Review of The Little Giant of Aberdeen County

A Look at Tiffany Baker's Colourful Debut Novel

Jan 26, 2010
Andree Lachapelle

The Little Giant of Aberdeen County - Photo courtesy Hachette Book Group

Some stories hook you and drag you in with the very first sentence, and so it is with Tiffany Baker's first book, The Little Giant of Aberdeen County.

With her first novel, author Tiffany Baker turns a small town in New York State into a world filled with magic and wonder. The story revolves around the giant of the title, Truly Plaice, a very big little girl who grows up to become larger than life.

Synopsis

Earl Plaice and his wife Lily already have a beautiful daughter, Serena Jane, when Lily learns that she is not only pregnant, but also afflicted by a malignant tumour. As the months progress, Lily grows so huge that the town’s doctor – the last in a long line of physicians named Robert Morgan – thinks she must be pregnant with twins. However, much to everyone’s surprise, he soon finds out that Lily is bearing one child only… and even more shocking, this behemoth of a baby turns out to be a girl.

As a result of her mother’s dying words, the child ends up being named “Truly.” Having this unlikely moniker as a first name is the least of her worries.

Life is not easy for our heroine. Her sister is an angelic beauty who seems to have been born under a lucky star, while her father, barely scraping by as the town barber, soon grows embittered after the death of his wife. Not only is he ill equipped to raise two daughters on his own, but Truly’s size turns out to be a challenge for everyone. Many of the town’s denizens treat her very existence as a mind-boggling problem that needs to be solved, and those who fail to see a solution quickly give up on Truly. The strange paradox of Truly’s life is that her sheer volume makes her invisible.

As she moves throughout the story and the town’s history with an unsuspected grace, Truly grows older and wiser, and her life becomes tightly entwined with the town's folklore and its many colourful characters. In the end, we see that Truly is a force to be reckoned with, and her physical fortitude is no match for her strength of character.

Truly’s story becomes a parable for how we deal with life, and death. She is “a kind of spirit-guide of mortality,” says the author, “who is also constantly reminding us that life is a feast.”

The Little Giant of Aberdeen County is a feast in and of itself. Tiffany Baker shows us that wonderful things can be found in the most unlikely of places, and magic is everywhere – for better or for worse.

About the Author

Tiffany Baker lives in Marin County, California with her husband and three young children – two girls and a boy. The Little Giant of Aberdeen County is her first novel.

Sources

For more information about this and other great novels, visit the Hachette Book Group website. To find out more about the author, visit Tiffany Baker’s official website.