Binding: Mass Market Paperback
Publisher: The Trumpet Club Special Edition
Date Published: 1989
ISBN-13:9780440841166ISBN:044084116X
Description: Acceptable. Overall below average used book. May have highlighting, underlining, notes, price sticker on cover, or be an ex-library book. read more
Binding: Hardcover
Publisher: Reader's Digest Association
Date Published: 1989-01
ISBN-13:9780895773289ISBN:0895773287
Description: Good. Book will be packaged with care for a safe journey! Pages look great, but missing dust jacket. *** 13 Years of online selling experience! ! **** Customer satisfaction guaranteed! read more
Binding: Softcover
Publisher: Harper Perennial Modern Classics
ISBN-13:9780060736262ISBN:0060736267
Description: Fair. Purchasing this book supports the King County Library System Foundation. Thriftbooks and KCLSF have partnered to help raise additional funds for the library system. Ex-Library book-will contain library markings. Millions of satisfied customers and climbing. Thriftbooks is the name you can trust, guaranteed. Spend Less. Read More. read more
Description: Good. Light shelf wear and minimal interior marks. Millions of satisfied customers and climbing. Thriftbooks is the name you can trust, guaranteed. Spend Less. Read More. read more
Description: Good. Light shelf wear and minimal interior marks. Millions of satisfied customers and climbing. Thriftbooks is the name you can trust, guaranteed. Spend Less. Read More. read more
Description: Very Good. 0060801263 1988 printing of great old book. Former seller stamped inside cover and former owner wrote name on flyleaf. No other marking to textblock, page ends or inside cover. Cover has creasing at spine from reading and gentle edge/corner wear including corner bumps. read more
Description: Very Good. Great condition for a used book! Minimal wear. Shipped to over one million happy customers. Your purchase benefits world literacy! read more
Description: Good. Shows some signs of wear, and may have some markings on the inside. Shipped to over one million happy customers. Your purchase benefits world literacy! read more
Description: Good. Shows some signs of wear, and may have some markings on the inside. Shipped to over one million happy customers. Your purchase benefits world literacy! read more
"I had to read this novel for a high school english class, and I am so happy for it. It is the ultimate story of empowerment, told by a young girl no less! Thinking about Francie's strength through troubled times has helped me find my own strength, and I highly recommend this work to anyone whom tough times have ever befallen."
"The last book I read in 2008, and what a book! The prose is heartbreakingly beautiful, and the story is very sad -- but still hopeful and uplifting. There is a nice mixture of humor and love as well and it made me nostalgic for a time and place I've never experienced. I can't think of a coming of age book that has touched me this much, I seriously burst into tears three or four times while reading it. I wonder if I would have felt differently if I'd read it in school, or when I was the same age as the protagonist.
The story follows a few generations of a dirt poor family living in a Brooklyn tenement from 1902 to 1919, but focuses mainly on Francie Nolan, a thoughtful, intelligent and lonely girl who loves to read and write. There were several passages that nearly made me gasp because they were so painful and dead-on, and I think they'll stick with me for a long time. Within the first page, I was giddy over the descriptions and poignant style.
"There's a tree that grows in Brooklyn. Some people call it the Tree of Heaven. No matter where its seed falls, it makes a tree which struggles to reach the sky. It grows in boarded-up lots and out of neglected rubbish heaps. It grows up out of cellar gratings. It is the only tree that grows out of cement. It grows lushly... survives without sun, water, and seemingly without earth. It would be considered beautiful except that there are too many of it.""
"I started out loving this book, and I do believe it deserves 4 stars. The protagonist, Francie, is spunky and precocious and seeing Brooklyn through her eyes gave me a new perspective of a city that I heretofore (is that a word?) thought of as, well, kind of dirty. The writing is pretty impressive and there are sentences and passages your pen screams to underline every few pages.
"Dear God, let me be something every minute of every hour of my life. Let me be happy; let me be sad. Let me be cold; let me be warm. Let me be hungry...have too much to eat. Let me be ragged or well-dressed. Let me be sincere- be deceitful. Let me be truthful; let me be a liar. Let me be honorable and let me sin. Only let me be something every blessed minute. And when I sleep, let me dream all the time so that not one little piece of living is ever lost."
The true antagonist of the novel is poverty, but by the end of the novel, it doesn't seem so antagonistic at all. Smith finds something amazing, dynamic, inspiring, quirky, or heart-wrenching in the smallest details in the landscape of her life. The characters are thought-provoking--sometimes they seem like caricatures, embodying some stereotype of an "immigrant" or a "single mother" or someone "poor." Other times Smith seems like a master of nuance, drawing humans as they really are: complex and mysterious, each a universe unto him/herself.
The missing star is for the end, which felt rushed to me, unlike the first 3/4 of the novel. It felt "wrapped up", but I'm not sure if this is a fair assessment or not because sometimes when I read something very fast I get this feeling and then realize later that it was my pace, not the author's, that cast a shadow on the ending for me.
Either way, the voice of this novel is so distinct it's a pleasure to read. You could take a snippet from it and hold it up against 15 other books and I would know which it was. I love author's with really distinct voices--some of my students have developed them already. Maybe one of them is a little Francie...waiting to one day write a book like this."
"I ended up loving this story. I have to admit, it was a bit slow getting into the book, but as I got to know the characters they grew on me and I became more and more interested in their lives. I cared what happened to them! Francie is one of the great (young) women in literature. All the women in this book are strong, but she shines. The men, although endearing in some cases, seem to falter and fall short of their potential(s).
So what happens in the book? Just life. If you're looking for fast-paced action, look elsewhere. Spoiled America needs to get this book out, dust it off and read the wake-up call. What we complain about is apalling when compared to what our grandparents of the early 20th century could have complained about. We've lost a sense of appreciation and replaced it with a sense of entitlement, surely a loss that will lead to our demise. People in this book learned how to be resourceful, both temporally AND spiritually. They dug deep inside to find their pride and their generosity - even when they had nothing."
We guarantee every item's condition, as described on Alibris. If you are not satisfied that an item is as described, return your purchase for a refund.
rating
