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The Big House A Century in the Life of an American Summer Home George Howe Colt 9780743249645 Books

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The Big House A Century in the Life of an American Summer Home George Howe Colt 9780743249645 Books

The full title of this National Book Award winner is important. It is "The Big House: A Century in the Life of an American Summer Home," and while it is most definitely about this 8,000-square foot summer mansion built in 1903 on 13 acres with 19 rooms (26 counting the bathrooms and included in that 11 bedrooms) on Wings Neck, Cape Cod, it is even more about the generations of people who summered there.

Author George Howe Colt started coming to the Big House as a child in the 1950s. He writes with love about this rather run-down place that was so enchanting for a young boy, telling the history of the house and his ancestors who built it.

But he gradually peels the layers of the story like an onion so before long we find out the very human story of this family, which seems perfect on the outside but is just like the rest of us close up. In 1967, something happens to the Colt family--and they are never the same. It is here we meet the real people with their heartbreaking problems: alcoholism, mental illness, marital woes and family estrangement.

If you have ever had the fortune to spend time in a summer home or wondered who lived in those big houses--be it on Cape Cod or anywhere else in the United States--read this book. Highly recommended!


Tags : The Big House: A Century in the Life of an American Summer Home [George Howe Colt] on Amazon.com. *FREE* shipping on qualifying offers. <b>National Book Award Finalist and a New York Times </i>Notable Book of the Year</b><BR> <BR>Faced with the sale of the century-old family summer house on Cape Cod where he had spent forty-two summers,George Howe Colt,The Big House: A Century in the Life of an American Summer Home,Scribner,074324964X,Customs & Traditions,Reference,Cape Cod (Mass.),Cape Cod (Mass.) - Social life and customs,Cape Cod (Mass.);Social life and customs.,Colt family,Colt, George Howe,Historic buildings - Massachusetts - Cape Cod,Historic buildings;Massachusetts;Cape Cod.,Vacation homes - Massachusetts - Cape Cod,Vacation homes;Massachusetts;Cape Cod.,BIOGRAPHY & AUTOBIOGRAPHY Personal Memoirs,Biography,Biography Autobiography,Cape Cod,General & world history,HISTORY United States 20th Century,HOUSE & HOME General,Historic buildings,HistoryUnited States - State & Local - New England (CT, MA, ME, NH, RI, VT),House & Home Reference,Massachusetts,Personal Memoirs,Social Science,Social Science Customs & Traditions,Social history,Sociology,Theory of architecture,United States - State & Local - New England,United States Local History,Vacation homes,World history: from c 1900 -,george howe colt; cape cod; summer home; memories; family; house; home; wings neck; ancestral; history; tradition; generations; past; exploration; mysteries; ancestors; century; american; childhood; life; national book award finalist; new york times notable book,BIOGRAPHY & AUTOBIOGRAPHY Personal Memoirs,HISTORY United States 20th Century,HOUSE & HOME General,HistoryUnited States - State & Local - New England (CT, MA, ME, NH, RI, VT),House & Home Reference,Personal Memoirs,Social Science Customs & Traditions,United States - State & Local - New England,Biography Autobiography,Biography,Cape Cod,Historic buildings,Massachusetts,Vacation homes,United States Local History,Social Science,Sociology,General & world history,Social history,Theory of architecture,World history: from c 1900 -

The Big House A Century in the Life of an American Summer Home George Howe Colt 9780743249645 Books Reviews

Such a great read. It did leave me wondering if the family members felt that they were on vacation while using the house and didn't pay as much attention to work that needed to be done over the years. And is the old Yankee habit of save it save it save it just an excuse not to spend the time to
assess what is there and catalogue/donate/pitch things??? Whatever, it is amazing that one family could keep a large home in one piece and in their possession for nearly 100 years. I have to hand it to them.
I picked out this book for my because it seemed like an appropriate choice for reading during my annual stay at the family summer cottage, where I have been going for over 50 years since early childhood. It was indeed. My own "big house" is a relatively small cottage, and it is in northern Michigan rather than Cape Cod (an area I've never visited). (On the other hand, coincidentally, the "big house" and the cottage were both first built in the same year, 1903.) Nonetheless, I almost felt as if I had lived parts of the story along with the author. The tendency to regard the summer home as more my "real" home than any of the places I've actually lived most of the year... the urge to try to hold back time by keeping the cottage and its surroundings as much unchanged as possible... the mixture of happy and sometimes sad family memories associated with the place... the issues as different family members try to share the cottage on an equitable basis, and the concerns about whether the family will remain financially able to retain the property... all these have been part of my experience as well as the author's. And as a result, the central "story line" as to whether in the present day the "big house" will have to be sold and torn down, or whether the family can somehow save it, generated more suspense for me than many a fictional story involving the fate of the world. (On the other hand, I suppose to someone who has never had the experience of sharing a summer home of this sort, the story told here might seem less meaningful and even insignificant compared to the more life-and-death type problems faced by some people. I sometimes have to remind myself, when I feel bad about not being able to spend as much time at the Michigan cottage or take part in as many activities there as I would like, that others would have grounds to envy me for being able to go there at all.)
While I love the idea of a family summer home, especially one in Cape Cod, the first half of this book was so dull that I almost gave up on it. It's another memoir where the author seems to think a general public reader will be totally fascinated by his or her family for some reason or another. Thus, no detail is left out about anything or anyone. The second half of the book fortunately was more interesting, but there still were problems with too many details, as well as invasion of privacy matters.

Really, does anyone want their mental and physical deterioration in old age described in detail in a memoir by a family member? I seriously doubt it. Yet dead individuals apparently have no privacy rights where memoirs are concerned. Moreover, why in the world do some memoirists think readers want to read such descriptions? Yes, it's reality, but that doesn't make it either interesting or tasteful. Or marital problems. In some memoirs there are reasons such problems need to be brought up, but not in this one.

The strength of this memoir is found in the thoughts and feelings of the beginning and end of summer, and in the thoughts and feelings of possibly having to give up a family summer home that's been in the family forever. Mr. Colt excels there, but, once again, he repeatedly marred the good parts of the story with way too many details. It's like he doesn't know when to shut up and let readers soak in what he wrote. He must throw in more and more details, as well as more and more descriptions of what everyone in the family was thinking and doing. Honestly, the Big House and the Colt family were not that intriguing.
There's no doubt Holt is a talented writer. I'm always a sucker for a well-turned phrase and acute observation, which is why I slogged through this overly-long and detailed tome. About half way through the book it occurred to me that he should have saved the long version for his extended family and taken a red pencil to the published work.

I read this on a and kept wondering if there were maps, photos, blueprints or a family tree in the print version. I would have welcomed all since at times I felt like I was reading a Russian novel.

I love the concept of the book and appreciate the intricacies of the story. A bit more editing would have helped me be able to recommend it.
The full title of this National Book Award winner is important. It is "The Big House A Century in the Life of an American Summer Home," and while it is most definitely about this 8,000-square foot summer mansion built in 1903 on 13 acres with 19 rooms (26 counting the bathrooms and included in that 11 bedrooms) on Wings Neck, Cape Cod, it is even more about the generations of people who summered there.

Author George Howe Colt started coming to the Big House as a child in the 1950s. He writes with love about this rather run-down place that was so enchanting for a young boy, telling the history of the house and his ancestors who built it.

But he gradually peels the layers of the story like an onion so before long we find out the very human story of this family, which seems perfect on the outside but is just like the rest of us close up. In 1967, something happens to the Colt family--and they are never the same. It is here we meet the real people with their heartbreaking problems alcoholism, mental illness, marital woes and family estrangement.

If you have ever had the fortune to spend time in a summer home or wondered who lived in those big houses--be it on Cape Cod or anywhere else in the United States--read this book. Highly recommended!