The Dive From Clausen's Pier: A Novel
by Ann Packer
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Book Summary Information
Author: Ann PackerEdition: Paperback
Audio: English (Original Language); English (Unknown); English (Published)
Published: 2003-04-08
ISBN: 0375727132
Number of pages: 432
Publisher: Vintage
Product features:
- ISBN13: 9780375727139
- Condition: NEW
- Notes: Brand New from Publisher. No Remainder Mark.
Book Reviews of The Dive From Clausen's Pier: A Novel
Book Review: Choices
Summary: 5 Stars
This is the story of one year in the life of Carrie Bell, a young midwestern woman. The writer goes deep into the lady's thoughts, actions,and feelings, her relationships with all her friends, her ambitions and the two men important in her life.
Carrue is a twenty three year old who has always lived a conservative life; she graduated from high school, obtained a college degree, dated the same boy since her early teens and had the same best friend since second grade. She was born and grew up in the city of Madison, Wisconson. Now she feels she needs to enlarge her life and choices. She has loved sewing, been fascinated with different types of fabrics and pours over books of clothing designing.
Then comes the tragic accident; Mike Meyers dives from Clausen Pier and is left a paraplegic. He spends weeks in the hospital. Carrie feels it is her fault; Mike was trying toimpress her. Carrie does not want to rush into marriage, her feelings for Mike has cooled. She wants to try other options before she settles down. And she is young and has her whole life ahead outside of Madison, Wisconsin. So she does.
Overwhelmed, and who can blame her, she hops in her car and drives all the way to New York. She has a gay man friend who has invited her to come to the Big Apple and stay and she does. Carrie meets most of his friends and finds a lover who she had metwhile Kilroy was visiting Madison. Carrie signs up for expensive clothing designing courses which she loves. But Kilroy is a strange one. He dislikes all of his family because of a reason that happened many years ago. For this he cannot forgive them. He wants nothing to do with any of them. He loves Carrie and wants to marry her. He is seven years younger than Carrie's mother.
Carrie goes back and forth in her mind, missing Mike, comparing him with Kilroy, missing her
friends in Madison, comparing them with the New York friends. When she goes back to visit Madison she misses the excitement of New York; in New York she misses the
lakes, parks and comparative quiet of Madison.
Finally Carrie makes her choice. Whether it is the right one or not is up to the reader to decide.
Summary of The Dive From Clausen's Pier: A Novel
How much do we owe the people we love? Is it a sign of strength or weakness to walk away from someone in need? These questions lie at the heart of Ann Packer's intimate and emotionally thrilling new novel, which has won its author comparisons with Jane Hamilton and Sue Miller.At the age of twenty-three Carrie Bell has spent her entire life in Wisconsin, with the same best friend and the same dependable, easygoing, high school sweetheart. Now to her dismay she has begun to find this life suffocating and is considering leaving it-and Mike-behind. But when Mike is paralyzed in a diving accident, leaving seems unforgivable and yet more necessary than ever. The Dive from Clausen's Pier animates this dilemma-and Carrie's startling response to it-with the narrative assurance, exacting realism, and moral complexity we expect from the very best fiction.
Carrie Bell is the worst person in the world. Or so she would have you think. In the gripping, carefully paced debut novel of personal epiphany, The Dive from Clausen's Pier, by O. Henry Award winner Ann Packer, Carrie's very survival is dependent upon her leaving her fianc?, even after he dives into shallow water at a Memorial Day picnic and becomes paralyzed. Things hadn't been going so well for the Madison, Wisconsin, high school and college sweethearts. Carrie knew, deep down, that she wasn't going to become Mrs. Michael Mayer. But expectations and pressure from all sides--his family, her mother, her best friend Jamie, Mike's best friend Rooster--force Carrie to shut herself up in her room and sew outfits of her own design as if in a trance. Then one night she slips out of the only universe she's ever known. Many hours later she finds herself on the doorstep of a high school classmate living in Manhattan. Carrie's adventures in the city--quirky roommates and a new romance with an older, emotionally impenetrable man--confuse her in her quest both to forgive herself and to embark on a career in fashion design. Packer writes in a convincing voice and packs a lot into this novel; she infuses Carrie with enough humanity and smarts to choose her own version of "happily ever after." --Emily Russin
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