Rating: 
Summary: Distorted Portrait
Review: Rachel Jensen appeared to have the ideal family setting. A former executive, she married Ned Jensen, a free lance artist whom she met in the mid-1980s while still a graduate student. She shared an interest in art with Ned, which led to a lasting relationship.
Their daughter, Kate, was conceived prior to their marriage and Rachel's mother, whom I found domineering and annoying did everything possible to try to control the young couple's lives. The Jensens moved from New York to rural North Hawthorne, New Hampshire so Ned could continue with his art and they could raise Kate in a small town.
In late 2001, Rachel joyfully discovers she is pregnant again. Saddened over Kate's deteriorating behavior, Rachel views the new baby as a hopeful promise. She and Ned hold off on telling Kate and plan on telling her together, but Rachel's mother upsets that apple cart as well. I didn't like the way Rachel's mother snooped each time she vistited her daughter and son-in-law; I didn't like the way she bossed Rachel around even after Rachel was herself a mother! I actually cheered when Rachel said to Ned, "Call a cab for my mother. She's leaving now," and Ned responding by saying he would drive her to the airport himself.
More unrest with Kate ensues. She witnesses the birth of her brother, Joshua and is traumatized when she believes Rachel's life is on the line. An ugly scene with Ned ensues and Kate flees into the night. More problems with her crop up and a devastating accident Kate has while caring for her brother send her into a tail spin.
A devastating series of accusations throughout the Jensen family take place and the family becomes an armed camp. Instead of the cheerful portraits Ned painted and photographs that grace their home, the Jensens become militants, armed against Kate. As her behavior deteriorates further, she is forcibly enrolled in a secure facility.
No promises are made and this book is not a "quick fix, feel good" formulaic series of plots and ending. Instead, it is a good hard look at actions, consequences and the very real no man's land of questions without answers.
I heartily recommend this book and would happily read more works by this author. I also like the book list included at the back of this book and Dani Shapiro now has me as an avid follower.
Rating:
Summary: Recommended
Review: The best books touch us physically in some way or another. I had a knot in my stomach as I read this book. I think any parent can identify with what this family is going through, as far as some of our greatest fears for our families.
Rating:
Summary: ABSOLUTELY RIVETING
Review: This was by far, one of the best books I have read in the past 2 years- it is such a thriller and written in such a great, literary (but never boring), tense, and emotional manner.
Please buy- I loved this book and hope to find many more like it!
Rating:
Summary: What has Katie Jensen done?
Review: What has Katie Jensen done? How did this New England teenager all but destroy her Hawthorne,MA family? Why has Katie's mother, Rachel Jensen been thinking lately about "what it takes to unravel a life, not just one life, but the fabric of a family, carefully woven together with love and faith over the years.
Dani Shapiro's "Family History" begins with Rachel Jensen confessing to the reader that she "lies in bed these days and watches home movies" In the first chapter, the reader can see the damage done by the Jensen's teenage daughter. Rachel and Katie's father, Ned Jensen are separated. Ned now lives in a condo complex called "Pine Dunes" but nicknamed "Divorced Dad Dunes" by Rachel and Ned earlier in their marriage when they thought nothing could split them apart. Ned is no longer a teacher at the local academy but is now employed by his affluent parents as a real estate agent for their real estate firm, Jensen Reality. The Jensen's youngest child, two-year old Josh is not developing as fast as his peers at The Little Acorn preschool.
"Family History," told through Rachel's eyes, bounces from the past within Rachel's memory to the cold harshness of the present day. Shapiro expertly takes the reader on an emotional journey of the love, anger, guilt, resentment, forgivness and redemption that exists in every family to some degree. Shapiro's novel reinforces the notion that struggles make families stronger both as individuals and as a whole.
I would recommend this novel to those readers who enjoy a true to life story of the struggles that families face everyday and to those readers who want to understand the extraordinary strength it takes for families to make it through the devastating "storms of life" and how they are still hanging on to one another after the wind and rain dies away.
Rating:
Summary: What has Katie Jensen done?
Review: What has Katie Jensen done? How did this New England teenager all but destroy her Hawthorne,MA family? Why has Katie's mother, Rachel Jensen been thinking lately about "what it takes to unravel a life, not just one life, but the fabric of a family, carefully woven together with love and faith over the years.
Dani Shapiro's "Family History" begins with Rachel Jensen confessing to the reader that she "lies in bed these days and watches home movies" In the first chapter, the reader can see the damage done by the Jensen's teenage daughter. Rachel and Katie's father, Ned Jensen are separated. Ned now lives in a condo complex called "Pine Dunes" but nicknamed "Divorced Dad Dunes" by Rachel and Ned earlier in their marriage when they thought nothing could split them apart. Ned is no longer a teacher at the local academy but is now employed by his affluent parents as a real estate agent for their real estate firm, Jensen Reality. The Jensen's youngest child, two-year old Josh is not developing as fast as his peers at The Little Acorn preschool.
"Family History," told through Rachel's eyes, bounces from the past within Rachel's memory to the cold harshness of the present day. Shapiro expertly takes the reader on an emotional journey of the love, anger, guilt, resentment, forgivness and redemption that exists in every family to some degree. Shapiro's novel reinforces the notion that struggles make families stronger both as individuals and as a whole.
I would recommend this novel to those readers who enjoy a true to life story of the struggles that families face everyday and to those readers who want to understand the extraordinary strength it takes for families to make it through the devastating "storms of life" and how they are still hanging on to one another after the wind and rain dies away.
Rating:
Summary: True
Review: When I picked up 'Family History' at the local library, I groaned inwardly at such a title and thought it might be boring. Then I started reading it at 11pm last night in bed and at 6pm the next day, I'm almost finished. I've never read a Dani Shapiro novel before, but found this book brilliant because it's true and believeable. As a teenager with chronic depression, I can feel for both Rachel and her daughter Kate. When Rachel and Ned, her husband, pick up Kate from summer camp, they find Kate to have changed, and what they see ends up becoming the tip of the ice-berg. It's difficult for Kate to tell her parents how she feels, and within my depression I have felt much the same way. There are good and bad times throughout it, and though Kate obviously has a far worse mental illness, crossing the border into schizophrenia, I can feel her pain. I suspect Rachel also suffers from depression, but it is less obvious to her, and I am able to feel her pain as well, as in my darker days I think everyone's lives are far better than mine (though I've got a good life, wonderful family and friends.) For these reasons, I've thoroughly enjoyed 'Family History' and am rather upset to be almost at its end.
|
