Customer Reviews

Tennyson

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Tennyson is a remarkable book. Remarkable in the sense that I don't think I've read any other book like it. The best way I can describe it is by giving you three keywords: Gothic + Southern + Writing. It's sort of a bizarre little book. The writing is very stark and vivid and dark; the characters odd but lovable. Parts of it made me laugh, parts made my heart ache. Sometimes Aigredoux and its occupants seemed ridiculous and absurd, sometimes they were frightening. Oh, how do I say this. It's not the sort of book you can describe. It's like a distant memory that you want to lose yourself in, but at the same time you're afraid that if the characters are hurt in any way, you will be, too. My reaction when finished wasn't a loud, bubbly, "I loved it!!" - more of a quiet, solemn, "I liked that. Yes, I did. Very much."

The year is 1932, and the Depression is running as deep and wide as the Mississippi. Tennyson is eleven, her younger sister Hattie eight, and they have never known nor needed anything outside of their home at Innisfree. They have stories and schooling from their gentle, loving father Emery. Their mother Sadie is a frustrated writer and poet. A wild dog named Jos comes in and out of their house whenever he pleases. It is a happy house.

The girls often play hide-and-seek in the woods, the soles of their feet thick as hide, the sound of their laughter filling the air, but they always come home at dusk. One night, their mother doesn't come home. Just like that, she is gone, having left by choice for parts unknown. Tennyson doesn't know where her mother is, but she knows why: "Because she's like Jos . . . She's wild and she doesn't really belong to us." Tennyson, also a writer, has been aware of her mother's discontent for years, so though her leaving hurts, it comes as no surprise.

So that he may search for his wife, Emery must leave his daughters with his sister Henrietta at a colorless Louisiana house called Aigredoux (pronounced Aag-reh-do). He tells them to pretend that they are actresses in a play, to mind what Aunt Henrietta says, and to be brave. He promises that he will be back soon with their mother. And then he, too, is gone.

Aunt Henrietta has little tolerance for her nieces' dirt-and-tear-streaked faces, appalled by their old clothes and lack of manners. She considers herself to be a lady and her crumbling, faded house a castle. Her husband Thomas, aka Uncle Twigs, is more concerned with his role as the president of the Louisiana Societ the Strict Enforcement of the Proper Use of the English Language than his supposed job as caretaker, and their housekeeper Zulma is as no-nonsense as Henrietta. The young sisters get by, for they have always been thick as thieves, with Tennyson looking after Hattie since they were little.

Tennyson begins to dream in detail. She sees her ancestors' tragic wedding take place on the same grounds she now lives, then later scribbles down the entire story on the back of old sheet music. If she could just get this published in her mother's favorite magazine, The Sophisticate, she knows her mother will read it and come back home. The only person who knows of her new plan is Zipporah, the gentleman at the local post office. As Tennyson continues to have these big dreams, readers will be drawn further and further in, turning pages until they reach the impactful conclusion. Afterwards, the book's appendix offers a family tree and history as well as song lyrics and poems noted in the story, including some by the protagonist's namesake, Alfred, Lord Tennyson.

In her third novel for young readers, Lesley M.M. Blume has woven ancestral tales together in one finely-spun Southern story. With the Gothic elements illuminated by history and known to be dreams, this is not a horror story and will not frighten young readers. Rather, like young Hattie (who finds Alice in Wonderland and Through the Looking-Glass to be more interesting than history), the dreams will make them curious and keep them reading. Instead of being outright haunted by ghosts, Aigredoux would appear to be haunted by memories, by the loss and destruction seen by the previous generations. Their faces are captured in portraits on the walls, their lives in Tennyson's dreams, and Tennyson's story is just as important as theirs. This is how and why and when she transitions from an intelligent child into a young adult.

This is the novel of Tennyson Fontaine. Tennyson is an old soul in an 11 year old body. The setting is the deep south, mostly during the depression, though we do have flashbacks to the civil war.

Tennyson and her sister, Hattie, have been left in the care of their aunt in a delapitated plantation manse. Their father has gone off to find their mother, a selfish cow of a woman who is only a mother in the biological sense, because she has run away in pursuit of her writing muse.

Tennyson doesn't have to run off... she has plenty of muse. She attempts to bring her scattered family back together by telling the story of the history of her family and the house they treasured. Both stories - the one in the nineteenth century and the one in the twentieth - are full of the details that bring a picture to life in your head.

The characters - from the precocious Tennyson to the narcissist-turned-empathetic character, Bartholomew - are well drawn and full of life.

This is an excellent read for an adult or a young teen. There are moral lessons a plenty, and, at the same time, a child hero who just gets it right (even though she does make some mistakes.)

(*)>

This was an interesting story that wonderfully captured two very different time periods. While it is primarily about young sisters, Tennyson and Hattie, struggling with a family separation in 1932, it also interweaves a Civil War tale of the girls' paternal family and their grand Louisiana plantation house. The descriptions are very real and I felt easily drawn into the varying scenes from Mississippi to Louisiana and even New York City. Blume is a wonderfully descriptive author who makes the reader truly feel the mood of each scene as well.

Both I and my 11 year old daughter read this book and enjoyed it. Her comment was that it had a strange ending-as if there should've been more. As an adult, I can say that it is an ending that does offer closure but not in a cut and dry manner. It's more of an emotional closure rather than an end to the story. I felt the moral of the story is Tennyson's realization that while history seeks to repeat itself, we are all empowered by the choices we make, choices that can alter the future for the better. I would recommend it for it's original storyline (Southern Gothic for children)and could be a springboard for discussing the Great Depression and the Civil War. Homeschoolers especially might appreciate the crossover potential between language arts & history/social studies.

In 1932, the Depression weighs heavily across the entire country. But for 11-year-old Tennyson Fontaine and her eight-year-old sister, Hattie, life goes on as normal in their simple shack home near the banks of the Mississippi. They spend their days playing hide-and-seek in the surrounding forests, staying out of their mother's way while she writes her stories and poems, and pass the evenings reading stories and history books with their father. When they're not partaking in these activities, they're swinging on the rope swing hanging in the kitchen.

One time, and one time only, Tennyson makes the mistake of fixing one of her mom's stories; she has the natural writing talents that her mom only dreams of having. But her mom gets jealous and angry when she fixes the story so easily, so she never attempts to help again. One of Tennyson's main responsibilities is trying to keep her mom happy.

However, one evening her mother never returns home. Her father goes out to search for her, but returns empty-handed the following morning. Not knowing what else to do, he packs up his daughters and delivers them into his sister's care while he continues the search. Aunt Henrietta and Uncle Twigs live in the Fontaine family home, an old southern Louisiana plantation house called Aigredoux. Though rich in history, Aigredoux is falling apart and overgrown with vines. Aunt Henrietta and Uncle Twigs seem to be stuck in the past as well, clinging to their rigid southern manners and outdated way of life. From the moment they meet, Aunt Henrietta and Tennyson's personalities painfully collide, and the future appears bleak and lonely.

Then Tennyson has an idea. She will write a story and get it published in her mom's favorite magazine. Her mom will see it and then feel compelled to return home to her family. But what to write? Tennyson starts having vivid dreams about the history of Aigredoux, dreams that are startlingly close to reality. As Tennyson writes her stories in order to call her mom home, she gradually grows closer to the dilapidated house, despite all of its dark family secrets being revealed.

Lesley M. M. Blume successfully displays her immense writing talents once again. She reawakens the past with vivid descriptions and careful research, taking readers on a personal tour of the Deep South and the stains humanity has left on her soil. The colorful characters leave a lasting impression, bringing the story to life with their funny quirks, deep-rooted lifestyles and distinctive individualities. And then the author weaves the entire tale together with her incredibly poetic, heartfelt and sincere writing style:

"Trees grew on either side of the driveway and they reached across and intertwined branches to make a long, dark tunnel. These trees were as lazy and heavy as the air. Instead of reaching up toward the sky, the bottom branches of Aigredoux's trees lay across the ground. Tennyson almost expected them to yawn and wake up and stretch their branches toward the sky where they belonged. But they didn't wake up; they just kept sleeping their drugged slumber. Thick gray Spanish moss hung from every branch, sullenly drinking up the light and looking like ghost clothes that had been flung up there to dry."

TENNYSON is a wonderful book!

--- Reviewed by Chris Shanley-Dillman, author of FINDING MY LIGHT and THE BLACK POND

TENNYSON is atmospheric and moody as a dream, yet full of historical fact, conscience, and humor. Even the houses come to life in this wonderful third novel by a talented writer.

Eleven-year-old Tennyson Fontaine and her younger sister Hattie are sent to live at Aigredoux, an old plantation, after their mother deserts the family during the Depression. While at Aigredoux, Tennyson has dreams of what the old plantation was like before the war. She sets out to write these stories and hopes to get the Sophisticate magazine to publish them in order for her mother to come back home.

I really enjoyed this story. The idea of an old Southern plantation revealing it's secrets to a young girl is fascinating. Blume's descriptions of the South are lush and rich.

I especially liked Tennyson and her desire to write the truth even when her Aunt Henriette still clings to the past.

A must read for those who enjoy historicals that deal with the South.

Lesley M.N. Blume's TENNYSON is set in 1932 in the Depression era in the South, and tells of Tennyson Fontqaine and her sister Hattie, who live in a rickety shack with their family and dogs. When their mother vanishes one day and their father leaves home to find her, the girls find themselves in a relative's Louisiana mansion - now a ruin - and it's up to Tennyson to uncover the secrets beyond the mansion's history - and perhaps save her family.

Why would anyone write a book for young children where a mother abandons her family, and then sends her daughter a letter saying she is not coming back? Kids have enough weird stuff coming at them these days without someone planting the idea that mom may leave them and never return. Very disappointed.