Home Ground (King Penguin) [Paperback]

Lynn Freed (Author)

Book Description

Series: King Penguin | Publication Date: September 1, 1987

Home Ground is the story of a theatrical family in a small South African town and "a revealing portrayal of an adolescent struggling to find her place in an unaccommodating world".--Village Voice.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

For protagonist Ruth Frank, home ground is a small town in South Africa in the 1950s, where her family occupies a doubly alienated positionas Jews in gentile society and whites in an overwhelmingly black country. PW noted that Freed is "perceptive" in her dialogue and depictions of characters.
Copyright 1987 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Library Journal

This first person coming-of-age novel takes Ruth Franka Jew growing up in South Africa in the 1950sfrom a brash 8-year-old to a plump, pimply adolescent to a head-turning 18-year-old with her first lover. Ruth, the youngest of three daughters of theatrical parents who play at "Happy Families" at home, worries about, among other things, her future, sex, her parents, money (the Frank family wealth also is illusory), and violent black revolution. Looking for the truth about her family, which values appearance above all, and about her segregated country, she is nurtured by the family's black cook, encouraged by a noted British actress, and supported by an Indian friend and her close-knit family. In this warm, well-constructed novel, the South African locale adds depth to Ruth's universal concerns about growing up. Michele Leber, Fairfax Cty. P.L., Va.
Copyright 1986 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Product Details

• Paperback: 288 pages
• Publisher: Penguin (Non-Classics); Publ. in Penguin Bks 1987 edition (September 1, 1987)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0140089489
• ISBN-13: 978-0140089486
• Product Dimensions: 7.7 x 5.1 x 0.5 inches
• Shipping Weight: 6.4 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (3 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #7,520,165 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

LYNN FREED was awarded the inaugural Katherine Anne Porter Award for fiction by the American Academy of Arts and Letters. She is the author of six novels, a short story collection, and a collection of essays.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Interesting portrayal of South Africa during apartheid, September 6, 2005

By 

EBS "Avid Reader" (Jenkintown, PA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Home Ground (Paperback)

An interesting glimpse into the lives of a Jewish family in Capetown, South Africa during apartheid. The family relationships were beautifully portrayed.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars I heart Lynn Freed., November 12, 2008

By 

Maren McConnell-Collins - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Home Ground (Hardcover)

I saw Ms. Freed do a reading and I just had to get some of her books. Home Ground showcases her warm, witty voice. This is an engrossing story of girlhood and coming-of-age with a heroine who's a bit of a holy terror. A very good read.

4.0 out of 5 stars Autobiography from a fascinating novelist, October 24, 2010

By 

Just_Karen (Portland, Oregon) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)   

This review is from: Home Ground (Paperback)

Lynn Freed offers a portrait of growing up in privileged South Africa in Home Ground.

This is a loving and merciless view of a theater family made up of three parts histrionic narcissists, two parts evaders, and one part Lynn. Freed is also merciless concerning her own abuses of power in South Africa as a child, the lines she thoughtlessly steps over to explore and satisfy her drives. No excuses, just the events, leaving the reader to draw her own conclusions about the "why." The lack of justification or complaint is refreshing in a memoir.

Freed creates very real people for her readers, but just as real is her gift for conveying beautiful, exotic settings in all their fullness; the clothes, furnishings, the light, what grows outside a window, the sounds that drift in that same window.

Recommended especially for fans of Freed's novels, who will appreciate the insight into the politics of race, colonialism and gender that fuel her fiction.