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Greenwichtown: A Novel [Hardcover]

Joyce Palmer (Author)
5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (14 customer reviews)


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Book Description

September 13, 2001
Jamaican writer Joyce Palmer is a first-time novelist who writes with raw talent and true freshness, in a voice that's uncontrived, unselfconscious, and immediate. Her narrator, Fay, sees the world with endearing simplicity and innocence, bearing her trials and mistakes with hope and honesty.

Set in Jamaica, Greenwichtown is the story of Fay Myrtle, a young, innocent, eight-year-old girl who lives in a shack outside a Jamaican plantation. An older sister takes her from the village to live in the inner-city ghettos of Greenwichtown, where she lives as her sister's daughter. There she has the chance to go to school and attend church, and her inner life thrives despite abuse by her sister and the squalor and poverty surrounding her. But as she struggles to come of age, searching for love, she gets caught up in a web of betrayal and is devastated by the death of the only man who ever loved her.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Fay Myrtle's life begins with her mother and siblings near a Jamaican plantation in Joyce Palmer's Greenwichtown. She goes to live in the city of the book's title with Flo an older sister she has never met who turns out to be a source of constant trouble. Fay grows up surrounded by poverty, violence and misery, attending school and later giving birth to twins but she is forced to leave the country to find work in order to support her children. Palmer's writing is spare and unflinching; while her plot is relentlessly grim, she does offer a glimmer of hope at the end. Agent, Jean Naggar. (St. Martin's, $23.95 272p ISBN

Copyright 2001 Cahners Business Information, Inc.

Review

"...a gripping coming-of-age novel in which the upbeat ending feels both believable and well deserved." (The New York Times Book Review)

"[An] inspiring view of a girl's coming-of-age in a challenging environment." (Essence)

Product Details

  • Hardcover: 272 pages
  • Publisher: St. Martin's Press; 1st edition (September 13, 2001)
  • Language: English
  • ISBN-10: 0312265972
  • ISBN-13: 978-0312265977
  • Product Dimensions: 9.1 x 5.8 x 0.9 inches
  • Shipping Weight: 15.4 ounces
  • Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (14 customer reviews)
  • Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #4,599,742 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

14 Reviews
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Average Customer Review
5.0 out of 5 stars (14 customer reviews)
 
 
 
 
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7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars Growing up female in Jamaica, September 21, 2001
By 
This review is from: Greenwichtown: A Novel (Hardcover)
"Greenwichtown" by Joyce Palmer is a Jamaican "Angela's Ashes." It is also blessed by female insight. Frank McCourt has his hero a boy coming to terms with poverty and religion and the drag of tradition, but his hero was very much a male with male virtues and vices. The "hero" in "Greenwichtown" is a woman who has to endure the same exterior forces of a society but also the physical and spiritual qualities of being a woman. A woman would have had a different role in Ireland and a man would have had a different life in Jamaica. Palmer stays true to reality and respects her character. This is sensitive and riveting.
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4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars This is a MUST READ book, February 25, 2002
By A Customer
This review is from: Greenwichtown: A Novel (Hardcover)
I could not put this book down.. I became Fay, seeing, tasting and smelling things through her eyes.. I was torn when she was ripped from her mothers home and all that was familiar.. I greived her new life of hunger, poverty, and shame.. and her disappointment of bearing unwanted twins and having the man she loved abandon her to raise fatherless children.. But it is a story of hope and courage as she takes her one opportunity and turns her life on a new course. This book is so full of compassion, and it leaves you feeling so ashamed for ever complaining about a thing. This is an absolute must read...a page turner.. and something that lasts deep within your soul.
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3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars A Great Read!!!, June 11, 2002
By 
Leah Simon (Ft. Lauderdale, Florida) - See all my reviews
This review is from: Greenwichtown: A Novel (Hardcover)
I just had to E-mail the author Joyce Palmer and tell her how much I enjoyed the book on so many levels. I had been to Jamaica several times and this book really brought the towns and people to life for me. I could imagine everything that happened to Faye and I felt her pain & despair and later on love & joy. It was a story of finding what was right & true and the unbreakable bond of Mother & child. I have recommended this book to several friends and they all came away with something different. Truly a wonderful story.
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Inside This Book (learn more)
First Sentence:
I WANT TO STOP crying but I can't. Read the first page
Key Phrases - Statistically Improbable Phrases (SIPs): (learn more)
communal sink, bag juice, flag lady, obeah man, mop stick, box drink, red party
Key Phrases - Capitalized Phrases (CAPs): (learn more)
Sister Lindsey, Miss Myrtle, Miss Ivy, Sister Myriam, Doctor Lawrence, Miss Mumpsy, Miss Voy, Fifth Street, Clara Myrtle, Jehovah's Witness, Santa Claus, Miss Little, Fay Myrtle, Flo Higgins, Hans van Dogen, Jesus Christ, Miss Brown, Third Street, Bruce Lee, Elder Green, High Gate, Jubilee Hospital, Nurse Jones, Reverend Dixon, Simone Baker
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