The Excellent Lombards by Jane Hamilton

As the second generation growing up on a Wisconsin apple orchard, Mary Francis Lombard has a contented life full of farming and extended family. She can't imagine a different life, or even one she'd prefer.

The child narrator of this adult fiction novel offers a unique perspective on the family and business of the orchard - she sees the world through a kid-shaped window and often doesn't necessarily understand what she sees and hears. She's precocious and curious about the grown-ups but often believes her own fictions rather than the truth. The adult relationships around her take on a fuzziness; they're less important than the make-believe war between cousins or the wonder of a new teacher.

This is a quiet novel of rich characters and small dramas. There's a lot of family and almost-family at the orchard - it's practically a commune and various relatives share several houses on the farm. There's also a caring, tough female "hired man" who suffers a great and terrible love story.

I loved this book, and since I have friends who own an orchard I understood more than I otherwise might have about the seasonality of the work to be done. The small dramas of the story make for a quiet novel about family and growing up, and an overall excellent read.

The Orchardist by Amanda Coplin

Family doesn't have to be inherited - sometimes you piece and patch together a family of people you love and who love you. In this emotional literary novel, when two bedraggled and practically feral preteen girls - both pregnant - appear in the orchard of a solitary farming man, he chooses to act from his heart and help the girls.

Talmadge is an isolated farmer, tending his fruit trees alone in the mountains of Washington. His family is gone, and his few friends are enough. But the girls need help, and he can help them; it's just that simple. And while their relationship isn't ordinary, they form a family of sorts over time.

There's a lot unsaid in this book - every character is a still pool of dark water. I'd expected a straight-forward historical novel (this book was chosen by our book discussion group at the library), but I was pleasantly surprised almost from the start by the complex characters and drama that takes place.

I enjoyed the casual unspooling of time across the story - weeks pass slowly as the story unfolds, then it accelerates and several years pass in a heartbeat. A large part of the book takes place in a single year, then a decade zooms past. It's unsettling, but also feels right for the story.