Walk Among Birches [Hardcover]

Carol McAfee (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: October 2002

In this absorbing and heartfelt novel, Carol McAfee balances despair and enlightenment, doubt and passion, to expose the crushing weight of depression and the salvation to be found in surviving.

After suffering the tragic loss of her infant son, Janey Nichols descends into a deep, airless depression. No longer able to handle everyday life or care for her husband and eight-year-old daughter, the ordered pieces of her life shatter and fall away.

In her search for a "normal" life, Janey is left only with questions. What does her marriage mean? What is true friendship? Whom can she trust? On her path of recovery, Janey’s journey reveals startling family secrets and the bonds of friendship between women.

Poignant, courageous and deeply moving, Walk among Birches evokes the staggering pain and suffering that is borne of depression—and the hope that struggles to emerge out of ultimate tragedy.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

This earnest third novel by McAfee (The Climbing Tree) centers on a young woman who, suicidal after the stillbirth of her son, winds up in a psychiatric ward and begins a long course of psychotherapy and soul-searching. Isolated from her family and crippled by depression, Janey Nichols slowly draws close to some of the others on the ward, especially the charming, flamboyant Delphina, a battered alcoholic, who Janey begins to realize just might be worse off than her. The stillbirth brings up Janey's suppressed memories of her little brother's childhood death, for which she feels responsible, as well as her mother's alcoholism. Just as Janey finally begins to confront these facts, an unexpected betrayal and Delphina's self-destructiveness threaten to short-circuit her recovery. Janey's ability to pull out buried memories on cue is somewhat implausible, and McAfee's prose is unremarkable, pitted with awkward therapeutic dialogue and some overwrought similes (teeth are described as looking like "little tombstones in the darkness"). Yet readers who stick with the novel through its slow start will be rewarded with some genuinely moving scenes in which Janey comes to understand both her own and Delphina's struggles. Moreover, buried in the book is an unexpectedly provocative suggestion that makes it stand out from other trauma-and-recovery novels: McAfee implies that some depression may be self-inflicted.
Copyright 2002 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Booklist

After the stillbirth of her son, Janey Nichols becomes so depressed that she attempts suicide and is hospitalized. She can't sleep, she can't eat, and she refuses to talk about her grief. Her only friend in the ward is Delphina, a funny, larger-than-life black woman. Janey can barely manage to hold it together to greet her patient husband and worried nine-year-old daughter, feeling that she has let them down. Somehow, in between her feeble attempts at art therapy, she finds the strength to go home, where she must deal with fights with her husband and ineffective attempts to get Delphina into a shelter for battered women. Postpartum depression is a timely topic, but it will take a better novel than this one to do it justice. The story's power is diluted by the author's shotgun approach to thematic development: along with depression, the field is crowded with other "big" themes (spousal abuse and infidelity). Still, McAfee's feel for setting, especially the psychiatric ward, is undeniably effective, and the novel's timeliness may draw interest. Joanne Wilkinson
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

Product Details

• Hardcover: 288 pages
• Publisher: Sourcebooks (October 2002)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 157071908X
• ISBN-13: 978-1570719080
• Product Dimensions: 9.1 x 5.9 x 1.2 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (5 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,851,578 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

5.0 out of 5 stars Great Character Development, November 3, 2002

By 

Julie McDill (Baltimore, WA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Walk Among Birches (Hardcover)

This book has some great characters! Delphina is one of the best. She is street smart, mouthy, sensitive and soft all at the same time. I like the scene where she sneaks in a pack of cigarettes into the psyc ward.
Julie McDIll

5.0 out of 5 stars Great Woman's Fiction!, November 3, 2002

By 

Julie McDill (Baltimore, WA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Walk Among Birches (Hardcover)

Carol MCAfee's "Walk Among Birches" is a triumph! I was moved by the author's openness and raw courage as she depicted her character's struggle with depression. McAfee makes the reader feel as if she is actually there in the psychiatric hospital, in that grieving home, right beside Janie on her pilgrimmage toward healing. This is a must for anyone who has struggled with depression.

5.0 out of 5 stars This is a very interesting book, November 3, 2002

By 

Ralph Arnsdorf (Baltimore, Maryland United States) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Walk Among Birches (Hardcover)

I read this book and I loved it. I got a real feel for the characters and when I read it I couldn't put it down. The story was interesting and the characters seemed so real.