Product Description

In this best-selling novel, Patrick Smith tells the story of three generations of the MacIveys, a Florida family who battle the hardships of the frontier to rise from a dirt-poor Cracker life to the wealth and standing of real estate tycoons. The story opens in 1858, when Tobias MacIvey arrives in the Florida wilderness to start a new life with his wife and infant son, and ends two generations later with Solomon MacIvey, who realizes that the land has been exploited far beyond human need. The sweeping story that emerges is a rich, rugged Florida history featuring a memorable cast of crusty, indomitable Crackers battling wild animals, rustlers, Confederate deserters, mosquitoes, starvation, hurricanes, and freezes to carve a kingdom out of a swamp. But their most formidable adversary turns out to be greed, including finally their own. Love and tenderness are here too: the hopes and passions of each new generation, friendships with the persecuted blacks and Indians, and respect for the land and its wildlife. A Land Remembered was winner of the Florida Historical Society Tebeau Prize as the Most Outstanding Florida Historical Novel.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #8371 in Books
• Published on: 1996-09-01
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 404 pages

Customer Reviews

A Saga of Florida's Growth
Few who speed along I-4 and enjoy the air-conditioned comfort of the Florida as we know it, give a passing thought to what our state was like before the rapid development of recent decades. Even those who have the occasional black bear in their back yards forget how close to the wild Florida we are and buy into the myth that there was nothing here before Disney. If you have not yet read a novel about early Florida History, this is the book for you.

Author Patrick Smith depicts the life of early Florida pioneers, the Macleveys. From hacking their first rude cabin out of the underbrush to daunting cattle drives down to the Gulf, this best-selling novel, brings to life three generations of a Florida family. They brave frontier hardships that are similar to those of the Wild West and as they tame the land, their understanding of it changes.

The novel ranges from 1858, when the first MacIeveys come to Florida, through 1968, with their grandson in his old age. They endure interaction with Civil War deserters and forge friendships with Native Floridians. They face threats from the weather--dealing with the same kinds of hurricanes and freezes that still shape Florida living today. The main characters are presented in an engaging fashion, as they wrest their future from the land, and make successful transitions from cattle to orange groves to real estate development that characterize the growth of Florida's prosperity. The narrative flows easily and the story holds new adventures on every page. Having read this novel, you may feel drawn to learn more about the pre-Mouse Florida.

Some of your children may have read this book since a teacher's manual is available for it to teach language arts, social studies, and science in conjunction with the Sunshine State Standards of the Florida Department of Education. If you do not know the derivation of the term "Crackers" for long-time Floridians, this book will tell you. Patrick D. Smith, is a multiple award winning author; he is a native of Mendenhall, Mississippi and came to Florida in 1966. "A Land Remembered" is his sixth novel.

A Land Remembered
This is an excellent book. We're not sure if it's such a page turner because we're from Florida or because it's exciting and informative and interesting but either way, every single person we've turned on to it has liked it.

A WONDERFUL PAGE TURNER, I COULD NOT SET IT DOWN
This was one of my bedtime books, it keep me up until the wee hours of the morning for several nights. It was such a great read. From the start of modern South Florida with McIvey to the step into old Florida with his family starting new, this book is as close as it gets to real life in the old south and drives the stake home on how we have forever changed the face of Florida. During my genealogy research one of my relatives suggested that I should read it and WOW what a surprise. I could not read a page without comparing the lives we live today with how they lived back then.