Life within "Arcadia" is so well described, in fact, it seems as though one can smell the very detritus of life in such a well-intentioned but hardscrabble existence.

We see all of this through the eyes of Bit, the first youngster born into the commune, who grows to adolescence amid the free-thinking members of the group. He sees it all, growing up in the face of life's sharp edges -- the rigors of birth, the struggles of the addicted -- and its simple joys.

But the insularity of this community looms as large as a character itself, and, as Bit grows, he begins both to anticipate and to dread life on The Outside.

When that day comes, he eventually finds himself confronting evils overwhelming to even the most hardened among us.

What a wonderful book. Groff's writing envelops the reader, casting us headlong into the world she has created for Bit, attaching us to him from the earliest age, engaging us in his growth, his struggles, and his eventual decision to seek a kind of redemption for the community itself.

This is Groff's second book. Can't wait to read her third.

I usually struggle with books that contain lots of visual description, and the first time I tried to read Arcadia I got about 20 pages in, then put it down. I'm glad I gave it another try. I forced myself to read slowly, taking in the descriptions, and was soon enmeshed in this story of a man, family and time. We see everything from the viewpoint of the narrator, Bit, the first child born in a utopian hippie community. Telling the story from the child's viewpoint meant I was forced to engage with the descriptions, which were so tactile, visual, auditory I felt like I was actually there. Despite the child's lack of understanding, the reader can spot the issues threatening this utopia and the little family. By the time Bit grows a little older, I was very invested in him and kept reading. As a child, I grew up around many hippies and the challenges the characters faced rang very true. But this isn't just a novel about the counterculture, but about how one takes one's beliefs into the future, the nature of family,how different people see things in completely different ways, and the stories we tell about ourselves and each other. This book was simply beautiful and days after finishing it, I cannot stop thinking about it.

There are so many good reviews here on "Arcadia," I hesitate to write a review, since it's all already been said by others quite succinctly. This book affected me more than any work of fiction I've read in recent memory (and I read about 50-60 books a year, mostly fiction). Groff has written a completely believable account of a hippie commune without lapsing into either sentimentality or cynicism. The book is about community, and how it can fail, both at the micro (commune) level and the macro level (the world). The book is also about love, and looking out for others, about putting others before yourself.

I agree with others who've said the first half or so was slow, but I think this is part of the book's power: you are slowly drawn in, and the slow pace and small sections (almost like tiny short stories) force you to slow down and notice, really notice, the fictional world growing in front of you. This is a another theme of the book, I think: mindfulness. Being awake, aware, in the moment. We tend to live for the future, waiting for *this* to happen and *that* to happen so we'll finally be happy. The truth, as the old book title goes, is that we can only Be Here Now. An important lesson to remember in the trials that face us all in the years ahead.

"Arcadia" is a stunning accomplishment. My congratulations to Ms. Groff.

...but I "took away a star" for the language problems cited by other reviewers. While I applaud the not dumbing-down of language ("smarting up"?), I had to look up a handful of words. "Fartleking down the highway"? "Lurching" was what I pictured. A "spivaned sofa"? Well, OK, I definitely increased my vocabulary...and the similes and metaphors were indeed a bit over the top. Also the absence of quotation marks -- what? Too "establishment"? All these slowed me down and made me wary of reading more of this author's work.

Having said that, I loved the story. Groff skillfully segued into a dystopia, but it was a lightweight dystopia and one that wasn't at all off the wall: It was neither depressing nor did it take over the plot.

As per my experience with income-sharing communities (I live on a kibbutz and spent five weeks at Twin Oaks), it seemed well researched indeed. I'd love to hear what Clane Hayward thinks of Arcadia! I described it to my daughters (we're all Hayward fans) as "Twin Oaks meets Hypocrisy of Disco meets [the film] Sweet Mud / *adamá meshuga'at*". Good going, Groff!

I had forgotten about Lauren Groff, a few years back I had read "Monsters of Templeton" at the recommendation of my late brother and enjoyed it so much that I gave it to my niece to read. Wether she enjoyed it or even read it (along with the other books I gave her) is open to speculation, as she has never spoken of them. I remembered Ms. Groff solely by accident the other day; I came upon a bad review of her latest book on Goodreads, and thought "wow, I remember Monsters, that was a good book." So I looked up what she has been writing lately and found this little gem of fiction " Arcadia". I'm so glad I did. It is just as impressive, heartfelt, and rolling with prose full of feeling, as her previous book. Thanks, Goodreads person, for getting me back in touch with this gifted writer

MY THOUGHTS
Really Liked It.

Born and raised in a commune during the early sixties, Bit doesn't attend regular school, eats no processed food, has never really seen movies or television and reads for entertainment. Arcadia is built by a group of people that want to live off the grid and be self sustaining. They have created what they believe to be the ultimate homestead and lifestyle. The story follows him from birth to old age when his parents die at Arcadia. The inhabitants also make their income from growing and selling pot, of course, it is all under the table. When word spreads out through the community that they will celebrate a harvest festival, it becomes a mini Woodstock and gets a bit out of control. The socialistic community has to decide whether it can remain idealized or sell out. I enjoyed the book but it took me forever to read as it was slow going. It was just the type of laid back story that didn't compel me to stay up late and finish it. I had to put it down several times since I just found myself bored at times. I adored Monsters of Templeton and there were the same quirky characters here as well, but they just didn't get me involved.

In Arcadia Lauren Groff tells the story of Bit, a young boy born into a hippie commune in the 60's. He lives a life of loving neglect as the community struggles to set down roots and survive, but still be true to their freedom-loving ideals. The book follows Bit as he grows to (and through) adulthood, chronicles the effect that the commune of Arcadia has had on him, and shows--through his eyes--the effect it has had on the other people in his life. In Arcadia Groff faithfully represents the defining philosophies of decades past and her characters' decisions to isolate themselves (either geographically or emotionally) but her true achievement is when she convincingly prophesies a future of forced isolation, caused by our own societal selfishness. The writing in this novel is lovely, and perfectly understated. The storytelling is excellent. Bit is a sympathetic and interesting narrator, who gives us an insider's view of a disappearing way of life, and a philosophy that sometimes seems as if it's almost on the verge of extinction.

Maybe my expectations were too high based on early reviews, but I was underwhelmed. I found life in the commune interesting, but I was annoyed by many of the characters and what they let transpire. Similar to other reviewers, I was also disappointed in the second half of the book. I would have liked more detail on how characters adjusted to life outside Arcadia. While I didn't necessarily need answers to all of the questions (and there is an unsolved mystery here), I found some of the plot twists contrived and unnecessary. For the most part, I wasn't moved by the characters or their fates.

Despite these thoughts, I do think Groff is a good writer and I would be willing to give her other books a try, but this one just didn't do it for me like I think it could have.

At first, I was a little disappointed in this book because the hippie community just seemed a bit much. Her first book, the Monsters of Templeton, has excellent descriptions of small town New York, and was quieter and much better than the first half of this book.

But this book grew on me. First, her writing style (which I see from some of the other reviews rubs some people the wrong way - I don't get it) is excellent. She is a great storyteller, and some of her sentences need to be read 2-3 times to realize how carefully constructed and well written they really are.

And when she focused on more timeless issues, for example, the death of a parent, the story really took off. A very good book.

I would read anything by this author.

How does a well-meaning man, living the principles of an idyllic and idealistic upbringing, cope with the wrenching changes in his life? How does a visionary leader engender his ideals in his followers? Lauren Groff provides memorable answers to these questions in her knowing and compassionate second novel, "Arcadia."

A cult has grown up around Handy, a folk/rock singer reminiscent of Jerry Garcia. He and his followers realize their utopian dream when they come into 600 acres in Upstate New York, and in the late 1960s they found the commune Arcadia. Built on full egalitarian principles, Arcadia achieves self-sufficiency for a time, with acceptance for misfits, common-law marriages, and a hands-off policy toward drug use. Into this idyll is born Ridley Stone, a premature baby and diminutive child and adult, known universally as "Bit." Through Bit's eyes we witness the unique and inexorable events of this story: a community starts under the highest ideals, but human nature rears its head and jealousy, lust, covetousness, and anger creep in to spoil things. Bit suffers particularly on account of the women in his life: his mother Hannah suffers from seasonal affective disorder and barely stirs from bed for months at a stretch. Helle, the childhood chum who grows brightly beautiful by age thirteen turns out quite troubled - a heavy drug user and apparent thief. Eventually she becomes the mother to Bit's daughter Grete, and at least in her case, Bit's influence proves sufficient to inculcate responsibility and a sense of family.

We suffer as along with Bit. He's a sympathetic character: caring, gentle, and wise, if a little timid. In this way he embodies the commune and its spirit. At the end of the story, his mother's mortality grinds down Bit's last nerve and physical reserves, but also provides a release from some overwhelming responsibilities, and an opportunity for love. Arcadia is the history of a noble experiment, an experiment that has hopeful beginnings, a golden age, and a tragic end. We hope Bit's end will not be tragic, because he's a highly sympathetic being who was schooled in principles by parents with high ideals.

And truly that is the story: Ms. Groff questions whether a commune like the one she describes can withstand the vagaries of human nature. The Arcadia of her story certainly can't. Bit, however, is the community's central figure, true to its ideals to the end. We wish his luck with the love of his life could have been better. This novel enjoys a much tighter focus than The Monsters of Templeton, and the result shows off the author's great skill with the language and the depth of her treatment of the moral issues. The prose throughout makes this novel fairly glow - there's almost no other way to describe it. This is a highly memorable read with fully-drawn characters, and a unified theme and concept carried forward very precisely by the characters. Ms. Groff's skill is really very impressive, and I'll frankly say it's more than I hoped for after Monsters. She hits it out of the park! Take it up!

This is the story of Bit, the first child born to the Free People, a commune headed by a charismatic leader named Handy in New York state. We follow him through his childhood and adolescence, then skip to his adulthood living in New York.

There is a large cast of disparate characters, but Ms. Groff does an excellent job sorting them out for us and making them fully dimensional.

The commune grows and eventually disintegrates as do all utopian visions when faced with the reality of human nature, and Bit's maturing voice keeps the reader in his present moment. As a toddler, his observations are somewhat superficial, and as he grows, his observations become more in-depth, but still stay true to his projected age at the time of the telling. We see through his eyes the eventual disillusionment of both of his parents, Hanna and Abe, with the commune's leader and with the eventual hierarchy that places one group in the main house and the others in cottages separated into certain groups. We witness through a child's eyes a horrible accident that happens to his father, and through an adolescent's eyes first love, and a wrenching away from all that is familiar.

When we again meet Bit as an adult, he is raising his daughter Grete as a single father, his wife having disappeared. We walk with him through the care-taking of his mother Hannah, who has ALS and we are saddened by the situation that put her into full-time care. Once again, disintegration creeps into the plot - the disintegration of Hannah's abilities as well as a disintegration of the wider world, which is fighting a pandemic and going through various crises, including a citrus blight.

Ms. Groff's writing is slow-paced and luminous, which makes for a lovely story. I must admit that the first half of the book, while it held my attention, did not totally draw me in, although I did connect with many of the characters and situations. Once I met Bit as an adult, however, I was transfixed by this truly gentle, loving soul and hoped against hope for his own happy ending.

While this is a contemplative novel, it can be enjoyed by the more casual reader because a LOT happens in these pages. For the more "serious" reader, it can be read with a mind towards the deeper connections implied in the growth of one person and what happens in that person's wider world.

I closed the pages reluctantly, not wanting to let Bit go off into the ether, but very happy to have met him.

QUOTES (from an ARC; may be different in final copy):

There is, Bit knows, what happens on the surface, and there is what pulls beneath.

Though people here have private rituals, Muhammad kneeling on a bit of carpet during the day, Jewish Seders and Christmas trees, religion here is seen much like hygiene: a personal concern best kept in check so as to not bully the others.

I don't know how much longer I can handle it, Hannah says. This isn't what I signed up for, this isn't a better life, this isn't anything but poverty and hard work and not enough money to buy the kids winter boots.

He imagines cities as larger Arcadias, but harder, meaner, people walking around thrusting cash at each other. He has seen the coins like embossed washers, the bits of green paper. Humans out there are grotesque: Scrooges and Jellybys and filthy orphans in the caverns of blacking factories, in lonely depopulated homes, a blight called television like tiny Plato's caves in every room. It is grimmer in the Outside. There is war in the Falkland Islands, there are Sandinistas and Contras, there are muggings and rapes, terrible things he had heard the adults talking about, has read about himself when he can find an old wrinkled paper in the Free Store. The president is an actor, placed in power to smoothly deliver the corporations' lies.

Writing: 5 out of 5 stars
Plot: 4.5 out of 5 stars
Characters: 4 out of 5 stars
Reading Immersion: 4 out 5 stars

BOOK RATING: 4.3 out of 5 stars

The idea of reading a story about a protagonist who grows up in a commune didn't really appeal to me but I'd just read FATES AND FURIES and was anxious to read another of this author's books. Groff creates a fascinating world both inside and outside the commune and ultimately this is a touching story (I cried while reading it, which doesn't happen often) about family, friends and the importance of community and the bonds that tie us together to with the people in our lives.

Best book and writer I've read in a long time! So well written, so deep and poignant it took me to profound inner places. Beautiful, sad, engrossing, deeply thoughtful, it held me in its spell all the way through. I didn't want it to end.
The author so skillfully and beautifully captures the mindsets of both the times (beginning in the 60s/70s) and stages of life and consciousness through the voice of Bit, the protagonist., moving from magical, strange childhood on a counter culture commune, to an urban living disappointed adulthood and outwards and back. To "arrive at the place where we started and know it for the first time." As far as Bit finds himself and ultimate meaning, we are along for the journey too. Ultimately, as in all great works, the story is our own, all of ours.

ARCADIA is a beautifully written book. Spanning a half century, the first half of the novel concerns the childhood and early adolescence of Bit Stone, the first born child of the Arcadia commune.

Goff does a master's job of showing both the beauty of the collective ideal and the rot that can lie within the human heart that belies that ideal. The Apollonian face of Arcadia is Abe, Bit's father, a man who wants to see the example of communal living in Arcadia change the world... but the real world isn't outside his vision, either. His Dionysian foil is Handy, the founder of the commune, who lives from the sweat of his followers without actually joining in on their toil. In between we have Bit, a true innocent, who believes in Arcadia with his whole heart. It is his life. The other Original Arcadians are sketched briefly, but completely. I got a very clear view of each from very few words.

In this section, Goff does a marvelous job of presenting the 'hippie' life nakedly, the good intents and healthy options never glorified, but still not entirely eclipsed by the harsh realities of hunger, cold, and the constant worry about others who desire the communal ideal without actually working for it. I felt for Bit and his family--I wanted both to help them and to take them away. Goff's language is rich and descriptive, allowing us to feel the pain and the glory in her protagonists' lives. I admired the hell out of that.

In the second half of the book, we see an older, sadder Bit, back in the life of the world, but still indelibly tied to an Arcadia that no longer exists. It's both created and defined the man he's become. The lives of the other Arcadians come under his personal microscope, revealing the depth to which their early lives has created the people they've become. Goff neither idealizes nor scorns their choices, which I liked. It's presented almost like a photograph, who they were and who they've become (Bit actually does a photography show along those lines--I wanted to be in attendance).

The only weak point I saw was in the pandemic introduced near the end. It came within a section that had a creeping preachiness that the rest of the novel avoided. It seemed like an avoidably clumsy metaphor for the destruction human beings wreak upon themselves, and was surprisingly hamhanded. ARCADIA worked better as a personal story. I think the same observations and conclusions that Goff makes and wants us to make are contained within that narrative, without beating the reader over the head.

Still, that was not enough to make me dislike ARCADIA. It's a beautifully written, powerful narrative, and I can completely see myself reading it again.

Great writing style, and what a vivid and painfully accurate retrospective on communal life, which was often, in reality, not the Utopian dream. Not necessarily a criticism, I felt like I knew Bit more inside than out, but did not really understand his love for Helle. Although she was a mysterious, elfin creature, she was probably not cut out for making it in the every day world, inside or outside Arcadia. But love is that way sometimes, and Bit obviously followed his heart and not his head. The descriptions of his relationship with his parents are striking and the end of the book is one of the most moving portraits of family love and commitment that I have ever read. Part of me wanted to rate this five stars, but books that I consider five stars (like most of Jennifer Haigh's) propel the reader forward no matter how disturbing or unpleasant the subject matter. I sometimes put Arcadia aside for days at a time because I found it too painful to continue. But that said, it gets my recommendation. Actually, I have a few friends who live in a commune (although theirs is religiously based and much more grounded than Arcadia) and I will recommend it to them as I'm sure there are striking similarities.

I loved the exquisite prose in Lauren Groff's novel, Arcadia. Here's a sample of one sentence I read twice: "He thinks of the rotten parachute they played with as kids in Arcadia: they hurtle through life aging unimaginably fast, but each grasps a silken edge of memory that billows between them and softens the long fall." If you like that sentence, chances are you'll like the whole book which presents protagonist Bit Stone, who was born in an upstate New York commune named Arcadia. Groff presents his life from the late 1960s to 2018. The commune was built on hope, and Bit's hope survives great upheaval. This story of family and community was a great start for me to a new year of rewarding reading.

Rating: Five-star (I love it)

In a nutshell, Arcadia is a story about commune life in upstate new York in the early 70's, and most baby boomers like me know that kind of life rarely goes well long term. The "Free People" of Arcadia, to insure success of their community believe in: "Equality, Love, Work, and Openness to the needs of Everyone." The commune is built on a rundown farm and mansion which was acquired by one of the commune's members and later sold to Handy, the commune's cult-like leader and his wife Astra for $1.00. The name found above the door, Arcadia lived on.

The story itself has several parts to it, and begins when "Bit", AKA Ridley Stone was about five years old. Bit was the first child living at the commune was born to Hannah and Abe. In the final part of the novel we see Bit some 50 years later. Along the way the reader gets a glimpse of commune living as seen through a young child who witnesses much more than any child of that age should have witness, much of which he doesn't understand because of his age. He loves and cares about his huge extended family.

When the great big family grows too too large, a lack of housing, poor sanitary conditions, lack of food, drugs and laziness on the part of some members become real issues. Eventually members leave the commune life and suddenly children who never experienced life outside of this commune are experiencing something foreign.

What may sound to some as a relatively simplistic story is really not all that simple. The fact that it covers a period of 50 years of Bit's life from commune child, to adolescence, marriage, fatherhood and life as a university instructor and even caregiver to a sick parent kept the story moving. Other commune dweller's lives are followed as well, but not to the same extent.

Did I like the book? It was an okay read/listen for me, because I was curious what later life would be like for the characters, especially Bit.

This book took me forever to review, having completed it in mid-June. Why? It was hard to get my thoughts sorted out, because the writing is good and the audio book was well done, but something didn't work well for me, and I'm still not totally sure what it was --perhaps the ending.

The beauty of this novel is in Groff's ability to clearly present the wonderment of life as experienced by a young boy named Bit, who is free to wander about a vast wilderness layered over the chronicle of a dysfunctional group of young adults who blunder into the dream of a self-sufficient, free love community and fail rather miserably. Despite the naivete and reckless abandon with which they live their lives and raise their children, Groff is able to make us care deeply for these unique characters she has created. What is truly enjoyable is the rich sensuality with which Groff writes. One can almost smell the ripe, husky scent of pot and fresh-baked bread, hear the mandolins and guitars and the low earthy sounds of lovemaking and the taste the blackberries that Bit pops into his mouth on his routine sojourns into the depths of Arcadia. It is a delicious treat to read, albeit rather depressing at times, as so much falls apart around this naive band of young hopefuls.
As the story jumps forward in time, we follow Bit fills in the gaps with flashbacks to earlier times, reflecting on the forces of good and evil that shaped his life. At first jarring, I came to appreciate Groff's sudden change of time and space because of the great mysteries it created. I will gladly enjoy this book again in a few years.

4-part novel about growing up on a hippie commune and the aftermath when it all falls apart, as told through the eyes of the first child born at Arcadia. I wasn't quite sure I wanted to read about a commune, but there were many lovely passages (and many slow ones as well), and thought-provoking insights into the nature of childhood, family, community and loss. Definitely worth reading! 3-1/2 stars

I agree with Ehrlich's assessment the author seemed to lose her way in the latter part of the book. Actually, I never had a sense of narrative tension in this book. It struck me as a long series of vignettes or prose poems strung together that taken together did not add up to sustained narrative. I agree with other reviewers description of Groff's writing as lyrical and moving (passages from the slow decline of Bit's mother, Hannah, were most affecting). Yet many times the story line would go slack and just drift for awhile.

One effect this had one me was to get more and more irritated at the protagonist, Bit. Though maddeningly - and often unaccountably - kind, his inner musings slowly coagulate into a thick goo of narcissism (and I love Proust!). After a while the other characters only seem to exist as seen through his solipsistic lens on the world. Ironic, since he is portrayed as all about connection to others.

I enjoyed this book as much for how unique it was, as for the story it told. I am weary of reading the same "woe is me" novels over and over again. It seems that the more tragedy you can shove between two covers these days, the more likely you are to get an agent. And while, yes, there was sorrow in this book, there was also joy. And incredibly well done description. Sometimes maybe too much description? Towards the end of the book I found myself skimming, and I admit I actually didn't read the last couple of chapters. But I am not blaming the author for that. It was more that I felt like the story had reached its natural conclusion already and I was ready to be done reading it. I fell in love with the character Bit. He was like a modern day Dickens character, and I love Dickens, so that's high praise from me.

This book is a complete rip off of the life of Ina May Gaskin. From the watercress and hepatitis to the Midwifery School in Tennessee. I would call this book loose fiction at best. The author should at least somewhere give reference to her very clear inspiration for the novel. Want to know more about this, read Ina May Gaskin’s Spiritual Midwifery, Birth Matters, and/or Guide to Childbirth.

Arcadia reads like poetry disguised as prose, with the characterization at once horribly real and beautifully portrayed. The story is a fictional narrative exhibited from the mind of the ever-so-trusting Bit Stone, a boy born into a free-loving hippie commune of upper New York state in the late 60's that was later deemed Arcadia. He earned his nickname Bit the day he was born (his birth name actually being Ridley Sorrel Stone) when the midwife who delivered him exclaimed him to be a "Little Bit of a Hippie," and was also given the title as the First Arcadian. The community he grows up in shapes his mind and understanding of the world, what it means to be "free people" and live off the land. Mostly, Bit learns what it is to really notice things, to really take in every detail of life that he can possibly hold. Groff takes the reader into the mind of 5-year-old Bit, who then grows into 14-year-old Bit, and then finally into the mid-adult years of this man now surviving and trying to understand the cold, unforgiving city of New York. Groff takes us through these crucial moments of Bit's life, from prospering Arcadia to a deteriorating one, to the post 9/11 cruel elbows and don't-give-a-damn stares of his new city home, now with a wife and child, to the frightening future of 2018, a period of ravaging infection and near-apocalyptic conditions. During each of these glimpses into Bit Stone's life, we see Arcadia still imprinted in the boy who had to change so much just to survive the real world he barely knew existed. Lauren Groff brings to the table a fascinating conversation of childhood memories, nostalgia, the process of growing up, the bitterness of regret, and the acceptance of life itself. With her excruciatingly detailed, romanticized view of the world through the lens of a child living in Arcadia, who wakes, eats, drinks, bathes, plays, works, and lives with hundreds of others in a family-style community, Groff leaves the reader nostalgic for Arcadia too, just as Bit is for the rest of his life.
As Bit moves through life, we follow. We ache for Arcadia just as he does, and by the end, when he has finally returned to the place of his dreams, we question just as Bit does if the memory we have of our childhood is really as wonderful as we remember, or if that questions even truly matters. Groff suggests to us through Bit's beautifully gentle mind that "It isn't important if the story was ever true. Bit manipulates images: he knows stories don't need to be factual to be vital. He understands, with a feeling inside him like a wind whipping through a room, that when we lose the stories we have believed about ourselves, we are losing more than stories, we are losing ourselves. (208)"
Reading this novel left me speechless and feeling heavy, like I was carrying the weight of the cold Arcadian winters with me even after I had finished those pages. Lauren Groff turns every line of this book into a miniature poem, some lines so moving I had to read them again and again just to soak them up in my brain, like a cloth eager to wipe up every last drop of spilled water. She left me wondering how so much brute, raw beauty could be shoved into so few words. I was at once greatly jealous and perfectly awed by her skill. Her imagery was so captivating even in the simplest of scenes that I found myself dreaming of the pictures she put in my head, usually only prompted by a short phrase. Lines like "He thinks of the rotten parachute they played with as kids in Arcadia: they hurtle through life aging unimaginably fast, but each grasps a silken edge of memory that billows between them and softens the fall, (222)" and "Pay attention, he thinks. Not to the grand gesture, but to the passing breath, (289)" make the reader catch their breath, see the billowing parachute, the running children, the wind through the trees and sugar bushes surrounding Arcadia House.
I should warn prospective readers that although Groff's imagery is suffocatingly real and even worth reading for this reason alone, the form she uses for dialogue is not welcomed by all readers. Dialogue in this novel is not set off by quotations, let alone breaks in the paragraph, so some may find it hard to follow along with conversation. However, I personally loved this after I finally got used to it. This style strongly emphasizes to remind the reader that we are always inside Bit's head, not outside of it to hear the dialogue firsthand. Bit speaks and people speak to him and around him, and we see it all through the thought lines in his mind, like he is thinking out his life as it's happening. I found it severely personal and moving.
Arcadia will undoubtedly change perspectives and prompt questions, provoke tears and induce a raging nostalgia for a place we've been only once before and where we long for all our lives: childhood. Bit experiences two extremes of the world, forced from fallen Arcadia into an unforgiving city life. Everywhere he goes, though, he manages to find a little bit of Arcadia, whether it's in the mural he is painting on his daughter's bedroom wall or in the face of his daughter herself, or even among the cramped community of thousands living within inches of each other in the big city. Bit realizes eventually that he has swallowed Arcadia whole until the only real Arcadia left is the one living inside his soul. And to Bit, that's okay.

It actually took me awhile to get through this book but it wasn't because I disliked it. Groff is an excellent writer. I think it was just the point I was at in my life...I would read some and then put it down for a bit, read some more and then put it down again. I was reading other books at the same time so that added to the fact that I kept putting Arcadia on pause. I learned many things about a time and way of life that I knew little about. I was happy that I finally finished it. It wasn't a suspense novel and those are the types of reads that I usually finish quickly. For me, it was the type of novel that you savor and take your time with. I really enjoyed Bit, the main character. It followed him from childhood to adulthood. He dealt with many struggles being the product of a commune in west NY in the 1970s. I enjoyed the book and will read more by Groff.

Every now and then, a book comes along that completely transports me and makes me want to stop living my life so I can do nothing but live in the world the author has created. This is one of those books.

Arcadia tells the story of the building of a commune through the eyes of the first child born to the commune, a tiny boy named Bit. His views of the world are nuanced and deep, and Groff does an incredible job of showing the world through the eyes of someone who isn't allowed to have candy or keep a pet dog (it's animal slavery!) let alone watch television or go to normal school. The world of the commune is richly painted, with all its benefits and significant drawbacks.

I don't want to describe the plot in any further detail because I don't want to spoil a minute of this magnificent book for anyone. When I finished reading the advance copy I received, I was sad it wouldn't be out til after Christmas, as I want to give it to everyone I know. I can't even believe that Ms. Groff is as young as she is, and my deep respect and admiration for her talents is the only thing that keeps me from being gnawingly jealous of her accomplishments. I've loved her two previous books, but this one has made me a fan for life.

To me, this book seemed like it had a new author a little over halfway through. The beginning was an interesting enough, pleasant story about a group of idealistic people trying to create a self-sustaining commune. The references to the Kid Herd, the Trippers, the Naturists, Ersatz Arcadia and Arcadia, all this stuffing of people and things into little identification boxes got a little old, and some of the metaphors got a little much for me. Some of the characters seemed stereotypical. It was a nice enough, three star story, but nothing especially memorable. Then Bit, a little boy who was raised in the commune, grew up. The characters had more depth, the story was more interesting, the metaphors rang truer to me, and I fell in love with the story, a five-star book, well worth the reading it took to get to that point. So split it down the middle and this one is a good, solid 4-star novel.

Thank you to the publisher for giving me an advance reader's copy for review.

I am partially into the audio book and am enjoying this a lot. The understated reading of it only accentuates the beautiful writing. Such a great setting-having come of age in the 70's when communes were around-that might be part of why I love this. Having read some of other Groff's work-it just ebbs and flows with such ease-it's quite masterful and lyrical.

I didn't like the style --- there is no direct dialog, its just words that the main character remembers. The book follows the main character's life from birth to middle age. It's a fascinating viewpoint of a child growing up in a commune. Its unsatisfying at the end, and kind of depressing. I love insights of what it was like to live in a commune. Ultimately, there were too many loose ends at the end and I just didn't think the end was well thought out. Bit is not a character that I admired. He was a pushover and let people take advantage of him. The writing is unusual in that I don't think the writer liked quotes or dialog since there was none. I'm kind of sure this novel will be made into a movie. It's a period of time in America's history that can be explored (late 60s/70s) with fervor. A generation of people who have lived in communes can now tell their stories. I wish for a different outcome for Bit, and really never got to know the other characters who were not as fully realized. Also, it seems he had a 3rd rate education, but somehow snags a great job as a college professor. Without giving too much away, we all know that's total fiction. But, as a photographer, I could relate to Bit.

It was an absorbing read. I liked how it went in some unexpected turns in the final quarter. Just when you kind of think you have it figured out it goes in some interesting new directions. I withheld one star because I felt like there was too much repetition in the first three quarters. Bit's internal monologues got repetitive. But overall engrossing, enjoyable and fascinating.

Like `Monsters of Templeton,' `Arcadia' has an over-written, over-workshopped quality. Especially when writing from a child's perspective, Groff goes way over the top with descriptors and lyrical flights of language. That said, something about the world she has created in Arcadia kept me reading through to the surprisingly moving finish. Page after page, Arcadia came to life for this reader, from the Soy Dairy to the Trippies and their minders to the tensions in marriage of Bit's parents. Bit himself remains terminally vague as a character throughout - Groff has her surest touch with the female characters and Hannah especially emerges as a fully formed personality by the end. In all, well worth plowing through the Iowa 101 passages to get to the engrossing narrative beneath.

It has been a long time since a book made me cry. I loved everything about this book; we read to be taken to another place and removed from our lives for just a few moments. Arcardia does just that. Beautifully written prose, engaging story--you care about the characters as they push into the foreground and recede into the background of the story. I loved the fragility and strength of the main character Bit. Don't want to give too much away, but this story spans much of Bit's life, and you come to understand how living at Arcadia has shaped who he is as an adult. Most importantly, the author doesn't pass any judgement for those who choose to live a rural life (Arcadia) versus a completely urban existence or vice versa. Rather, her writing makes you long for elements of each and question your own decision about who you are and how where you have chosen to live affects and shapes you as a person. A compelling, lovely read with well-written, almost poetic passages that manages to somehow be both soothing and completely jarring a the same time.

My husband randomly picked this book up from the library, and I was hooked after the first few pages. Lauren writes the book like she lived on the commune, and many of the phrases, foods cooked, observations of the characters, on and on were so spot on, I don't know how she knew to write them. As someone who grew up in the 60's, I ate many of the same foods described, and it was like she had also grown up eating them. The comment about the venison tasting like death, and then vomiting, was exactly the same thing my son thought when tasting meat for the first time.
I love this book, and was very sorry when it ended. The vivid way Lauren paints her pictures of nature, living so close to the land, the tree images, water, all of it, was like a canvas in my mind.
I cannot give enough compliments about this book. Thank you for writing it!

It's hard to believe that this is a work of fiction -- it's intimately peopled with characters so real, I could make them a cup of chamomile tea and a soy cheese enchilada, and they would eat it. Now that I've finished it, I miss them.

I listened to the excellent recorded book version of this book. I revisited childhood, more vividly than I remember my own. I struggled, as I once did in real life, with the wish to believe in a charismatic, inspiring, and narcissistic guru, and the confusing disillusionment that follows, if you're lucky.

There were so many interesting little threads carried through the book, artfully reappearing like actual memories, but with better timing. Mysteries were solved deliciously, from treasures unearthed from the dust in an abandoned mansion, to how to cherish a fleeting breath in a chaotic world.

The author wasn't even born in the hippie era that forms the foundation of the story. How on earth did she nail the details of commune-speak, addiction, raising teenagers, caring for aging parents? She must be a kid genius: a master of "show, don't tell," even though her medium is words.

Another reviewer was reluctant to believe that a naked 5-year-old could help a laboring woman through childbirth. I found that sensuous birth scene entirely believable, though I'm sure it might shock some readers. A laboring woman is sensitive to the energy of people in the room with her, and extremely sensitive to touch and smell. I could see how a gentle, cuddly, familiar child could be just the right medicine, and I could imagine his satisfaction at being so helpful. The one thing that struck me as fanciful was the behavior of the doctor late in the book. I won't spoil it by going into detail, but I thought it was maybe too good to be true. But I was happy to suspend my disbelief for that -- it COULD happen, in the kind of Utopia that gurus can only hope for.

I have always thought that writing about the past and present without acknowledging the hell-in-a-handbasket forebodings of modern life is naive or maybe irresponsible. But in a book about wishful thinking, Groff has managed to tackle our likely dystopian future as well. The main character evolves, bit by little bit, from believing in a sort of magic to celebrating reality. I am enriched. This book will be a tough act to follow.

I didn't love the book.
I didn't dislike it either.
It just never ended up going anywhere for me.I loved the writing though. I found it very Shakespearian and that helped me finish the story.
The story itself feel flat for me though. Without the clever phrasing and writing style, my attention wouldn't have been kept.
I'm sure others will disagree, and that's cool, but it just left that impression on me.

2.5/5

I had very different feelings as I read the 3 sections of "Arcadia". The first section, when the main character, Bit, is very young, was very reminiscent of Jack in "Room" by Emma Donoghue. Such an innocent voice, a child who only know his world and nothing of the world beyond. Where Bit lives in a utopian environment and Jack lives in a prison, neither of them know of or view their lives in those terms. Instead, the reader is given such a different perspective - at times a more limited one, and at times one that is so perceptive that it nearly takes one's breath away. Because of their environments, there is an incredible clarity of vision.

"...Bit wakes alone, heart racing. The icicles in the window are shot with such red light of dawn that Bit goes barefoot over the snow to pull one with his hand. Inside again, he licks it down to nothing, eating winter itself, the captured woodsmoke and sleepy hush and aching cleanness of ice. His parents sleep on. All day, the secret icicle sits inside him, his own thing, a blade of cold; and it makes Bit feel brave to think of it."

The first section lets the reader get to know this boy, this world of a utopian gathering of souls in the late sixties/early seventies. There is innocence, love, spirit as the reader learns of these people who've left the world they know to try and form a new world based on community and love. Bit is the child of this new world, born into it and never leaving. While there are certainly some flaws in this new world, we see mostly the best of it through the eyes of this quiet soul who seems only to desire that while the commune seeks to be.

The second details the fraying and eventual collapse of Arcadia. This came too fast for me. I'd just settled in and was expecting to read about the best times of the commune, the brightest times. But the book skips that part. The reader watches the building of Arcadia and then never really has the chance to enjoy it before it starts to fall apart.

Because of that, I don't think I was very grounded in the other characters - outside of Bit and his parents. As the idealists split apart from one another, I didn't feel the sorrow or sense of loss that Bit did.

"Sometimes you have to let time carry you past your troubles, she says. Believe me. I have been where you are. This is something I do know."

And Bit is carried away from the only world he's ever known - heading towards an uncertain future.

"He leans his head against the cool window. The same moon hovers. A line flaps with sheets, a mailbox shines. The road passes beyond everything he knows of it. They go around a bend he has never been around, a house he has never seen; all is doubly new, sick with newness. A bridge made of steel; an ice cream parlor, much larger than what he'd imagined. A sidewalk, a flag on a pole. A brick school. A Ferris wheel. The endless hills, heaped and sleeping. The sun rises. In the window, it reflects him back to himself. There is so little to Bit: a fine hem of golden hair, the filthy neck of a teeshirt. Fragile, pale flesh over a sharpness of bone, and eyes so vast in his face they threaten to swallow the world just now spinning past, they threaten to be swallowed by it."

The last section takes place in the future, and for a while I was afraid the book would start in utopia and end in the apocalypse. That was not the case, but I spent much of the numerous final chapters wishing for more of the beginning of the book. There was a lot of the middle of the book and a LOT of the end of the book, but not as much of the early days of Bit as I would have liked. His vision, inside of the world in which he was born, was just beautiful. Lyrical, as the book jacket mentions.

Still, there are lovely passages as he deals with our world and with his place in it. With the changes and the losses that are a part of life.

"He understands, with a feeling inside him like a wind whipping through a room, that when we lose the stories we have believed about ourselves, we are losing more than stories, we are losing ourselves."

Ridley Sorrel Stone, know as "Little Bit" in the commune that was Arcadia, is a beautiful soul, the dream come true of a past time and the best of people. His story is a sweet one, changing to bittersweet as his world changes.

"Bit feels it start to swell in him. The love, which he had turned from, breathes, blinks, swallows. A creature, stirred back to life. He can't be separate. It is impossible. He is part of the whole."

Mesmerizing story as haunting as a dream. From the wise non-speaking child narrator to the gentle man caring for his non-speaking mother, Lauren Groff held me captive. When I finished, I browsed back through the book reading sentences and wondering if any were ordinary, serving only to move the story forward. I did not find one that wasn't alive with feeling.
Richard Russo said of "Arcadia" that "It's not possible to write any better without showing off." I agree.

I agree with the other "2 stars" that the concept and development of this novel are limited, despite the lush, sensual details. Yes, Bit is definitely more interesting in his commune days than later, and the disappearance of the annoyingly selfish Helle rankles rather than intrigues. Moreover, the "quiet" doctor who takes Helle's place is totally unbelievable (sitting for hours over tea with Bit!) and as boring a character as he is.
The whole time I read this, TC Boyle's wonderful "Drop City" stayed in the back of my head. With the definitive story of the death of a commune already written, Groff faced a difficult task!

I liked the story, but it didn't need to be quite so long and slow-paced. Perhaps the pace was appropriate, as it set the atmosphere of the hippy commune lifestyle, but I think 75% of the length would have done the job. I found the characters genuine and interesting even if their circumstances seemed far-fetched.

Got very slow in places. Didn't see the apocalyptic part coming. Interesting commentary on how Utopias fail. Three more words required. What? It's my review so if I only have one word to say that should suffice.

The author's writing is beautiful and she makes it easy for the reader to vividly picture what she is describing. The beginning of the book is through the eyes of Bit who is five when the book begins and then fourteen. I found this section of the book very powerful. The author starts to lose me with the adult Bit. I didn't care enough about this adult that Bit had grown into and I didn't feel like the characters were as believable.....and the section on his mom getting ill goes on and on.... I felt depressed when I finished reading..... it just seemed like a let down after the beginning of the book.

I wanted so much to like this book from the time I first laid eyes upon it to the turning of the last page. The problem is, aside from the beautiful writing, there isn't much to like. To say I am disappointed would be an understatement - I just expected so much more. One would imagine commune life to be so complex and intense, however when viewed through the eyes of such an insipid main character, the reader is left without much. This novel makes you imagine little, and feel even less.

I was transported by the author's writing. Her wording forced me to look at the content in startlingly unexpected ways. I have just finished the book, so evaluation of the story will have to follow sitting with it for some time. In the '60s it seemed much more possible to take your life in your own hands to make your own destiny than it does today. This book chronicles that change brilliantly yet gave me no sense of what lies in the future. It gave a great deal to think about. Overall, astonishingly well written.

Loved that this novel was balanced in it's storytelling, highlighting the community's missteps and triumphs equally. At the end I could see how individuals tried to make societies like Arcadia work, despite human nature working against them. The characters were real, and the ending was fulfilling.

I had high hopes for Arcadia after really enjoying The Monsters of Templeton. Unfortunately, Groff's sophomore novel didn't work for me. Although the early days of the commune and the politics of group living were interesting, I couldn't find a character to really root for. Even Little Bit was more annoying than endearing. And as a adult, I found him bland and boring. The book skips from Bit's childhood to adulthood, skipping his coming of age in the real world after the collapse of the commune. Too bad, I suspect that was the most interesting time of his life.

Though the critics loved Arcadia - calling it lyrical, nuanced, and revelatory - I found it distant and depressing.

The writing in this book is incredible and the arc of the story is pretty compelling. However, at times, the narrative gets a little bit bogged down in detail (though I love the writing of said detail)...yet, pacing might've helped stir more life into the book when it most needed it.

I was transported by the author's writing. Her wording forced me to look at the content in startlingly unexpected ways. I have just finished the book, so evaluation of the story will have to follow sitting with it for some time. In the '60s it seemed much more possible to take your life in your own hands to make your own destiny than it does today. This book chronicles that change brilliantly yet gave me no sense of what lies in the future. It gave a great deal to think about. Overall, astonishingly well written.

Loved that this novel was balanced in it's storytelling, highlighting the community's missteps and triumphs equally. At the end I could see how individuals tried to make societies like Arcadia work, despite human nature working against them. The characters were real, and the ending was fulfilling.

I had high hopes for Arcadia after really enjoying The Monsters of Templeton. Unfortunately, Groff's sophomore novel didn't work for me. Although the early days of the commune and the politics of group living were interesting, I couldn't find a character to really root for. Even Little Bit was more annoying than endearing. And as a adult, I found him bland and boring. The book skips from Bit's childhood to adulthood, skipping his coming of age in the real world after the collapse of the commune. Too bad, I suspect that was the most interesting time of his life.

Though the critics loved Arcadia - calling it lyrical, nuanced, and revelatory - I found it distant and depressing.

The writing in this book is incredible and the arc of the story is pretty compelling. However, at times, the narrative gets a little bit bogged down in detail (though I love the writing of said detail)...yet, pacing might've helped stir more life into the book when it most needed it.

I suffered through this book despite myself. For all of its detail in the earlier chapters we never get to know any of the characters, even Bit, the main character, in any real detail. The characters just sort of passively muddle along through this lush landscape in which every daily task is described in excruciating detail. Things happen, but one could combine all of the significant events in this book into a twelve page short story. I'm not someone who needs a lot of plot, but if there isn't a plot, there needs to be character-driven dynamics that make me want to read.

Arcadia is so full of beautiful writing that it's breath-taking. The subject matter, the rise and fall of a alternative community called Arcadia, is fascinating and obviously well researched. Bit, the focus of the book, is a voice I'll never forget.

I received an advance copy of ARCADIA and have been waiting impatiently for the pub date so I can post a few thoughts (not that anyone's been waiting to hear from me). ARCADIA is a stunning novel. Look elsewhere for a plot summary--I can't do it justice.

The imagery Groff uses on page after page took my breath away--and by the last third or so, I was weeping. Here is the very stuff of life. Hope, dreams, love, how to live, lost hope, lost dreams, lost love, death. Bit, the protagonist, is beautifully crafted and will break your heart.

It's a gorgeous book. I can't stop thinking about it. I'm going to read it again. Writers know that the most particular and specific may also be the most universal. Nevertheless, sometimes a book comes along that you think has been written just for you. ARCADIA is like that. If you care about the world, buy a copy.

Arcadia is an interesting remembrance of the passionate devotion of the followers of gurus who preached a back-to-the earth policy embodied in communal living. The book follows the evolution of some of the people born into a commune, as well as those who preached the virtues of the lifestyle.

This book was a strong four stars...up until the last third. Although I've never lived in a commune, the descriptions seemed spot on and quirkily charming. The characters were likeable and eminently believable. I knew ahead of time that the book skipped over Bit's early adulthood and that some reviewers didn't like that, but I thought there were enough descriptions of what had happened to the main characters that it was acceptable. I did get a little tired of the many different descriptions of the apparent emaciation of the most of the women in the book (thin, bony, whippet-thin, long and thin, thin and white...)

Where the book went sharply downhill was after Hannah becomes sick and Abe commits suicide, and bit returns to their cabin to care for Hannah. I thought it was like Groff got stuck and didn't know how to end the book, so she just kept going. I found Bit uncharacteristically cruel when he called Grete selfish for not wanting to switch schools in the middle of the year with no warning and go live with her ill and depressed grandmother in the house where her grandfather killed himself. I found the sudden conversion of the world into a pre-apocalypse (people fleeing the coast! Deadly diseases that run unchecked and kill in hours! Nobody cares about anybody else !) ridiculous - this was supposed to be 2018, not 2118 - and I was supremely irritated that it Helle's disappearance was never explained.

Arcadia is a rare book where all the elements come together: each character is someone you want to root for, the plot was cohesive and believable and yet contained surprises, and the language was gorgeous. I still would love to meet Bit in real life, give him a hug, be counted among his friends. I want to see "the twin towers" of Hannah and Astrid, I even want to hear Handy's music.

This is a book I'll read again and again.

There is some real technical mastery in this book, just in terms of craft. As well, and more importantly, there is a veritable dump truck load of heart, insight, compassion and wisdom. It's taut, yet poetic. It moves quickly yet never wants for depth. It's brimming with beautiful writing and powerful imagery. It's a great book. Read/buy easy, it doesn't disappoint.

I loved the monster's of templeton it was a page turner and I never lost interest. In Arcadia the beginning was interesting and than it just lost my interest. The characters did not remain interesting and unfortunely it just seemed like once they got into the mansion everything lost steam . would not suggest this book.

There us a certain complexity to this book, but only in he fact that even if one of the bad things about the book was good, the book would still be bad. I found myself thinking as I read the book "Please let this be over". (I read it for a book club) I wondered if I was fixing on the bad details because the plot was boring, or if the plot was a bit more interesting, would I begin to care about the characters. Was the lack of punctuation and lack of verb tense an attempt to reflect a certain "be-here-now" consciousness or had the author gotten bored with her own work and had simply ceased to care?

The Plot -- As far as I can tell the plot revolved around a bunch of people who went to live in the woods and had a diet overwhelmingly comprised of soy-based products. (Possible spoiler alert if you read further) Small wonder that at times the mother just stayed in bed for most of the day. Oh, and she's living in a bread truck with her husband, chores are divided up among gender lines, and everyone gets to stick their nose in your business. Well, that's about it. Except eventually they all move away -- back into the real world -- where Bip takes up photography. He gets a red light and steals money for chemicals and spends hours in the bathroom of their apartment. I don't know when he learns he also needs an enlarger but the reader must be left to imagine some things. Bip has a hard time finding love. He only has eyes for a skinny alcoholic drug addict who leaves him. But after years of obsessive pining for his one true love he finally dares to love a doctor who, in addition to being shorter than him, (Bip is short), also makes house calls.

Characters -- Nobody seems to know what the **** they're doing.

Style -- People saying things without punctuation marks. Sentences are put on the pages and sometimes the periods don't show up where most people would put one and the verbs are all present tense except once in awhile I read a sentence without one and wondered why. What was the difference between that one and the one I'm reading right now I say to myself.

Example at random -- (quotation marks are mine -author does not bother) "A shock: Bit hasn't understood until now: his parents are vastly different from one another." Think I'm being unfair? Any book has some meaningless verbiage. True. But here from another page which I swear I opened to totally at random. "He pushes back the words that were already sickly until they die on the bitter part of his tongue. They send bad tendrils into his chest. They heap, a toad, in the cave of his throat". I suppose I could figure out what that means, but look, I'm the reader. Why should I have to spend my time thinking about how tendrils heap and how that becomes kind of like a toad would be if it was not only in my throat but in the cave of my throat - and that one - the cave of my throat - I'm not sure where that is.

I haven't felt this understood by a book in a long time. Lauren Groff depicted life in a commune style community dead on. I felt like I was reading my 20's, and she is the same age as me. The author accurately captures the world of hope in building a better alternative society, and the host of problems that happen in reality- freezing in the winter, going hungry, attracting tons of unstable people, the loss of innocence by children at a very early age. Her descriptions of Hannah and Bit's bouts with depression are honest and true to life, as is her account of the death of a close family member to long term illness. Loving someone unreliable and how it tears you apart, living in a beautiful world that is also cruel and ugly, the shock of returning to the dominant culture. What can I say, the lady nailed it.

The writing is beautiful, but it continually gets in the way of telling a very interesting story. There is too much superfluous information blocking the flow of the narrative. The story is compelling enough that it becomes necessary to begin scanning the pages in order to find out what happens to the characters without getting bogged down by the excess information. In the last third of the novel, a pointless science fiction like pandemic is introduced. It pretty much ruins the end of the book. Having said all of that, there is still a beautiful story here with good writing and memorable characters. I would doubt, though, that this is headed for best seller land.

This book was the most overwritten book I have ever read. I had to read it for book club or I would have quit around page 10. Similes are a good tool when an author wants to make a statement but every sentence? Please! Does the author think we are too stupid to form an image in our own brain? She must because descriptions of everything are shoved down your throat. "It is as if all of their edges have bled a little into the space where Handy had been, the way seperate stews eke across the plate to mingle when the rice in the middle has been eaten". Every sentence is like that! The book would be about 20 pages long if you took out all of the "fluff". That would have suited me just fine.

Arcadia is a rare book where all the elements come together: each character is someone you want to root for, the plot was cohesive and believable and yet contained surprises, and the language was gorgeous. I still would love to meet Bit in real life, give him a hug, be counted among his friends. I want to see "the twin towers" of Hannah and Astrid, I even want to hear Handy's music.

This is a book I'll read again and again.

Great characterization, lovely feel for different times and places, and sensory descriptions all made for a very good read. Bit is one of those characters that will stay with me long after I have forgotten the plot. There were some loose ends at the end of the narrative, but I was not overly perturbed by them. All in all, a fine novel.

Arcadia is an absolutely brilliant novel, and Groff's grasp of language, and especially punctuation, is breathtaking. In some ways, this story fails to be placed into a category, but if it needs a categorization, I would say coming of age. I compare it to Catcher in the Rye here: [...]

... a mentor once told me. That said, one might save oneself 289 pages of fragmented, self-indulgence and know that the last line of the book is " ... and all is well in the world." If the author happens to read 1-Star reviews, then Lauren, you owe me for my patience.

The story line (plot) seemed to jump around a lot.. as tho the author was maybe one of the characters writing while high. Sometimes not making sense at all. Other times was very good. Seemed a little long and rambling.