Tag Archives: Anne Tyler

#BookReview ‘Ladder of Years’ by Anne Tyler #contemporary #family

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Ladder of Years is another fine character-led drama by Anne Tyler, one of my favourite authors. It is the story of Delia Grinstead who, in a moment of dissatisfaction with her life and relationships, goes for a walk on the beach and keeps on walking. Finding a niche in a small town, with hardly any money and possessions, Delia starts again. And when her family catch up with her and ask her why she left, she cannot find a way to explain. It is twenty-eight years since Ladder of Years was first published. It was chosen by Time magazine as one of the ten best books of 1995. Tyler had already been a Pulitzer Prize finalist in 1986 with The Accidental Tourist and won it in 1989 for Breathing Lessons. All her novels stand the test of time and can be read as if the action takes place today, so accurately is her finger on the portrayal of human emotion.
Adrift from her husband and three almost-adult children in Baltimore and not understanding why, Delia finally tips over the edge while on holiday. She finds herself in Bay Borough, the sort of small town where everyone knows everyone else’s business. She finds a job and a room to rent, buys a couple of secondhand work dresses and a nifty gadget to heat water in a cup so she can make an early morning cup of tea. Delia knows she should let her family know she is safe but is disinclined to do so, feeling she has been taken for granted. Inevitably, one of her sisters arrives on the doorstep. What follows is the story of a woman free for the first time, having married as a teenager and worked all that time as her doctor husband’s receptionist. Free from the expectations of others, she makes a circle of friends on her own terms.
This is a novel about middle-aged stasis and escape, about admitting the truth of one’s own life, choices and possibilities, and that there are no easy answers. Tyler’s characters are always so well-drawn and believable and her observations so wise and true, sometimes uncomfortably so. Here’s an example; ‘Didn’t it often happen, she thought, that aged parents die exactly at the moment when other people (your husband, your adolescent children) have stopped being thrilled to see you coming? But a parent is always thrilled, always dwells so lovingly on your face as you are speaking. One of life’s many ironies.’ Of course, Delia encounters other parent/child combinations in Bay Borough which challenge this theory.
Tyler’s novels deceive; seemingly about small domesticities and passage-of-life-events, they are really about the big, difficult questions we all face as we pass through different phases of life.
Excellent.

Read my reviews of these other books by Anne Tyler:-
A SPOOL OF BLUE THREAD
CLOCK DANCE
FRENCH BRAID
REDHEAD BY THE SIDE OF THE ROAD
VINEGAR GIRL

And read the first paragraphs of:-
DINNER AT THE HOMESICK RESTAURANT 
BACK WHEN WE WERE GROWN UPS

If you like this, try:-
‘Olive Kitteridge’ by Elizabeth Strout
‘Mothering Sunday’ by Graham Swift
‘The Stars are Fire’ by Anita Shreve

And if you’d like to tweet a link to THIS post, here’s my suggested tweet:
#Bookreview LADDER OF YEARS by Anne Tyler https://wp.me/p5gEM4-49S via @SandraDanby

#BookReview ‘French Braid’ by Anne Tyler #contemporary #family

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Anne Tyler writes about everyday relationships with a sharp eye and a silken pen, choosing subjects which to people who have never read her may appear boring or worthless. Her books are never boring. French Braid, her 24th novel is, like all the others, about people, individuals and their families, ordinary people who become so familiar they could be real. Anne TylerWe first meet college students Serena and James, on the train returning to Baltimore from a Thanksgiving visit to James’s parents in Philadelphia. They’re in love and think they know each other well but this visit has highlighted differences in their experience of family and childhood and the expectations each has of how their own family will be in the future. Not all families are alike, they discover. After this shortish section, Tyler settles into the main story of Mercy and Robin – Serena’s grandparents – and their three children Alice, Lily and David through births, marriages and deaths from the 1950s to today.
The Garretts think themselves an awkward family, aware they’re not perfect – as Robin thinks when preparing for his and Mercy’s fiftieth wedding anniversary party, ‘Oh, the lengths this family would go to so as not to spoil the picture of how things were supposed to be!’ But in fact they’re being themselves, getting along together in the way that suits them, dealing with what life throws at them.
There’s a brief scene in the kitchen between sisters Alice and Lily as the family gathers at Easter to meet David’s new friend, Greta. They’re setting out food for lunch when their mis-communications and misunderstandings are laid bare. Hilarious lines – ‘Was bottled mayonnaise not a good thing?’ – are typical Tyler and made me smile. It’s a classic way of showing how two sisters can be so unalike but still rub along together. Tyler has such a deceptively simple way with words, summarising sprawling emotions so concisely that I want to write it down to enjoy again later.
Tyler examines how each family finds its own way through life. Not all siblings are best friends, not all spouses live in each other’s pockets. There is no right way or wrong way of being a family. Close-knit families may find looser-knit families cold or odd, but may in turn themselves seem claustrophobic and cliquey to outsiders. Neither is odd, simply different. Everyone muddles through the best they can. The trick to being part of a family, in Tyler’s world, is to adapt. Allow individuals to be themselves and accept annoying traits, awkward memories and uncomfortable truths along with the happy memories and shared laughter as part of a family’s mosaic.

Read my reviews of these other books by Anne Tyler:-
A SPOOL OF BLUE THREAD
CLOCK DANCE
LADDER OF YEARS
REDHEAD BY THE SIDE OF THE ROAD
VINEGAR GIRL

And read the first paragraphs of:-
DINNER AT THE HOMESICK RESTAURANT 
BACK WHEN WE WERE GROWN UPS

If you like this, try:-
‘At Mrs Lippincote’s’ by Elizabeth Taylor
‘The Goldfinch’ by Donna Tartt
‘The Pull of the Stars’ by Emma Donoghue

And if you’d like to tweet a link to THIS post, here’s my suggested tweet:
#BookReview FRENCH BRAID by Anne Tyler https://wp.me/p5gEM4-5PV via @SandraDanby

#BookReview ‘Redhead by the Side of the Road’ by Anne Tyler #literary

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Anne Tyler is one of my favourite writers, so elegantly understated, so spot-on with her characters. Her latest Redhead by the Side of the Road is slim, at 180 pages, but a delight. Why? Because she writes about what it is like to be human, the everyday things, the ticks, the habits, the way we are and the subtle ways we change. Anne TylerHers are not plot-driven page-turning books, they are thoughtful portraits of people who seem to be like us – they chop vegetables and mop the kitchen floor, like Micah Mortimer, an unmarried 44 year old self-employed IT specialist and janitor of his apartment block. His family teases him about his finicky household habits and he accepts the teasing with good grace. He is infinitely patient with his elderly clients, going round to reboot computers and routers. No scene is wasted in this novella. I particularly loved Micah’s visit to new client Rosalie Hayes who has inherited a house, and computer, from her grandmother. Rosalie cannot find her grandmother’s passwords and is tearing her hair out. This is how we see Micah’s world, through his interactions with neighbours, family, clients, girlfriend Cass and a stranger who turns up on his doorstep – the student son of Micah’s old college girlfriend. Brink’s arrival precipitates change.
Because we see and come to understand Micah’s thought processes, we see how he misunderstands Cass and fails to say the right thing. And we see him find the right thing to say to student Brink who knocks on Micah’s door under a misapprehension and stays because of a problem he cannot express. It is Micah’s gentle nature which finally reveals Brink’s difficulties. Anne Tyler is brilliant at creating characters who, whether you love them or hate them, make you want to read about their story.
A definite 5*. A book you will read and enjoy, wanting to get to the end while at the same time wishing it would last longer.

Read my reviews of these other books by Anne Tyler:-
A SPOOL OF BLUE THREAD
CLOCK DANCE
FRENCH BRAID
LADDER OF YEARS
VINEGAR GIRL

And read the first paragraphs of:-
DINNER AT THE HOMESICK RESTAURANT 
BACK WHEN WE WERE GROWN UPS 

If you like this, try:-
‘A Wreath of Roses’ by Elizabeth Taylor
‘Brooklyn’ by Colm Tóibín
‘A Sudden Light’ by Garth Stein

And if you’d like to tweet a link to THIS post, here’s my suggested tweet:
#BookReview REDHEAD BY THE SIDE OF THE ROAD by Anne Tyler https://wp.me/p5gEM4-4Di via @SandraDanby

#BookReview ‘Clock Dance’ by Anne Tyler #contemporary #family

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Every novel by Anne Tyler is a treat, I save them up, anticipate them. For me as a reader, she tells stories that seem ordinary but have exceptional depth, gentle stories which make me want to continue reading on into the night. For me as a writer, it is her I aim to emulate; her economy of word and scene, achieving depth without unnecessary diversion. So, to Clock Dance. Anne Tyler Told in three parts – 1967, 1977 and 2017 – this is the story of an ordinary woman, Willa Drake, to whom things outside normal life don’t happen. The three key events in her life – the disappearance of her mother, a marriage proposal, being widowed at 41 – are passive acts. Willa is not a proactive person. We meet her first as an eleven year-old, at home with her family; her emotionally-erratic mother, her passive, lovely father, her awkward younger sister Elaine. Willa takes on the motherly role, making a chocolate pudding, observing the ups and downs of her parents’ relationship with acute asides. At college, her boyfriend proposes to her and expects her to give up college and move across the country. In 2017, a confused phone call from the neighbour of her son’s ex-girlfriend sets in motion a chain of events that sees Willa gain a substitute grand-daughter but endanger her own marriage. Each time, Willa reacts to other people.
In Baltimore Willa and her second husband Peter move in with Denise who has been shot, and Denise’s nine-year-old daughter Cheryl and dog Airplane. It is an everyday story of a household, hospital visits, neighbours and community. Tyler’s observations of daily life are so spot-on, she tells the story in a way that makes it seem real, not a literary invention involving toil, plotting and rewriting. Without you noticing, time passes and people change so subtly it is impossible to put a finger on the point when the change started. Simple, complex, hugely perceptive.
This is a novel about meekly accepting your place in the world until the day arrives that you realise life is passing you by. Does Willa have the courage to find a new life? I was urging her on all the way. A 5* book for me.

Read my reviews of these other books by Anne Tyler:-
A SPOOL OF BLUE THREAD
FRENCH BRAID
LADDER OF YEARS
REDHEAD BY THE SIDE OF THE ROAD
VINEGAR GIRL

And read the first paragraphs of:-
DINNER AT THE HOMESICK RESTAURANT 
BACK WHEN WE WERE GROWN UPS

If you like this, try:-
‘Autumn’ by Ali Smith
‘The Stars are Fire’ by Anita Shreve
‘The Gustav Sonata’ by Rose Tremain

And if you’d like to tweet a link to THIS post, here’s my suggested tweet:
#BookReview CLOCK DANCE by Anne Tyler https://wp.me/p5gEM4-3J9 via @SandraDanby

Great Opening Paragraph 92… ‘Back When we were Grown-Ups’ #amreading #FirstPara

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“Once upon a time, there was a woman who discovered she had turned into the wrong person.

She was fifty-three years old by then – a grandmother. Wide and soft and dimpled, with two short wings of dry, fair hair flaring almost horizontally from a center part. Laugh lines at the corners of her eyes. A loose and colourful style of dress edging dangerously close to Bag Lady.

Give her credit: most people her age would say it was too late to make any changes. What’s done is done, they would say. No use trying to alter things at this late date.

It did occur to Rebecca to say that. But she didn’t.”
Anne TylerFrom ‘Back When We Were Grown-Ups’ by Anne Tyler

Here’s the #FirstPara of DINNER AT THE HOMESICK RESTAURANT, also by Anne Tyler.

Read my reviews of these other novels by Anne Tyler:-
A SPOOL OF BLUE THREAD 
CLOCK DANCE
FRENCH BRAID
LADDER OF YEARS
REDHEAD BY THE SIDE OF THE ROAD
VINEGAR GIRL

Try one of these #FirstParas & discover a new author:-
‘Couples’ by John Updike 
‘Jack Maggs’ by Peter Carey 
‘Norwegian Wood’ by Haruki Murakami 

And if you’d like to tweet a link to THIS post, here’s my suggested tweet:
#Books #FirstPara BACK WHEN WE WERE GROWN-UPS by Anne Tyler http://wp.me/p5gEM4-1Tg via @SandraDanby 

#BookReview ‘Vinegar Girl’ by Anne Tyler #Shakespeare #contemporary

6 Replies

I love Anne Tyler’s writing. It is so simple and under-stated. She lets you slip so easily into the head and the world of her characters. This is her re-working of Shakespeare’s The Taming of the Shrew. Generally I dislike these artificial re-writes, but I made an exception for Tyler. After this, I may try some of the others. Anne Tyler Kate is a pre-school teaching assistant and housekeeper for her distracted scientist father and teenage sister. She is dissatisfied with her life, can never seem to get things right, but doesn’t know how to change things. Admonished by her headmistress for being too frank with her young charges, she is not in the best of moods when her father introduces her to his lab assistant, Pytor. He seems a lumbering foreigner and Kate does not understand her father’s eagerness that they meet. Pytor has a problem, his work visa is about to expire and he must leave the country. Kate’s father is frantic, he simply cannot lose his irreplaceable assistant or his research project into autoimmune disorders will fail when it is so near success. What happens next is predictable except Tyler turns Shakespeare’s tale of Katherina and Petruchio into a modern tale about tolerance and freedom, without the overtones of ‘man tames untameable woman’.

Read my reviews of these other books by Anne Tyler:-
A SPOOL OF BLUE THREAD
CLOCK DANCE
FRENCH BRAID
LADDER OF YEARS
REDHEAD BY THE SIDE OF THE ROAD

And read the first paragraphs of:-
DINNER AT THE HOMESICK RESTAURANT 
BACK WHEN WE WERE GROWN UPS 

If you like this, try:-
‘Some Luck’ by Jane Smiley
‘Housekeeping’ by Marilynne Robinson
‘My Name is Lucy Barton’ by Elizabeth Strout

#BookReview VINEGAR GIRL by Anne Tyler via @SandraDanby http://wp.me/p5gEM4-2bj

Great Opening Paragraph 82… ‘Dinner at the Homesick Restaurant’ #amreading #FirstPara

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“While Pearl Tull was dying, a funny thought occurred to her. It twitched her lips and rustled her breath, and she felt her son lean forward from where he kept watch by her bed. “Get…” she told him. “You should have got…”
Anne TylerFrom ‘Dinner at the Homesick Restaurant’ by Anne Tyler

Here’s the #FirstPara of BACK WHEN WE WERE GROWN UPS, also by Anne Tyler.

Read my reviews of these other novels by Anne Tyler:-
A SPOOL OF BLUE THREAD 
CLOCK DANCE
FRENCH BRAID
LADDER OF YEARS
REDHEAD BY THE SIDE OF THE ROAD
VINEGAR GIRL

Try one of these #FirstParas & discover a new author:-
‘The Philosopher’s Pupil’ by Iris Murdoch 
‘Mara and Dann’ by Doris Lessing 
‘Affinity’ by Sarah Waters

And if you’d like to tweet a link to THIS post, here’s my suggested tweet:
#Books #FirstPara DINNER AT THE HOMESICK RESTAURANT by Anne Tyler http://wp.me/p5gEM4-1Tb via @SandraDanby

#BookReview ‘A Spool of Blue Thread’ by Anne Tyler #contemporary

9 Replies

What do you think of when you think of novelist Anne Tyler? For me, it is The Accidental Tourist, Breathing Lessons, Dinner at the Homesick Restaurant. It is quite a list. So I enjoyed the anticipation of reading her latest, A Spool of Blue Thread. What do I expect? Family, no-one writes about family like she does. Anne Tyler I became wrapped in the story of Abby and Red Whitshank and their four children Denny, Stem, Jeanie and Amanda. Abby was the character that fascinated me, we see her first as a mother in 1994 when Red takes a strange phone call from Denny who is living who knows where. They don’t know whether to believe Denny, whether to worry about him, Abby tries to empathize, Red says there is such a thing as being ‘too understanding’. And so the Whitshank story slowly unfolds like a dropped spool of blue thread running across the floor. We hear the story of Red’s father, Junior, a carpenter, who built the house Abby and Red now live in, we hear about Linnie Mae, Red’s mother and her love affair with Junie. The history of this family is in their bones, and in the bones of the house where they live. But Abby and Red are getting old now, and managing in this large house is becoming fraught with incident.
Anne Tyler dissects the structure of the family, how they become who they are, how the memories and misunderstandings from childhood and adolescence filter through to adulthood and shape mature viewpoints. And how all of this affects the Whitshanks’ relationships with each other, and the outside world.

Read my reviews of these other books by Anne Tyler:-
CLOCK DANCE
FRENCH BRAID
LADDER OF YEARS
REDHEAD BY THE SIDE OF THE ROAD
VINEGAR GIRL

And read the first paragraphs of:-
DINNER AT THE HOMESICK RESTAURANT 
BACK WHEN WE WERE GROWN UPS 

If you like this, try:-
‘A Thousand Acres’ by Jane Smiley
‘Housekeeping’ by Marilynne Robinson
‘My Name is Lucy Barton’ by Elizabeth Strout

And if you’d like to tweet a link to THIS post, here’s my suggested tweet:
#BookReview A SPOOL OF BLUE THREAD by Anne Tyler via @SandraDanby http://wp.me/p5gEM4-1xH