The Dive From Clausen's Pier: A Novel by Ann Packer
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Book Reviews of The Dive From Clausen's Pier: A Novel
Book Review: A book to help you reflect on your own innate personality
Summary: 5 Stars
"The Dive From Clausen's Pier" -- by Ann PackerA female author also wrote the second book I read in January (the first being "The Lovely Bones"). I won't hide the fact that many elements of both stories contained those foreign viewpoints that only women understand because most men are really from Mars (or is it Venus). That statement aside, I was mesmerized by this story. Ann Packer is a faultless writer, a stickler to details, a magnet for vibrant words and a connoisseur of character development. The rich dialog unfolded as if the author followed the main character through the real-life story with a tape recorder. Although the novel was based on a relatively simple premise, the transformation of the main character (Carrie Bell) was gut wrenching.
You see, all of us are one accident, one death, one tragedy or one broken relationship away from a world-shattering/soul-shifting crisis. Are we stronger when we face the tragic event head on or are we stronger when we muster up the courage to turn our back on the horrific event and start our lives over again? I've had a few occasions in my life where I was tempted to run away and start over. Ultimately, the same "you" ends up in the new setting. Things don't change. You sure as hell don't change. Problems that existed prior to the escape are still present.
Carrie Bell's story occurs in three acts. During the first act, Carrie's life is abruptly changed when her estranged boyfriend makes an ill-fated dive from Clausen's Pier. During the second act, Carrie escapes from her small Wisconsin town and starts over again in New York City. Act three contains the real shocker. Carrie has started a brand new life in New York complete with new friends, a new boyfriend and a new career direction. Would she run away from this life and go back to Wisconsin? Should she be described as despicable, selfish and unsympathetic or should she be regarded as a woman just trying to do the right thing in the best way that she knows how? Ultimately, that becomes the reader's pronouncement.
"The Dive From Clausen's Pier" gave me many things to ponder. Sometimes, I placed the book on the floor and reflected on my own innate personality. This story (finely crafted by Ann Packer) allowed me to analyze my own life-choices, my own spirit my own faith and just as importantly, my own flaws and insecurities. Could anymore be asked of a novel?
My Grade A
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.
Book Review: Fast compelling read
Summary: 5 Stars
This is one of the best books I've read in a long time, because it was fast, really fast, but it made me think, and I won't forget it right away. The main character Carrie Bell is at a place in her life where she wants to move on from her hometown and her highschool sweetheart Mike, who she's not really sure she wants to marry. But, Mike has a tragic accident that leaves him quadriplegic, and nothing will ever be the same for Mike or Carrie.
The character of Carrie is a little weak. I never felt like I really knew her even though I was in her head, perhaps because she kept making choices that really surprised me; they didn't seem to fit who I thought her character was. But, also because I didn't know whether she really loved her fiance Mike, her best friend Jamie, her new boyfriend Kilroy, or even her mother, which is strange.
However, the book really made me think about a lot of things. First, what it would be like for Mike to overnight go from being an athlete to a quadripede. I have a friend who has spent a lot of his life taking care of his quadriplegic son (a young man who was injured in a similar kind of accident) and the book really touched me because of that. I felt like I understood my friend a lot better after reading it.
I think Carrie's relationships in Madison were pretty realistic. Breaking away from highschool friends and significant others is a hard thing to do, especially in a town like Madison where you don't have to. You grow apart, but you're still together. I could relate to that. I also liked that Carrie sewed. I don't sew, but I found Packer's descriptions of it riveting, and it actually made me want to start. And, finally, I loved the character of Kilroy. I almost feel like I knew Kilroy, because the character was so like someone I knew long ago. He's a complex, interesting character.
So, while I thought the book was flawed, the good parts outweighed the bad. And, even though a lot of Carrie's decisions made me cringe, I am so glad I read this book. I thought it would be depressing when I read the back of it, but, by the end, it was uplifting. I highly recommend it.
Book Review: What would you do if you were Carrie?
Summary: 5 Stars
My mother reccomended this book to me and while I was a little hesitant since her selections are a little different than mine, once I started reading it, I was hooked. The story gets right into the mind of Carrie and her doubts of her relationship with her high school sweetheart Mike. As their traditional memorial day trip to the lake ended in a total tragity leaving Mike paralized after trying to impress the girl he loved so much who was slowly slipping away, the author takes you on an emotional rollercoaster with Carrie and all the thoughts and obsticals she had to overcome. There were a few times when I wanted to cry, times when I was so upset I had to put the book down, and times when I was holding on to the small glimmer of hope that was left for Carrie and Mike. Once the fact that he was never going to walk again sunk into Carrie's mind, it scared her even more. Since the relationship was already on the outs, and everyone around them could see it, Carrie makes a break, otherwise known as running away, to New York to try and discover herself once again. (Even though that really frustrated me, I kept reading.) While trying to rid herself of her Madison memories and what life was like in the "dull" town, Carrie finally realizes that her heart, family, and everything she knows is back in Madison. You're taken on a ride with her emotions, how indecisive she becomes when faced to choose between love and lust. Should she stay in NY or go back to Madison, WI? I never wanted to put the book down. Always cheering for Carrie to come to her senses, I often asked myself what I would do if someone I loved became paralized. The author provokes the reader to really think about what they would do in Carrie's situation, yet having Carrie choose the selfish answer we read about the emotional consiquences she suffers. I definitely would not let one's review persuade you one way or the other. The best way to find out if you like this book is to read it yourself. So, Bravo to the author's excellent first novel, and bravo to Carrie for being selfish yet selfless.Book Review: Ann Packer works at her craft and it shows.
Summary: 5 Stars
We had George Eliot, the Bronte sisters and Jane Austen to give us exquisitely memorable characters and now we have Ann Packer. She not only gives us characters such as the main character, Carrie, who is the first person narrator but Carrie's two lovers, Mike and Kilroy. Don't forget the rest of the cast. All of them are unforgettable. I am still imagining them a week after I finished the novel, something which is the test of a good book. Kilroy says at one point, when Carrie is worrying about the age old question of "loves me, loves me not" that he was just "blown away" by her (this from a cynical man who isn't blown away by anything until then). I thought to myself, "I'm blown away by her too. I'm in love!" In love with Carrie the character and Ann Packer, the writer. Ann has it all as a writer. Not only does she get her characters and her dialogue down pat but she also has smell, sight, taste and sound all just right. I have walked around Manhattan just like Carrie has and I have visited Madison, Wisconsin, Carrie's home town. Ann Packer's place descriptions are as real as the cities themselves.
Oh, the story. I almost forgot about the story in savoring the characters and the places sentence by sentence.
The story is so true to life, I ached from watching the events unfold. It is a page turner but different from a crime novel page turner. There is more at stake here. Old fashioned things like love, honor, duty, morality, goodness are all up for grabs in this story but all of them are put down there in the details of the story. Ann Packer resists the temptation to preach. She lets her characters speak for themselves and she does the same thing with her story. This story unfolds by itself with the same brutal honesty Carrie has about herself.
I liked the ending. I liked everything about this book. It's going to be on my Christmas list for all kinds of people.
Thank you, Ann, for working so very hard on this book. I hope you do the same for your next and your next and your next.