Idaho Commission for Libraries

Housekeeping (1981), Marilynne Robinson’s best-selling novel, tells the story of two orphaned girls who grow up under the care of their grandmother, then their two fumbling great-aunts after their grandmother dies, and finally, when the aunts flee, their mother’s transient sister. Through Ruth, the central character, we discover that "Loneliness is a absolute state," but we also discover her housekeeping grandmother, who "would scan the shores to see how nearly the state of grace resembled the state of Idaho."

Robinson, who lives in Massachusetts, spent childhood summers with her grandparents in Coeur d'Alene and received her PhD from the University of Washington. This 1982 novel, her first, won the Ernest Hemingway Foundation award and was nominated for a Pulitzer Prize.

Book Reviews of Marilyne Robinson's Housekeeping

"Book reviews: Housekeeping" The Horn Book Magazine. April 1982 v 58 p. 199

"Book reviews: Housekeeping" Commonweal May 22, 1981 v.108 p. 306.

"Book reviews: Housekeeping" The Nation. Feb 7, 1981 v 232 p. 152

"Book reviews: Housekeeping" The New Yorker. March 23, 1981 v 57 p. 157

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