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Title: Ladder of Years by Anne Tyler ISBN: 0-8041-1347-5 Publisher: Ivy Books Pub. Date: 30 March, 1997 Format: Mass Market Paperback Volumes: 1 List Price(USD): $7.99 |
Average Customer Rating: 3.48 (154 reviews)
Rating: 2
Summary: Not Tyler's Best Work
Comment: If you have seen the movie Accidental Tourist or read the book, don't waist your time reading the Ladder of Years. It felt as if Tyler had taken her wonderfully written book Accidental Tourist and re-written it - badly. In the Accidental Tourist, the main character had a sister that was perpetually single, same in this book. The A. T. had a character who was focused on people speaking improper English, same in this book. Both books main characters marriages are close to ending and both main characters are uncaring. The similarities go on and on. That aside, the biggest problem I had with this book was that the main character never experienced any type of personal growth. She left her husband, really without any thought or plans, to live an invisible life. She wasn't happy or unhappy in this new existence, just there. In the end, she walks away again to return to the old life without expressing her feelings or needs to her husband. It was as if she took a hiatus from her life and family without any thought or remorse for their feelings. This book left me feeling very disappointed.
Rating: 4
Summary: O.K., but Tyler disappoints in the final analysis.
Comment: Tyler uses language very well and, in that sense, the book is a delight to read. On a few occasions I was positively delighted at some turn of phrase, description, or insight. In general,though, in reading Ladder of Years, I remembered why I hadn't read anything by Tyler since The Accidental Tourist. I really can't get that involved with her characters. Her women are so frustratingly out of touch and are not very interesting characters. They seem to lack emotional depth. Tyler tells us Delia cries herself to sleep every night for a long time, but she never convinces me that Delia has the emotional reactions I would expect a mother to have when she leaves her children and the rest of her family whom she claims to love.
The extraneous characters, who became Delia's friends, didn't make much sense to me. ( What was the point of Mr. Lamb? Another very desperate woman? or another man who Delia didn't see clearly?) I did like the growth in Delia when she developed a better relationship with Eleanor and even with
Joel's ex-wife. I wish these kind of relationships would have been developed more. I do think Delia is beginning to gain some insight at the end of the book.
Rating: 2
Summary: Plodding all the way...
Comment: I am, I confess, only a third through this book and thinking I will put it down. Now remind me: why did this author win the Pulitzer? I've read five of her books, and liked Patchwork Planet best, but even that, sweet as it was...well, I do not think that Ann Tyler writes "beautifully." She writes ploddingly. Yes, her writing leads you on. You keep hoping the next sentences will actually lead to something important in the plot or character development. Ho-hum. They don't.
In reference to this book: what is the point of going from the archetype of MOM and WIFE to SECRETARY? Now, if I were writing this book I would have plunged Delia back into another life...made it more "Twilight Zone"-like. That would have added at least a soupcon of spice...as it is, "Ladder" is flat, unsalted, dietetic, in short, not tasty. All those who enjoy a taste-less book, raise your hands. Deafening silence.
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Title: If Morning Ever Comes by Anne Tyler ISBN: 0449911780 Publisher: Ballantine Books Pub. Date: 27 August, 1996 List Price(USD): $12.95 |
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Title: A Slipping-Down Life by Anne Tyler ISBN: 0804108862 Publisher: Ivy Books Pub. Date: 23 August, 1992 List Price(USD): $6.99 |
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Title: A Patchwork Planet by Anne Tyler ISBN: 080411918X Publisher: Ballantine Books Pub. Date: 01 May, 2001 List Price(USD): $7.50 |
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Title: Saint Maybe by Anne Tyler ISBN: 0804108749 Publisher: Ivy Books Pub. Date: 23 August, 1992 List Price(USD): $7.99 |
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Title: Back When We Were Grownups by Anne Tyler ISBN: 0345446860 Publisher: Ballantine Books Pub. Date: 09 April, 2002 List Price(USD): $14.95 |
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