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katykelly's review against another edition
5.0
Wow. Builds slowly to an unmissable historical drama.
I loved Girl with a Pearl Earring and saw Chevalier had written another historical piece, the setting fascinated me - frontier America, just before the Gold Rush.
A warring couple who settled with their children in the swamp their wagon got stuck in are just about surviving in Ohio. Sadie is permanently fuming at her husband's obsession with his apple trees and takes petty revenges whenever she can. She has no problems with the applejack their fruit provides her with, however. James watches his fruit grow and his children die of swamp fever around him every year.
Their remaining children grow amidst the damp and desolate swampland as their parents' bickering only worsens.
We then jump forward 15 years to the Gold Rush era, when one son, Robert, is writing home to his family in Ohio. Just why did he leave home at 12? And what future can he make for himself in a land overtaken by greed? His present and past eventually collide, and we learn the Goodenoughs' fate and legacy.
I was entranced by this story. The setting is incredibly vivid, the sense of mud and decay in the swamps hard to see through. Sadie is quite a character, her muddied emotions regarding her family if not ones we would share, very human. The difficulty in surviving and thriving in these conditions is made clear, the ease with which death could take you shocking.
Robert's story is hard to put down, his travels taking us across America with him, his letters home hinting at events we can only guess at, and which come full circle as his past returns to him all of a sudden and he is forced to make choices he has avoided since childhood.
There are some very strong and powerful women in this story, not overtly so, but those with 'sass' and a lifeforce that means that even though it is men who hoed and dug and worked, the women were also breaking new frontiers too and doing it a lot more quietly than their male counterparts. Some rather admirable examples here.
A great story, almost an epic if not in length. I hope the story is one day continued. Loved the setting, the characters, the slow reveal and structure - a winner.
I loved Girl with a Pearl Earring and saw Chevalier had written another historical piece, the setting fascinated me - frontier America, just before the Gold Rush.
A warring couple who settled with their children in the swamp their wagon got stuck in are just about surviving in Ohio. Sadie is permanently fuming at her husband's obsession with his apple trees and takes petty revenges whenever she can. She has no problems with the applejack their fruit provides her with, however. James watches his fruit grow and his children die of swamp fever around him every year.
Their remaining children grow amidst the damp and desolate swampland as their parents' bickering only worsens.
We then jump forward 15 years to the Gold Rush era, when one son, Robert, is writing home to his family in Ohio. Just why did he leave home at 12? And what future can he make for himself in a land overtaken by greed? His present and past eventually collide, and we learn the Goodenoughs' fate and legacy.
I was entranced by this story. The setting is incredibly vivid, the sense of mud and decay in the swamps hard to see through. Sadie is quite a character, her muddied emotions regarding her family if not ones we would share, very human. The difficulty in surviving and thriving in these conditions is made clear, the ease with which death could take you shocking.
Robert's story is hard to put down, his travels taking us across America with him, his letters home hinting at events we can only guess at, and which come full circle as his past returns to him all of a sudden and he is forced to make choices he has avoided since childhood.
There are some very strong and powerful women in this story, not overtly so, but those with 'sass' and a lifeforce that means that even though it is men who hoed and dug and worked, the women were also breaking new frontiers too and doing it a lot more quietly than their male counterparts. Some rather admirable examples here.
A great story, almost an epic if not in length. I hope the story is one day continued. Loved the setting, the characters, the slow reveal and structure - a winner.
t8r's review against another edition
4.0
I'd never read anything by [a:Tracy Chevalier|1973|Tracy Chevalier|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1439297099p2/1973.jpg] when I started this book, so I didn't know what to expect.
I was pleasantly surprised. This is a great book: it contains action, love, hatred, lust, and conflict between new and old, and practical and romantic.
The audiobook narrator was very good.
I was pleasantly surprised. This is a great book: it contains action, love, hatred, lust, and conflict between new and old, and practical and romantic.
The audiobook narrator was very good.
nearly_empty_nesting's review against another edition
4.0
Told in two generations, this book shows the darker side of a family going West in the 1800's. Isolation, domestic violence, loss, illness. The impact on this family is monumental and devastating.
I don't know that I was prepared for how dark this was going to be going into the book, but I did appreciate the journey
I don't know that I was prepared for how dark this was going to be going into the book, but I did appreciate the journey
aubrey_the_explorer's review against another edition
4.0
This is an interesting piece of historic fiction. In the first part of the book one of the female characters I found to be rather unique for the time period. Later on the book moves forward a couple of decades and the story continues on. That's a great tale for anyone who enjoys westerns or has an interest in Forestry.
candacesiegle_greedyreader's review against another edition
3.0
3.5 stars
The Goodenough family leaves Connecticut in 1838 to settle on the frontier and cultivate apple trees. They get as far as the Black Swamp of Ohio and there they are literally stuck, unable to drag themselves and their belongings another step farther in the sucking mud.
James and Sadie should never have married. James contemplates the layers of flavor in each apple they grow, while Sadie just wants to grow any kind of apple that can be made into a potent drink to keep her drunk for as long as possible. The frontier is brutal, they've lost five of their ten children to swamp fevers, and their family dysfunction brings the Ernshaws of Wuthering Heights to mind.
This sounds like pretty dire reading, but it is actually quite engrossing. They buy apple seedlings from John Appleseed, who down the river dressed in nothing but a coffee sack. They go to a revival meeting in the closest town. James nurtures his pippins and Sadie revels in the other product of apple farming. Where can this family be going?
Part two is set fifteen years later in the California Gold Rush, as the youngest Goodenough son becomes increasingly involved with a different sort of tree--the giant redwoods and sequoias, as he collects seeds to be shipped to English gardeners. He writes to his family in Ohio, not knowing who is there or if the letters ever arrive.
Reading the Ohio section is like anticipating a train wreck. The family is so out of whack and their circumstances so difficult that "What is going to happen here?" hangs over the reader's head like a muddy cloud. Part two is brighter. The Gold Rush is winding down, but there is so much natural beauty to explore. There is the beginning of tourism to visit the huge, glorious trees, more people with different interests. But James is haunted by his family. What happened there? Will he ever see any of them again?
I read this book with only expecting to like it, but I enjoyed it completely. It's different. You see how living on the frontier influenced so much in the American character, how the wonder of the wilderness formed us.
The Goodenough family leaves Connecticut in 1838 to settle on the frontier and cultivate apple trees. They get as far as the Black Swamp of Ohio and there they are literally stuck, unable to drag themselves and their belongings another step farther in the sucking mud.
James and Sadie should never have married. James contemplates the layers of flavor in each apple they grow, while Sadie just wants to grow any kind of apple that can be made into a potent drink to keep her drunk for as long as possible. The frontier is brutal, they've lost five of their ten children to swamp fevers, and their family dysfunction brings the Ernshaws of Wuthering Heights to mind.
This sounds like pretty dire reading, but it is actually quite engrossing. They buy apple seedlings from John Appleseed, who down the river dressed in nothing but a coffee sack. They go to a revival meeting in the closest town. James nurtures his pippins and Sadie revels in the other product of apple farming. Where can this family be going?
Part two is set fifteen years later in the California Gold Rush, as the youngest Goodenough son becomes increasingly involved with a different sort of tree--the giant redwoods and sequoias, as he collects seeds to be shipped to English gardeners. He writes to his family in Ohio, not knowing who is there or if the letters ever arrive.
Reading the Ohio section is like anticipating a train wreck. The family is so out of whack and their circumstances so difficult that "What is going to happen here?" hangs over the reader's head like a muddy cloud. Part two is brighter. The Gold Rush is winding down, but there is so much natural beauty to explore. There is the beginning of tourism to visit the huge, glorious trees, more people with different interests. But James is haunted by his family. What happened there? Will he ever see any of them again?
I read this book with only expecting to like it, but I enjoyed it completely. It's different. You see how living on the frontier influenced so much in the American character, how the wonder of the wilderness formed us.
deniiiise's review against another edition
sad
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
5.0
drianturner's review against another edition
5.0
I read The Girl With the Pearl Earring many years ago. I enjoyed that but not so much that I so wanted to read her other books. But the number of her books on my Kindle started to mount up.
First, I read The Last Runaway, which I absolutely loved! It was set in Ohio, in the late 18th century, and featured people furthering the escape of slaves on the underground railroad. Then, I read this, the Edge of the Orchard, which was also set in America but in the 19th Century. It was a family trying to grow apple orchards in the harsh, marsh environment of the mid-West. I enjoyed this, too, but not as much as The Last Runaway.
Finally, I read one of her older novels, The Lady of the Unicorn, which I think Chevalier wrote immediately after The Girl With the Pearl Earring. It certainly seems so as the tales were very similar.
First, I read The Last Runaway, which I absolutely loved! It was set in Ohio, in the late 18th century, and featured people furthering the escape of slaves on the underground railroad. Then, I read this, the Edge of the Orchard, which was also set in America but in the 19th Century. It was a family trying to grow apple orchards in the harsh, marsh environment of the mid-West. I enjoyed this, too, but not as much as The Last Runaway.
Finally, I read one of her older novels, The Lady of the Unicorn, which I think Chevalier wrote immediately after The Girl With the Pearl Earring. It certainly seems so as the tales were very similar.
bethsponz's review against another edition
4.0
I liked reading about the sequoias and redwoods, especially since I'm going to California soon. I liked Robert Goodenough's journey, and not so much his family in beginning. I really like this author and have read 2 other of her books.