Emily Louise

It is 1945 in Saskatoon, Saskatchewan. Only 29, Theresa Freidmann has lain in a hospital bed, crippled with arthritis, for five years. Emily Louise is the new nurse's aide at St. Anne's Home for the Chronically Ill and the Aged. What follows is a familiar story--the crotchety invalid resents the brusque ministrations and endless chatter of the young, opinionated, irrepressible Emily Louise, who stubbornly drags her back from despair. In return, Emily Louise gains direction in her own life and learns to accept her personal losses. The fusty heartwarming plot and some unfortunate generalizations (Emily Louise, of Scotch-Irish descent, is redheaded, freckled and uses expression like ``my pretty''; while the Jewish Pap Freidmann is mentioned mainly for his shrewdness about business) do not cancel the book's strength: the author knows the workings and atmosphere of a Catholic hospital firsthand and depicts them ably. Beam (who wrote Emily Louise and two other unpublished novels before she died young in 1961) was a physical therapist and a dental assistant in Canada. There is the occasional comic episode and character (notably the scheming lawyer, Mr. Dickey), but it is in her depiction of the rounds of life, death and healing among nuns and patients of St. Anne's that Beam's simple narrative turns luminous. (Apr.)