Summit Avenue

Rating:
Summary: Haunting, moving, deeply poetic
Review: From the very first page of this book, I felt as if I were in a lovely trance. I responded to it on a deeply personal level, as a writer who loves language, as a woman, as a person who is enchanted with tales as a window into human experience. I felt as if Mary Sharratt had written this book uniquely for me, but I know that many, many others will feel the same way. Others have summarized the plot so I don't need to go into that here. This is one of the books on my shelf that will surely show the tatters of a hundred more readings in years to come.

Rating:
Summary: A Poignant, Unexpected Love
Review: I have edited my original review of this book. Because while I,
personally desired a different reaction from the main character, Kathrin, I've come to realize she behaved the way most young women in the 1800's would have.

Kathrin is a young woman whose inability to think "outside the box" of traditional ideas, leds her to make some very bad decisions. By the time she realizes this, the course has been set and circumstances are such her options have become quite limited.

Kathrin causes not only herself a great deal of unnecessary anguish, but tremendous emotional pain for Violet Waverly, as well.

The book ends before the two main characters meet again, but
knowing the characters so well by that time, I felt happiness
was surely within reach.

Rating:
Summary: Too bad it ended
Review: Mary Sharratt is a wonderful writer, quite frankly, a writer to be envied, and if I can say this without hexing her, an old-fashioned writer. By that I mean not merely that the book is set in early 1900's - and she does put us right into the look and feel of Minneapolis and that era very well - but that she writes closely and carefully and thoughtfully and persistently and richly. So much writing today does not seek to engage the reader at any level beneath the most obvious. I like her style. All of her metaphors and allusions and analogies and similes are lovely and they tie into mood, mode, theme, premonition and each other - as well as the basic story level - seamlessly, exquisitely. This is obviously a book that women will enjoy, but anyone who enjoys rich language and writing will enjoy it, and anyone who enjoys reading about the life of the imagination, forming narratives as consciousness, layers of reality, and a sense of history, immigration life will enjoy it. The book is sumptuous. Her language, choice of words, imagery, is supple, allusive, suggestive - and consistent with her story - in a natural and earthy way. For example, she describes a woman's skin as "glowing like the inside of a shell" at one point, a vivid erotic description, yet the mother of pearliness also carries multiple meanings.

The story is a tender, tumultuous, very feminine meditation on love, desire, identity, self-exile, consciousness, and cultural transition and growth. An intellectual middle-aged widow hires a young German mill girl, an immigrant, to help her translate fairy tales, her late husband's last ethnology project. Tantalizingly ambiguous themes and secrets and mysteries unfold like narratives within narratives, like fairy tales, like dreams until they build into a life that the young woman is preapred to accept and thrive in.

The exploration of the evolving relationship, which includes a sense of discovery for both Violet and Kathrin, as they trade roles, maiden and mother, mentor and student, sisters and lovers, is beautiful and empowering and hopeful, regardless of your gender. I've already said too much. As a man who enjoys all kinds of literature, with no set reading pattern, this was a pleasant find. Absolutely sublime.

Rating:
Summary: Great Novel on Minnesota History
Review: Mary Sharratt's new book , Summit Avenue , is a great novel about a German immigrant to the USA . Kathrin Albrecht, a German teenager when her mother dies, emigrates to the USA to start her American dream. The historical detail about Minneapolis is very fascinating, and the reader gets a better understanding of the living conditions of young female immigrants to the USA in the beginning of the 20th century. The details about Germans in the USA during WW1 are interesting. Also very fascinating is the use of fairy tales throughtout the book. The book is divided into 3 sections, and each section has a fairy tale that forms the backbone of this specific phase Kathrin goes through in life. The fairy tales are vry different from the fairy tales one reads a lot these days -- they are full of original images, and do not have a happy ending. They have nothing in common with the happy endings we know from Walt Disney. The real end of the book however is very beautiful, full of hope and love.

Rating:
Summary: Great Choice for Book Discussion Groups
Review: SUMMIT AVENUE is a great pick for book discussion groups, because different readers can find many different things in the book. It explores archetypal psychology, working class women in the early twentieth century, fairy tales and women's inner lives and dreams. It's also a love story and a spiritual quest. There's plenty there for both the mind and the heart and soul. Highly recommended.

Rating:
Summary: A novel that the careful reader would enjoy...
Review: The very title of this work, SUMMIT AVENUE, makes one think of tree shaded streets, in prim mid-western towns at the turn of the century -- American's so-called "Golden Age". Yet Mary Sharratt weaves a tale that is as timeless and as far reaching as any being written today. Perhaps even more.

The intimate level of detail -- my favorite scene is Kathrin's first day at the mill -- belies a smoothly written storyline, a depth of character rarely found in first novels. This is the sort of book that will speak to you, no matter what your own bounderies may be. Read this book. You will not be disappointed.

Rating:
Summary: A gem-like novel
Review: This is a poetic novel of longing, the timeless story of a young woman yearning to find herself and her place in an unfamiliar world. As an immigrant steeped in the fairy tales of her native Germany, Kathrin struggles to build a new life in the flour mills of Minneapolis during the World War I era. She perseveres in learning English, dreams of books and college and being loved. Unexpectedly swept into a different world by an elegant and cultured woman who hires her to translate German folk tales, Kathrin soon arrives at an emotional crossroads. The author does a lovely job of blending rich historical detail with the psychological and emotional resonances of ancient folk tales. Readers will be swept away by the story and yet think long afterward about its many layers. This is one of my favorite books of the year.

Rating:
Summary: A novel that the careful reader would enjoy...
Review: This poetic novel is not only moving, but is intelligent and carefully measured. The author is attuned to the pressures compelling her characters, to the sources of their longing, and the dignity that lend them tenacity and strength. Hers is a beautiful tale of the power of language to create stories that inhabit and transfigure our lives. There is much to be admired in this book. Sharratt takes us through the supple surfaces of her heroine's tales, but also brings to light how such tales translate into the present. One that begins in displacement, a German girl worlds away from home, the novel's story comes to encompass reunion, too. I recommend this book to anyone who reads in order to approach a deeper understanding of the conflicting experiences that enrich and complicate our lives. The book shimmers with a subtle clarity rare even to the realm of literature. A miracle of a book.