The Sandy Bottom Orchestra [Hardcover]

Garrison Keillor (Author)

Book Description

Grade Level: 5 and up

Beloved author and radio host Garrison Keillor now brings his storytelling talents to children with The Sandy Bottom Orchestra. Twelve-year-old Rachel has always known that her parents were a little eccentric, and now she fears that their weirdness is rubbing off on her. When Rachel is given an opportunity to play with the Dairyland Symphony Orchestra, she wonders if her music will be enough to sustain her through the long, lonely summer. (Ages 10 and up).

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Debuting as a writing team, Keillor (Lake Wobegon Days) and his musician wife, Nilsson, offer a keenly perceptive slice of Midwestern life as they evoke the muddled emotions of a 14-year-old violinist from Sandy Bottom, Wis., a place as uninspired as its name. Embarrassed by her pianist mother's tireless efforts to instill "cultural awareness" in the community and dubious about her dairy-manager father's decision to conduct a full orchestra (cannons included) at the annual Dairy Days festival, Rachel Green would just as soon spend her summer some place far away (Italy, for example). But staying at home and joining the local orchestra does hold promise, especially when it means she will be seeing more of Scott, an attractive young cellist. Readers will empathize with Rachel's longing to be more "mainstream" without compromising herself and will savor the priceless characterizations of quirky dairylanders (among them a mayor with "an I.Q. around room temperature" and a cat-loving, aging string player with "bird-cage" hair). Throughout, heartland sentiments and artistic egos are parodied with affection. Even when personalities clash and conflicts arise, an aura of warmth and optimism prevails. Ages 10-up.
Copyright 1996 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From School Library Journal

Grade 5-8. Rachel Green is an only child in a small town in Wisconsin. She loves playing the violin and does it well. Other than that, she spends her time being embarrassed by her slightly eccentric parents, who are too culturally advanced for their community, and worrying about what everyone else thinks about her. Young readers who adore music and who feel out of place in their communities will desire far more fleshing out and depth of musical knowledge. The story reads somewhat like a sports novel without any play-by-play action. Readers who are unsophisticated about music and accept the simple references to a Mozart Concerto as though there were only one will have a hard time finding a reality that convinces. A violin teacher and Rachel's mother's friend who lives in Italy appear with promise, but then fizzle and fade. Rachel's own inconsistencies?one minute complaining about her family not going anywhere and the next rhapsodizing about last year's trip to Italy?could leave readers wondering if she is unaware of her ups and downs or if the authors forgot who wrote what. The girl's feelings of ostracism could provide a connection but her own elitist attitude is off-putting. Rachel speaks sometimes like a Keillor radio monologue and sometimes not. A far better novel about a talented musical teen is Virginia Wolff's The Mozart Season (Holt, 1991). Suffering from an inconsistent voice and parents who are far more interesting than the central character, this is light entertainment, acceptable as fluff summer reading and proof, once again, that a famous name on the title page is no guarantee of quality in children's books.?Carol A. Edwards, Minneapolis Public Library
Copyright 1997 Reed Business Information, Inc.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover: 160 pages
• Publisher: Hyperion; 1st Edition, 1st Printing edition (December 2, 1996)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0786801735
• ISBN-13: 978-0786801732
• Product Dimensions: 8.5 x 5.8 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 14.4 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.9 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (11 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,118,691 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Garrison Keillor is the bestselling author of Lake Wobegon Days, Happy To Be Here, Leaving Home, We Are Still Married, Radio Romance, The Book of Guys and Wobegon Boy (available in Penguin Audiobook). He is the host of A Prairie Home Companion on American public radio and a contributor to Time magazine. He lives in Wisconsin and New York City.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars One of my favourite books!, October 4, 2003

By 

"count_mushnik" - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Sandy Bottom Orchestra (Paperback)

I first read this book about four or five years ago, when I was around eleven, and it's become one of those books that I can just go back to and re-read as many times as I want and never get tired of. OK, so it's not one of the deepest books ever written, but the style is easy, the plot simple and entertaining, and yet somehow it manages not to slip into cliche or become overly shallow.

The books follows exclusively the character of Rachel Green, an early teen whose one solace from life and parents is classical music. Perhaps the reason that I found this book so enjoyable is that I am a big fan of this type of music myself (as you can see from my name!). The girl displays all the characteristics typical in an early teenager - paranoia about her appearance, desire for acceptance, the feeling that her parents are unbearable, etc. However, in the last case, she might well have a point.

Her mother is a crusader for better education and artistic facilities in the town of Sandy Bottom, and forbids a TV in the house; instead there is a grand piano. Her father meanwhile conducts imaginary symphony orchestras in the den, and cries over recordings of classical music.

As you can see, the characters in this book are, shall we say, unique, and even those characters which could be called "transitory" are invested with larger-than-life personality traits. (The foremost among these being Drew and his mother.)

Mainly due to these characters there is a good deal of humour in the book. However, there are a lot of wry observations made by the authors on some aspects of life and love. Speaking of which, there is a touching romance between Rachel and a cellist thrown into the book, further making the character of Rachel even more real and vivid.

The book's overlying theme is obviously music, which makes it a joy to read for someone who is interested in this, but you definitely do not have to be a music-lover to get a great deal of enjoyment out of this book.

All in all, for something which appears on the face of it to be merely a "children's book" it is a very enjoyable and easy read for people of pretty nearly every age.

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars I love this book!!!, April 11, 2001

A Kid's Review

This review is from: The Sandy Bottom Orchestra (Paperback)

I really liked The Sandy Bottom Orchestra by Garrison Keillor and Jenny Lind Nilsson. I enjoyed this book for many reasons. The characters are well developed and very realistic. They are just like ordinary people you might find in a small town. I also liked this book because it is about one of my favorite things- music. Anyone who plays an instrument-strings especially- will love this book. I liked this book because, for the most part, I would love to have a summer like Rachel's. I think it would be really fun to play in a professional orchestra.

The best part of The Sandy Bottom Orchestra is when Rachel is at the orchestra rehearsals. She meets a lot of new people, and most of them are very wierd and funny. There is a man with hair like a birdcage, and Rachel's stand partner comes to the first rehearsal wearing a sweatshirt that says NEVER MESS WITH MOMMA and carrying a pink and turquoise striped purse. The rehearsals are the best part because it's there that the plot develops the most.

The setting and the characters were the most vivid elements of The Sandy Bottom Orchestra. The authors describe the setting so well that you can almost imagine a sleepy little town like Sandy Bottom. What makes this a really good book is the characters. They are vivid and strong and really draw you into the story. Rachel's mother is civil-minded and demanding, while her father is shy, yet successful, and loves classical music. Each is rather quirky and poor Rachel is afraid she will grow up to be like them.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars This book is hysterical., October 28, 1998

By A Customer

This review is from: The Sandy Bottom Orchestra (Paperback)

I can't believe I almost missed this book. I was just leaving the bookstore and I saw the word "orchestra" on the bottom shelf of new releases. I picked it up and read the first page, to see if it was a good book or a bad book. Good book. I could see that easily. So the very next chance I had, I called it from the library in the next town (I can't understand why they didn't have it at our own library) and read it. Then I read it again. Then, because I thoght it was so good, I had to order it from Amazon. Here's why I like it: It's real. Rachel and all the people surrounding her life are very believable and also insanely funny. It's not predictable, yet it's an extremely comfortable read, like everything turns out how it should. The musical aspect of it is very funny too, and if you play an instrument (school band does NOT count) you can sympathize with this book. Yes, there's romance in this book too. A great drive-in movie scene with Rachel and her special guy . . . If that's not enough to convince you, you need psychological help. :) Get to this book before it's too late!!!