37 of 38 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Learning to let go should be learned before learning to get., October 23, 2006
A measure of how much I was drawn into this book is the fact that I picked it up at 2:00 in the afternoon- and by 9:00 that same evening I had finished it. I hope that Mr. Bradbury will not be upset that I felt compelled to finish in one afternoon what it took him 55 years to complete. It must be nearly 35 years ago now that I first read Dandelion Wine. I have lost track of the number of summers that I have reread it since. This book is a continuation of that unusually prolonged summer of 1928.
While this book's predecessor is the penultimate anthem of eternal youth (second only to Huckleberry Finn) this second part is...different. Here, Douglas Spaulding runs up against adulthood in more ways than one (perhaps it was that fever that he suffered late in the first book.) He starts out by waging war against time and its avatars in Green Town. He ends up by accepting that time and life must flow or be frozen into an unnatural caricature of life. Both 13 year-old Douglas and his 81 year-old nemesis Calvin Quartermain come to realize this. Puer aeternus and "hold-fast the dragon" come to see themselves through each other's eyes- and time and life begin their natural flow once again.
There are many references here to the characters and events of the first book- if you loved it you will find much in this second book to please you. However, the spirits of the two books are really quite different. I do not find this objectionable since it saves Douglas Spaulding from becoming a sort of eternal Peter Pan. Childhood can be magical, it should be remembered fondly and not sealed in or out, but you can't stay in that state forever.
A word about the conclusion- if you can keep a straight face as the two main characters each say goodbye and hello to their "little friend" respectively then you are one up on me...
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16 of 18 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
A charming and profound sequel to DANDELION WINE, November 3, 2006
What a great time to release a gentle gem like this --- a nostalgic tale set in October that shares its longing with the real-time October going on all around us.
I can honestly say that my emotive brain "composed" its thoughts on FAREWELL SUMMER in the midst of summer's waning breath, as we worked this week to clean up the nearly leafless orchard for another season. As I raked and carried mound after mound of leaves and twigs, I felt myself wholly embraced by the scene of bright, low-angled sunshine, cool northwest breezes, and a long slate line of snow-bearing clouds looming just beyond the old abandoned rail line to Princeton, Ontario.
In this charming sequel to his equally memorable DANDELION WINE of half a century ago, Bradbury has returned to the lives of his teenage boy characters, still on the verge of puberty in small-town America. His fictitious Green Town, Illinois could be Berea, Ohio, or Gimli, Manitoba, or my familiar Princeton, Ontario --- any one of thousands of places that were once (or still are) imbued with a culture that understands change yet tenaciously protects old-fashioned values like character and loyalty. And no matter who you are or how long your family has lived in one place, those small town values don't simply come along with rural genes; they have to be experienced, absorbed and learned by each new generation.
That's the delicate and essential space Bradbury has so charmingly re-visited in FAREWELL SUMMER, as Doug and his little "gang" wage a mini-war of wits against several local elders who wield power on the school board and at city hall. A series of boyish pranks culminates in the most daring escapade of all --- an elaborately planned night-time assault on the town hall clock. Stop time, and you stop the inevitable decline of life that looms with approaching adulthood --- or so Doug and his pals have figured it! But of course, the curmudgeonly old folks still remember the lovely wild dreams of their own youth, and a combination of coincidences and consequences catch up with the boys and show them another side of their onetime "enemies."
This is how Bradbury has caught the essence of that complex yet evocative transition between childhood and a new level of awareness that comes with responsibility and self-worth. One day Doug and his cohorts, much older and wiser, would tough it out with a new generation and in turn take on the role of wise and eccentric elders who figure so prophetically in the young boys' lives.
Bradbury easily could have exploited the archetypal generation-gap conflict that is a mainstay of so much literature and created a story with predictable proportions of humor, nostalgia, tension, conflict, winners and losers. But as his numerous fans in so many genres already know, that's just so much superficial "stuff" on his palette.
The same Ray Bradbury who strides across undiscovered universes to find the footprints of God is just as adept with the comparative microcosm of a little town basking in golden autumn light and fallen leaves, a place where lives aren't as simple and tranquil as in a Norman Rockwell or Peter Etril Snyder (for we Canadians!) painting.
Here, practical jokes and profound wisdom make peace with one another, and all of Bradbury's characters, young and elderly, finally stand together amid the sweet expiration of memory and delight that was summer --- and will be again.
--- Reviewed by Pauline Finch (paulinefinch@rogers.com)
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13 of 15 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Back to Green Town, Illinois..., October 23, 2006
I first read Dandelion Wine when I was 16 in 1967. Now, almost 40 years later, this sequel is profound and bittersweet. I wish the story went on further (it only takes about 90 miutes to read), but any trip back to Green Town is always worth it! October is the perfect month to read this book too.Bradbury's reflections on youth and mortality surely mirrors his own current thoughts, as he just turned 86 on August 22.If this is his literary finale (and I pray it is not!), it is indeed fitting --- lyrical, deeply resonant, and filled with wisdom collected from a lifetime of joy and struggle. Ray reminds us that "life is an ice cream cone", so savor its preciousness and its fleeting quality and its rich goodness, and love and share the forever summer that resides in all of our souls...
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