Customer Reviews

If Morning Ever Comes

5 star:		(5)
4 star:		(8)
3 star:		(5)
2 star:		(3)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

It is hard to believe that Anne Tyler wrote this book, her first, when she was only 22 years old. To have such perception, such vision, such maturity, and such knowledge of the intricacies of family life is something I would expect of a writer twice that age.

This is also, I believe, her only novel set in the south, where Tyler was brought up. In a rare interview, she has said that she considers herself a Southerner. She certainly paints a good picture of a typical extended southern family! And this family has all the quirks and curious behaviors that have become Tyler's hallmark over the years.

Poor BenJoe...he is so confused, having taken the path of least resistance by going to law school in New York City, a totally foreign element to this small-town boy. He uses the slightest excuse to rush back home where he gets into everyone's business in a few short days, even though the houseful of women (mother, grandmother, five sisters, and a niece) clearly was doing just fine without him. Tyler makes us like him. She writes from his point of view and gets it letter-perfect.

This book is about much more than a small-town extended southern family - it is about birth and death, living and dying, and the unbreakable bonds of family.

I don't know why I picked up this book; I suppose it was because it's set in the past and most of my selections are present day. Almost in spite of myself, I found myself becoming engrossed in the lives of the Hawkes family, of Ben Joe and his sisters, his looney-tunes Grandma, and his reserved but strong-willed mother. It paints an exquisite picture of small-town Southern America in the early 60's. There's a lot more going on in Ben Joe's head than ever really happens in the book. It's a lot about what people let you see and what people try to hide. I enjoyed it. It makes me want to read more Tyler.

It is a really great book! The novel is a fairly quick read if you are looking for an interesting story about family life and relationships. It is written by a woman author, telling the stories of eight women in one household through the perspective of a male. I would recommend reading it!

If you understand that all the action and thought in the novel is through the main male character than you can understand the point of the novel better. Ben Joe feels responsible for the women in his life. He wants to take care of them, but he doesn't realize that they all are very strong and in control of their own destinies. Sometimes they are even in control of his. Once again Tyler is able to get us into the head of her character and what a foggy place that can be!

The guy is a self-proclaimed worrier, and when he learns one of his many sisters has returned to the family home with a baby and no husband, he feels somehow responsible and obligated to fix things. His return proves to be of more value to himself than to the houseful of eccentric (Tyler's specialty) women that have been muddling along just fine without him, thank you very much.
Typically wonderful writing in this compelling family drama about love, caring, bonding, and healing. Not Tyler's best, but just fine.

Ben Joe Hawkes has been surrounded by women his entire life. With his grandmother, mother,and all his sisters he has always felt like an outsider his life, plus he's a worrier. Ben Joe has come home after law school and surprisingly enough, this crazy visit to his childhood home send Ben Joe into an exhilarating battle with his own heart-where unforeseen love demands his surrender...

Only a rarely talented novelist could have written this fine book! It's funny, serious, touching, zany, delightful, revealing and more!

This is Anne Tyler's first novel (one she has disowned), and it definitely shows. Ben Joe Hawkes is a law student from North Carolina who is attending law school in NYC. He misses home and decides to return there for a visit. Home consists of six sisters, his mother, and his grandmother.

We get lots of talk about past incidents, mostly of unusual doings (running off with salesmen, for example) that nobody seems to take too seriously. The book is fairly disjointed (in one scene a drunken soldier appears out of nowhere on their front lawn playing a bagpipe) and filled with lots of talk, much of it not very interesting. Much better work was to follow.

I hope the reviewer who said that Anne Tyler diavowed this book was right - it was a real snoozer! The characters were shallow, two-dimensional at best, and the pace was atrociously slow. I had to force myself to finish it, so I could give it a fair chance while discussing it at my book club meeting. Surely, even in the South in the era in which this was set, people had some feelings, some purpose in life, some rational thought processes that guided their lives. These characters seemed to have none of these. From Ben Joe (where was he from the time he finished college to the start of law school?) to his vacuous sisters, no character stood out as definable in my eyes. And how was it that Shelley could so easily go from one love to another, agreeing to marry someone she hadn't seen in years, and who proposed so hastily and half-heartedly? I wanted to change the name of this book to: "If the End of This Book Ever comes, I'll Be Happy."

Is there a better author alive today? I can't think of one. You can go look at the back cover and it'll seem so simple. But it's not. It never is. Anne Tyler is a phenomenally talented observer who makes you observe exactly what she does. Her writing is life. She's also so adept with language that you hardly notice. Readers all over the world probably think, "If I were a writer, this is what I'd want to write." Hey, I think that myself, and I've got five published titles to my name. She is that good. And while she'll never be on anybody's list of humorists, she makes me laugh at our foibles better than any "comic" ever will. And to think this was the first of her books to ever be published, long before she won the Pulitzer and long before she had 15 titles to her credit. Most of the others are on my shelf unread, so you already know who I'll be reviewing next week.

It was a very short read. I enjoyed the story although I felt the characters could have been developed better. I read it as an ebook from my public library and found lots of misspellings/typos.