Franny is the youngest of three daughters, and at thirteen she is just beginning to see her family and the world as they truly exist. ROWING IN EDEN tells the story, through Franny's eyes, of one summer at Pynch Lake, the midwestern resort where the family has gone for generations, and now lives full time in somewhat reduced financial circumstances. Franny, caught in that strange hinterland between childhood and adolescence, becomes increasingly entwined in the lives of her older sisters. She is their confidant, but is too young to drink and attend the nightly parties by the lake. She is too young to have an ever changing string of boyfriends. She is too young to fall truly in love, isn't she? And then she meets Ryan Marvel, an eighteen year old college freshman. Like Beth Gutcheon, Elizabeth Evans paints a masterful portrait of adolescence and a powerful, if unusual, love story.
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Book Description
Editorial Reviews
From Publishers Weekly
It's the summer of '65 in Pynch Lake, Iowa, when Evans's perceptive coming-of-age novel opens. The Wahl family are year-round residents in the summer-tourist town: Peg Wahl, a faded beauty queen, and her appropriately named husband, Brick, an alcohol-soaked lawyer who doesn't pay his bills, have always been stars in the community's small social firmament. But now their two college-age daughters are taking over center stage. Rosamund is sought out by a former suitor of Peg's, and Martie is quickly blossoming into a reckless party girl. Nearly invisible in the glare of emotional turbulence is 13-year-old Franny, the youngest Wahl daughter, who observes the world around her with an adolescent's fantasies and misconceptions. Trouble arrives in the form of reckless college freshman Ryan Marvell, who takes a romantic shine to Franny, precipitating shocked disapproval from her peers and one family disaster after another. By having Franny chart her own unique course between the examples of her two sisters (nice-girl Rosamund is discreetly boy-crazy , while Martie is more overtly rebellious), the novel goes beyond the sentimentality of a '60s era coming-of-age tale. Evans knows the language of teenage confusion well, and Franny's resiliency is appealing. Depicting the domestic chatter, tensions and emotional shifts of the Wahl family unit, Evans creates a textured portrait of one family's painful acclimation to changing sexual mores. Ryan's passionate attraction to the decidedly immature, if charming, Franny is never quite convincing, however, and without this essential credibility, the novel falls short of its potential. Agent, Lisa Bankoff. Author tour. (Aug.)
Copyright 2000 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
Copyright 2000 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
From Booklist
Franny Wahl is a precocious 13-year-old growing up in a small lake resort in Iowa. During the summer of 1965, as the vacationers return to town, Franny finds herself caught in mid-leap between childhood and adolescence, innocence and knowledge. Her two sisters, home from college and each struggling in her own way with becoming adults, spend the summer throwing booze-drenched parties. At one of the gatherings, Franny finds herself attracted to a college student; trouble ensues when the young man returns her attentions. Franny's parents aren't much help. Her mother lives in a world bounded by self-delusion, empty rituals, and meaningless cliches, while her alcoholic father resents his economic bondage to his mother. Evans has done a remarkable job in weaving a deeply colored and textured tapestry of images and emotions. Using the news, music, and television shows of the late 1960s, she effectively re-creates a specific time and place. The vividness of the setting makes the human drama all the more poignant, as various relationships bloom briefly and die prematurely. Evans has written an anthem for failed romantics. George Needham
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
6 of 8 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Another haunting, beautiful book from Elizabeth Evans,
By A Customer
This review is from: Rowing In Eden: A Novel (Hardcover)
With Franny Wahl, the almost fourteen-year-old heroine of Elizabeth Evans fine third novel, Evans has created a character that is at once endearing and terrifying, as are any and all fourteen-year-old girls. In the summer of 1965, Franny's sexuality blooms right under her distracted parents' noses, even as her middle sister, Martie--the observably wild one--sics their alcohol-fueled father on Franny's college age suitor, Ryan Marvell.As the story progressed, I took every step with Franny: holding back on answering the phone until at least two rings, gazing at the fence where she once sat talking with her beloved and most importantly, Franny's efforts at discovering how to give and receive love without giving up too much of herself. By the end of the book, I began to empathize even with Franny's parents, hard-drinking, impecunious Brick and relentlessy busy Peg. They are simply confused and overwhelmed with the ways that their world has changed. Franny Wahl is a girl I believe as much as I believe my own, long ago, fourteen-year-old self.
2 of 3 people found the following review helpful:
1.0 out of 5 stars
Tedious and empty,
By A Customer
This review is from: Rowing in Eden: A Novel (Paperback)
I found it interesting that one of the editorial reviews for this book contained the following: "Her mother lives in a world bounded by self-delusion, empty rituals, and meaningless cliches." This book is filled with empty rituals and meaningless cliches and was terribly disappointing. I had heard good things about the author, but I fail to see where any of those good things come into play here. This is pretty tedious stuff.
3.0 out of 5 stars
Inventing the Wahls...,
By
This review is from: Rowing in Eden: A Novel (Paperback)
When I first read the back cover of "Rowing In Eden", I thought that it sounded a lot like the film "Inventing the Abbotts." There were many similarities as it turned out, but lots of differences, too.The book is centered around the Wahl family, especially the three daughters-Rosamund, Martie, and Franny. The novel is told through Franny's eyes, the youngest sister at 13. During the summer of 1965, Franny comes of age at the lakeside resort where she lives. Her parents seem far too preoccupied with her older sisters to take much notice of her, so Franny spends most of her time writing in her journal, reading poetry, and spending time with her friends. While Rosamund and Martie are entertaining their college friends at a party one night, Franny finds her independance and her first love. From that moment on, she embarks on a journey of self-discovery that her older sisters have yet to learn for themselves. A beautifully-written and very descriptive novel!
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