Customer Reviews

The Rope Walk

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

 

 

There are novels driven by either character or plot, and at least one more category that might best be described as "atmospheric," in which the author sets herself the principal task of creating gorgeous word pictures that lodge themselves indelibly in our subconscious. Carrie Brown's sixth novel fits comfortably into this last group, the book's ravishing images destined to linger in the mind long after the details of its quiet story are forgotten.

THE ROPE WALK opens on May 29, 2005, Alice MacCauley's 10th birthday. Alice, a redhead and something of a tomboy, lives with her father Archie, a Shakespeare scholar and dean of a small college, and five older brothers in the town of Grange, Vermont. Her mother had died in a horse riding accident one month after Alice's birth. At her birthday party Alice meets two people who will change her life over the course of the summer during which most of the novel's action is concentrated: Theo Swann, the mixed-race grandson of family friends who has come from New York City to spend the summer, and Kenneth Fitzgerald, a prominent artist whose eccentric sister is caring for him as he is dying of AIDS.

On the evening of Alice's party, Theo's grandmother suffers a stroke. The MacCauley family takes him in as a temporary accommodation, but a bond quickly grows between the children and it soon becomes apparent that he's destined to spend the summer with them. Theo is a preternaturally bright boy who believes any problem can be solved with a toolbox and a bit of imagination, and his urban upbringing has made him more sophisticated than Alice. Still, he lacks her courage, fleeing from their initial encounter with Fitzgerald, who is disfigured from the effects of his disease and grabbing Alice's shirt at moments of stress.

Fitzgerald befriends Alice and Theo, inviting them to his sister's house to help him pass the long hours of enforced idleness brought on by the ravages of his illness. Each day he leaves them with an obscure word like "sempiternal" and "bagatelle," to spark their intellectual curiosity. He gives Alice and Theo his stunning mobiles, and the children take turns reading excerpts from the journals of Lewis and Clark, the account of their perilous westward journey serving as a metaphor for Alice and Theo's budding maturity. On a more concrete level, the explorers' tales inspire the children to erect a fort on an island in the shallow river that traverses the MacCauleys' land. Eventually, they decide to hack their way through the nearby woods to create the rope walk of the novel's title in a plan to give Fitzgerald an opportunity to escape the prison in which his disease has locked him. The unforeseen result of their project creates the novel's climactic event.

Some of THE ROPE WALK's characters, chiefly Alice's rambunctious brothers and, to a lesser extent, her emotionally distant father, feel slightly underdeveloped and, at best, almost peripheral to the story. Perhaps this is a consequence of the fact that the novel is narrated so skillfully through Alice's observant eyes. Brown succeeds admirably in channeling the character in a pitch-perfect rendition of the thoughts and emotions of a young girl poised on the edge of adolescence. When she describes Alice's realization that "for the first time happiness and sadness, beauty and cruelty had begun to join together inside her, entwining themselves inextricably like the tendrils of a vine up the trunk of a tree," she writes about a person with whom she's on intimate terms.

For anyone old enough to remember languid summers that seemed to float by in an endless reel of sunny days, Brown's shimmering prose will evoke that experience in all its luminous and transient beauty. "The days wore on through July," she writes, "warmer and warmer, longer and longer, slow bees droning in the garden, the light of the sloping, golden afternoons so rich it seemed to melt over the towering trees at the edge of the lawn." Passages like that one and countless others in THE ROPE WALK remind us of one of the principal reasons why we read: to experience the unalloyed pleasure of watching a skilled writer layer arresting images and acute insights onto a canvas to create a work of art.

--- Reviewed by Harvey Freedenberg

From the first scene, this story mesmerizes with its pitch-perfect recounting of a summer friendship between two children, Alice and Theo. These kindred souls, from strikingly different backgrounds, enjoy a shared view of the beautiful and sometimes sad world around them. "The Rope Walk" reminded me, in feeling, of another favorite, "To Kill a Mockingbird."

Best book I've read in years.

This novel made me cry from joy, sadness, fear, and recognition. It evoked childhood in ways that I hadn't experienced in a long time. The descriptions of how Alice thinks, feels, and acts are so true to the years of innocent discovery the author so beautifully contextualizes. This novel really made me remember my childhood and how amazing it is to lose the angelic innocence that we don't even realize we had until it's gone. In some ways, reading it made me feel like a kid again.

The author writes in a way that almost seduces the reader. Her descriptions are eloquent and fit perfectly into the flowing narrative of the story. She is incredibly talented and can paint a scene so vividly that the reader feels as though s/he visits it in dreams. This is a wonderful novel.

This beautifully realized gem of a novel has all of life's big issues writ on a small canvas. Family relationships, love, loss, inter-racial relationships, AIDS,and death are all here, seen through the eyes of an enchanting 10 year old in rural Vermont.I wanted to be part of Alice's family. I did not want this book to end.

If The Rope Walk had been written by Ian McEwan (supposing for a moment he were capable of such restraint), we would be talking Booker Prize. It is amazing that this book has not received wider acclaim.

The Rope Walk is a delightful, wish it would never end book with endearing characters. The words that are used to describe each scene are so vivid and beautiful. The children in the book make me wish I was a child again - the author describes their enthusiasm and adventuresome spirits with such joy and abandon. I thoroughly enjoyed this book and have recommended it to friends and family.

I started listening to this book on audio format while driving. After about 5 chapters I threw it aside, not interested in continuing. I felt that every scene, every sentence, had so much descriptive language that it got tiresome to listen to it. I soon became bored and my mind started wandering instead of keying in on the story itself. I rarely toss a book after starting it, but this one was too much of a chore to continue.

Like a gourmet meal at a five-star restaurant, The Rope Walk, by Carrie Brown, delights the senses from appetizer to dessert. A total sensory experience, it's seasoned with just the right metaphors, it evokes both the sweet and savory memories of childhood, and is filled with the richest characters.

I love this book. So deep is its spell, I found it difficult to keep it located in time. Even though it is set in today's small-town Vermont, I literally kept forgetting it wasn't talking about a different time--a different place. It's so ethereal, so timeless, so completely its own world.

And I'm not completely sure it really isn't its own world. "On her windowsill, Alice waited, watching. The full energy of the day, like a parade assembling its drums and cymbals and marching players, lay just out of sight, gathering strength at the of the world. Any moment now, the day's brimming cup would spill over the far treetops and flood the hour with light." That sounds like a creation story to me.

The Rope Walk tells the story of the relationship between a white, ten-year-old small-town girl, Alice, and Theo, a young black boy from the big city. Thrown together by his grandmother's illness, Theo comes to live with her family for the summer. With all the spontaneity and innocence of childhood, the two children find adventure, intimacy, solace and heartache as they delicately walk the line between their own world and the adult world that surrounds them.

If you only have a short time to visit this new world, do not pick up The Rope Walk, choose a magazine instead. This book is a feast and deserves the ambiance of a five-star restaurant rather than a fast-food drive through.

Armchair Interviews says: Powerful storytelling to touch your heart.

A jewel of a book! I am so glad I read this novel, and will definitely read more of Carrie Brown's writings. I was drawn into Alice's world from the first page. Loved the close relationships between Alice and her family....the love they had for each other;the interactions and caring concern for the neighbors and friends in a small town; the descriptions of their everyday lives. When Alice's world begins to change over the course of the summer, we are drawn in by the sadness she feels at her brothers' departures for school, the close bond she develops with her adorable, quirky new friend, Theo; and the lessons of tolerance they both learn when Kenneth is introduced into their lives. I savored every word and phrase. Beautifully written!

The Rope Walk by Carrie Brown is one of those books that I probably never would have found on my own. It was suggested to me by a friend after a conversation we had about a book I wanted to write myself about AIDS. I mentioned another character from a book I was reading at the time who was HIV positive, and my friend suggested I might like The Rope Walk because it too had a character in it who was dying from AIDS. Now, some might find that a bit odd. It's like assuming all gay people or all black people know each other, but I accepted the loan of her copy to read and was not disappointed.

After about the first eighty pages, I began to wonder just what this book was about and where it was going. It wasn't even close to what the back of the book said which discusses a ten year old girl named Alice befriending a young biracial boy named Theo and the two of them entertaining a dying man by reading to him. It was more about Alice herself and her relationship with her dad and brothers, their eccentricities, the lack of her mother who passed away when Alice was very young, and then there's Alice's birthday party where she first meets Theo, who is in town from New York visiting his grandmother.

Odd circumstances cause Theo to become a summer long visitor at Alice's house, but the two of them quickly become the best of friends. Brown paints some beautiful narrative of the two young innocent children playing in the woods, building a fort, and sleeping outside in their sleeping bags. Alice becomes obsessed with the color of Theo's skin and his unique smell, and how Theo doesn't seem to be too homesick for his parents back in New York. Even odder circumstances call for the children to entertain an artist named Kenneth who has taken up hospice, dying of AIDS, at his sister's house nearby. Alice reads to Kenneth and Theo from the diary of Lewis and Clark. Kenneth shows his gratitude by bestowing gifts up the children, including elaborate mobiles which he is known for. To help Kenneth, the children begin to build a rope walk in the woods so he can go outside and walk around without getting lost.

There are a number of awe scenes that capture the innocent minds of children perfectly. Theo obsesses over the dangers of New York. He's afraid of terrorists, earthquakes, and other disasters. He knows how to do everything and is eager to show Alice his talents. Alice questions why race is such an important issue among grownups, puzzled by the reactions Theo gets from his relatives. Why would a child want just one color in a box of crayons, she ponders. Their relationship to Kenneth also poses more "grown up" questions about death and dying.

Brown obviously has an appreciation and knowledge of children and nature. She writes the two just perfectly and truly captures those moments that as grownups, most of us have forgotten about. That is until a kid of our own or a grandchild asks an innocent question or blurts out a funny statement that only a child would have thought of. It's also the magic of summer vacation when everyday was spent outside exploring trees and bugs or building things with what we had. The book moves at the pace of a long summer day spent with a good friend outdoors.

My only complaint is that while the events involving Kenneth seemed, at first, like it was going to become the center theme of the book, it is not. It actually becomes a sideline as most of the story focuses on the relationship between Alice and Theo. So, while that might sound like the focus (based mostly on what you'll read on the back of the book), it isn't really the main stage here. That being said, yes, scenes of kids playing outside may become redundant to you after a while but Brown keeps the reader thoroughly entertained. You'll discover something new on each page just as the kids do.

Beautiful writing! Superb imagery and imagination. A nice long read and an excellent way to end my summer! Be prepared to shed a few tears in the end. You'll be glad you made it, but you might just be sad to seethe summer, and Alice and Theo, go.

Synopsis: Set in the summer time, this coming of age story is about a young, white girl named Alice. On her 10th birthday, she meets a young, black city boy named Theo.
Due to Theo's mother's depression, he is eventually forced to live with Alice and her family. They become closer friends, discovering about the world around them, and life itself. Most importantly, together, they learn about themselves, and grow to be who they are truly meant to be.

Review: I liked this book a lot. I thought it was entertaining, thought-provoking, and memorable.
I think the main reason why I liked this was because the author did a good job contextualizing childhood, innocence, and discovery in a realistic manner. It was all very believable, and did not seem in any way contrived. The way she wrote about the two main characters, Alice and Theo, was simply effortless. It was easy for me to picture them; how they were acting, thinking, and feeling. In a way, it's almost like I was sinking in to their world, and leaving mine. It's not often that an author can do that, at least for me. Mostly I believe this is because her writing fit just perfectly with every character and every word in the book. It was not difficult at all to see the scene she has painted.
Of course, there were some minor flaws. There were times that the descriptions seemed too much or that chapters became too wordy. Despite these little mistakes I would've liked to see gone, I still do recommend this very underrated book.