Up High in the Trees: A Novel [Hardcover]

Kiara Brinkman (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: July 10, 2007

An exquisite debut novel about a family in turmoil told in the startling, deeply affecting voice of a nine-year-old, autistic boy. Following the sudden death of Sebby’s mother, his father takes Sebby to live in the family’s summerhouse, hoping it will give them both time and space to recover. But Sebby’s father deteriorates in this new isolation, leaving Sebby struggling to understand his mother’s death alone, dreaming and even re-living moments of her life. He ultimately reaches out to a favorite teacher back home and to two nearby children who force him out of the void of the past and help him to exist in the present. In spare and gorgeous prose buoyed by the life force of its small, fearless narrator, Up High in the Trees introduces an astonishingly fresh and powerful literary voice.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

The Asperger's afflicted narrator of Brinkman's sincere, sober debut struggles to cope with his pregnant mother's recent death after she was hit by a car. Already keenly sensitive to emotional and sensory stimuli, Sebby Lane finds his mother's loss almost unbearable; he acts out at school, biting a girl on the shoulder. Sebby's father, Stephen, is nearly unable to function, and, in an attempt to help both Sebby and himself, takes Sebby to the family summer home, hoping that a change of scenery will ease their mourning. Once there, however, Stephen slips ever deeper into his misery. Sebby, however, reaches out, writing letters to his teacher and befriending two unpleasant neighbor children. Though the narrative direction is muzzy and the conclusion is saccharine with forced uplift, the cast is portrayed with keen sympathy and sensitivity—no easy task with a young, on-the-spectrum narrator. Told in brief poetic vignettes, the novel moves quickly and episodically, like a series of snapshots from the camera of Sebby's unique mind. (July)
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From The Washington Post

Reviewed by Ron Charles

No one could blame you for turning away from Kiara Brinkman's haunting first novel. The muffled pain of Up High in the Trees will trigger your reflex for emotional protection but, if you can bear it, the treasures here are exquisite. I can't remember when I ever felt so torn between recoiling from a story and wishing I could somehow cross into its pages and comfort a character.

Brinkman's narrator, 8-year-old Sebby Lane, lives in Massachusetts with his father, a music professor at Wellesley, and his older sister and brother. All of them are rubbed raw with grief, clinging to their routines just to stay alive. Five months earlier Sebby's mother was hit and killed by a car while jogging at night. She had been pregnant, carrying a baby they had already named Sara Rose. In vignettes that range from just a few lines to a couple of pages, Sebby describes the harrowing months that follow his mother's death. He becomes increasingly confused and angry, aggressive and incommunicative. When he's suspended from the third grade, his father takes him to their summer house in Vermont, hoping the setting will give them both a chance to heal. But instead, his father quickly slides into a crippling depression, growing quieter and stiller until he's spending whole days lying on the floor listening to music or wandering barefoot through the snowy woods. Sebby is left to care for himself, bravely struggling to fathom the tragedy that tore their lives apart.

It's clear that he and his mother adored each other and sought refuge in a special emotional space amid this family. "I used to write notes to Mother," he tells us, "and hide them in places." Now, he's left with his memories of her, memories he's desperate to retain. "I can't fall asleep," he says one night, "because I know what I want is to remember everything Mother did." But even in the family stories that he polishes over and over, ominous implications about his mother's mental health seep through; her death seems less and less accidental.

Believe me, I have no interest in the kind of masochistic sentimentality this plot suggests, but it's saved from mawkishness by an arresting balance of delicacy and resiliency. Sebby speaks in a quiet, poetic voice, swollen with sorrow, but pared down to the point of austerity. Here's one of these vignettes in its entirety:

"Dad's waiting for us in the kitchen. He's sitting with his elbows on the table. Between his elbows, there's his black coffee mug with steam twisting up. I walk over to him. Dad grabs me and holds me against his loud chest. I put my hand over his heart and feel it beating. Dad stands up with me. He walks in circles around the table.

"Goddamn it, he says. He sets me down and looks at me with his hands on my shoulders and then he hugs me too hard."

Again and again we see Sebby's acute sensitivity to smells and sounds, his startling sense of the world around him: "Straight ahead," he says, "the empty white sky gets brighter. I look down at my lap, but the white sky glow stays and makes me see glowing spots all over. It's true that the sun can make you blind if you look at it for too long. I close my eyes tight and think about how the sun fills up the whole sky with light. Then my head is quiet and there's the sound of trees growing, stretching up and up. The trees are growing and making everything else small."

This is a novel in which the smallest, quietest moments are the most shattering. In one, Sebby takes a favorite picture of his mother and throws it in the lake. "I stand up with my hand hanging down heavy," he says, "and I watch the picture underwater. I'm waiting for Mother's picture to make me jump. Then Mother's face flickers dark and I jump in to save her." It's a weird little ritual, almost too intimate to endure, like so much of this heartbreaking novel, which should be read in a single, reverent hush.

Although none of the characters names his condition, Sebby exhibits symptoms of autism, probably a milder form called Asperger's syndrome. He can speak, but only in short sentences that sometimes seem inappropriate or illogical. He takes great comfort in routine and shuts down when stressed, retreating to hiding places under his bed or under tables. But he displays none of the savant abilities associated with autism in the popular imagination. (Thanks for nothing, "Rainman.") Though Sebby's family must deal with the exasperating demands of his condition at all times, his condition never becomes the focus of the novel. Readers who enjoyed Mark Haddon's The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time will find this an entirely different book -- narrower emotionally and thematically. But like Haddon, Brinkman has tutored youngsters with autism, and parents of autistic children will find her sensitive portrayal of Sebby particularly moving.

And yet I can't emphasize enough that Up High in the Trees is not a novel about autism, a condition that affects nearly 1 percent of us; it's about grief, a condition that affects 100 percent of us at one time or another. Compared to the dysfunction all around him, Sebby's mental condition doesn't seem so peculiar at all. Indeed, in Brinkman's handling, autism becomes an illuminating metaphor for the isolating effects of mourning, and Sebby's innocent voice speaks for anyone bravely grasping for order and solace amid unspeakable loss.

Copyright 2007, The Washington Post. All Rights Reserved.

Product Details

• Hardcover: 336 pages
• Publisher: Grove Press; 1ST edition (July 10, 2007)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 080211847X
• ISBN-13: 978-0802118479
• Product Dimensions: 8.4 x 5.7 x 1.2 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 3.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (16 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,384,366 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

14 of 15 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Definitely worth reading!, June 22, 2007

By 

Amber Mitchell (Woodland, CA United States) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Up High in the Trees: A Novel (Hardcover)

I have just finished Up High in the Trees in one sitting. It is very engaging and makes you continue reading even though it's getting a little dark and it's hard to see. I would recommend it whether or not you are familiar with autistic/asperger children. Brinkman's style has you fully believing you reading a story through the eyes of an eight year old boy after the first ten pages. I found myself immersed in the storyline and feeling as though I was getting to know the main character, Sebby, on a personal level. For a first novel, I feel Brinkman has made a clear statement that she is a very talented writer and I am looking forward to her next work.

7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Up High In The Trees, July 13, 2007

By 

H. Kuratek - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Up High in the Trees: A Novel (Hardcover)

This is a wonderful, wonderful book. Although it does shed light on what it might be like to view the world as an autistic/Asberger's child, that issue is just one element in this unique and beautiful story. The author draws the reader so close into the feelings and perspective of the 8-year old narrator, you begin to identify with him and to see how his experiences reflect how we all deal with intimate tragedies.

Buy this book, you will be glad you did!!

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars 3.5 stars, July 11, 2010

By 

Kathleen Wagner (SWPA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Up High in the Trees: A Novel (Paperback)

This is a story told from the POV of an eight year old boy whose world has suddenly tilted him into a darker version of what it used to be. His mother died. The boy Sebastian, or Sebby as he is called is the main character. It may be that Sebby has Asperger's, although no one comes out to say so. He has a view of life that is very individual, and although endearing, it is often very sad.

This young boy tells of his mother's death and how the family copes, and in some cases fails to. Very important characters are Leo and Cass, his older brother and sister, who each demonstrates a strength and determination far beyond what is typical.

This is not an exciting book. It is rather sad, but even though sadness is a thread that runs through it from beginning to end, there is so much more to it. Hope is important to me. I like having hope. I like reading stories that give me hope. This story is hopeful, but not until the very end. Still, having hope when you need it is the most important time to have hope.

And then, there's love...and then there's love.