Lake Country

Praise / Awards

• "These 'Journeys' are to twenty-one points around Michigan, from Ann Arbor to Drummond Island. As usual, Stocking is surprising, charming and insightful—no matter where she turns up."
  —Detroit Monthly
  
• "Ruminating about life out her back window, Stocking has forged an outlook that focuses on the small, familiar, yet invaluable connections in our lives."
  —Chuck Moss, Detroit News
  
• "For Stocking, island life is a welcome anachronism, and she records its rhythms lovingly: the daily arrivals and departures at ferry landings; the seasonal wax and wane of the population; and the distinctions that separate natives from outsiders and the islands themselves from the mainland. A constant is the author's own introspection, an earnest self-examination that only seldom wears thin as she interweaves personal history with more far-reaching questions about society, fate, democracy, morality, and the nature of God and the universe."
  —Kirkus Reviews
  
• "Kathleen Stocking's new book Lake Country is like a fine wine—it should be savored awhile, swallowed slowly and remembered fondly, preferably as a lingering blaze crackles and pops from a nearby fireplace. . . . It's a great feeling to relax and enjoy the efforts of a gentle but highly skilled essayist who cares deeply about the slowly vanishing rural lands and the headstrong, resolute people who live there."
  —Ray Walsh, Lansing State Journal
  
• "This well-written tour of the fringe areas of Michigan is recommended wherever good, literature travel books are requested and is essential for regional collections."
  —Library Journal
  
• ". . . Stocking's images mirror herself and her soul and her beloved northern Michigan. Not since Bruce Catton has there been a writer of such poetic place."
  —Prime Time News
  
• ". . . twenty-one lucid essays that tightly weave together nature, spirituality and humanity's connection to each."
  —Publishers Weekly
  
• "[Stocking's] latest book proves that there is much worth exploring, both in northern Michigan and in ourselves, and encourages us to take pride in our individual gifts, as well as those of our neighbors. It's an inspiring, thought-provoking, and refreshing volume."
  —Sault Sunday (Sault Ste. Marie, Michigan)
  
• ". . . there are solid, midwestern virtues here: a keen eye, an unassuming tone, a sensibility that refuses to pontificate, and an intelligence that respects "otherness" while rejoicing in signs of human connection."
  —Wilson Library Bulletin