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    Goldengrove: A Novel
    Goldengrove: A Novel
    Goldengrove: A Novel
    Audiobook8 hours

    Goldengrove: A Novel

    Written by Francine Prose

    Narrated by Mamie Gummer

    3.5/5

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    About this audiobook

    “With a dazzling mix of directness and metaphor, Prose captures the centrifugal and isolating force of grief. . . . “[Goldengrove is] a moving meditation on how, out of the painful passing of innocence and youth, sexuality and identity can miraculously emerge.”  — Los Angeles Times

    An emotionally powerful novel about adolescent love and loss from Francine Prose, the New York Times bestselling author of Reading Like a Writer and A Changed Man.

    After the sudden death of her beloved older sister, thirteen-year-old Nico finds her life on New England's idyllic Mirror Lake irrevocably altered. Left alone to grope toward understanding, she falls into a seductive, dangerous relationship with her sister's boyfriend. Over one haunted summer, Nico faces that life-changing moment when children realize their parents can no longer help them as she experiences the mystery of loss and recovery. Still, for all the darkness at its heart, Goldengrove is radiant with the lightness of summer and charged by the restless sexual tension of adolescence.

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherHarperAudio
    Release dateJul 5, 2016
    ISBN9780062640871
    Author

    Francine Prose

    Francine Prose is the author of twenty-two works of fiction including the highly acclaimed The Vixen; Mister Monkey; the New York Times bestseller Lovers at the Chameleon Club, Paris 1932; A Changed Man, which won the Dayton Literary Peace Prize; and Blue Angel, which was a finalist for the National Book Award. Her works of nonfiction include the highly praised Anne Frank: The Book, The Life, The Afterlife, and the New York Times bestseller Reading Like a Writer, which has become a classic. The recipient of numerous grants and honors, including a Guggenheim and a Fulbright, a Director’s Fellow at the Center for Scholars and Writers at the New York Public Library, Prose is a former president of PEN American Center, and a member of the American Academy of Arts and Letters and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. She is a Distinguished Writer in Residence at Bard College.

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    Reviews for Goldengrove

    3.5/5

    190 ratings24 reviews

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    • 4/5
      A beautifully sad novel about a girl who loses her older sister in an accident. I especially enjoyed the audiobook, performed by Mamie Gummer, who really made me believe I was listening to the inner mind of a 13-year-old girl.
    • 3/5
      I really wish I could give this 3 and a half stars. Maybe it's because I just finished The Fortress of Solitude, which is a pretty meaty read, but this feels just a little bit thin to me. I don't mean just length-wise, though it's pretty short. I didn't feel the weight of the subject matter the way I might have if the book had been executed a little differently. Having said that, it's not a bad little read, and there's a lot to like about it. Even if some of the "modern" references to things like email and MTV feel conspicuous, there are lots of other references that work for me--things that remind me of my own experiences with my own sister and during my own adolescence. At times, the dialogue feels forced, but when I remind myself of the main character's age--thirteen years--the awkwardness of certain passages of dialogue seems maybe a little appropriate. The first few and last few chapters are what make the book worthy of an extra 1/2 star. The writing in those chapters is more elegant and more gripping than it is in the middle of the book. For as little time as it takes to read this, I think it's worth it.
    • 3/5
      Pretty heavy and sad but I enjoyed the psychology behind the grief and confusion Nico experiences when her big sister dies and her sister's secret boyfriend starts paying attention to her.
    • 4/5
      The story begins with the drowning death of Margaret, sister to Nico and girlfriend of Aaron. Everyone deals with death in his own way, but Nico and Aaron have a particularly bizarre way of working through their feelings. What was interesting about this was the psychology of the situation. Was Nico really trying to step into Margaret's shoes? How about Aaron? Was he really trying to turn Nico into Margaret? This was a believable story and a good introduction for me into the writing of Francine Prose. It grabbed me enough to want to seek more of her novels.
    • 2/5
      I forced myself to finish this book, probably because I kept thinking it would have to get better, that something important was going to happen. Nope. It was just a long, excruciatingly sad slow buildup to nothing. And all that mawkish, sappy teenage angst stuff, along with the grief psychobabble. Where was the rising action, climax and denouement? And sorry, but all that final tidying up of loose ends in the final chapters just didn't work for me. This book should have been clearly labeled YA, and maybe 'chick lit' YA at that. Only my opinion, I know, and as a friend of mine used to say, "Opinions are like a**holes. Everybody's got one." I'm still thinking about the book, which I just finished reading this morning, breathing a sigh of relief - and disappointment. Like the rapture stuff in the book, maybe she should have titled it, "The Great Disappointment." I'm afraid I can't give it more than two stars. Again, my opinion. But I'm glad I only paid a few bucks for this book off a remainder table. If you wanna read a really good Francine Prose book, then try BLUE ANGEL. That one really grabbed me and kept me going. A rather frighteningly good book, actually. Maybe that's why this one so surprised and disappointed me. Or if you wanna read a really good book also called GOLDENGROVE, then hunt up a copy of Darryl Ponicsan's novel from the 70s. He was the author of THE LAST DETAIL and I read all of his books until he disappeared into the neverland of screenwriting out west, not so surprising, I suppose, considering his uncanny ear for dialogue that always rang true. Now he's turned to painting in the Sonoma Valley. So here I am writing about other books (and authors) instead of Prose's GOLDENGROVE. Maybe because I kept thinking, while reading it, that I would rather be reading something else - something better. To borrow an expression from her book, this read was a "Debbie Downer."
    • 3/5
      Well written but almost exhaustingly detailed. Because I was listening to the audio version I kept going....but I definitely wished I could speed up the reading speed to get to the end.
    • 3/5
      I found this book to be a quick read but I think the author handled the grief of losing a daughter and sister as something that one would "get over" in a very short period of time, like the summer. At the end of the book I was left with a feeling that this was rushed and unfinished. I also think the author added characters that had no relationship to the dead girl.
    • 4/5
      Lovely novel about saying goodbye and moving on after a tragedy
    • 4/5
      Well-written novel about a young girl's coming of age while in grieving for her beloved sister. I had read Prose's 'Hunterers and Gatherers' prior to this and not been enthralled. This was significantly better.
    • 4/5
      In Judith Guest's Ordinary People, two siblings go out on the water but only one returns: the more promising, handsome, and popular brother drowns in a storm, and the rest of the book explores the family dealing with guilt and grief. In Francine Prose's Goldengrove, two siblings go out on the water but only one returns: the more promising, handsome, and popular sister drowns, and the rest of the book explores the family dealing with guilt and grief. So, am I saying been there, done that? Yes, but Goldengrove isn't a bad read, if you're in the mood for this sort of novel. For one thing, it has been over 20 years since Guest's book was first published, and society has changed quite a bit since then. For another, the focus is primarily on 13-year old Nico and her developing relationship with Aaron, her dead sister's boyfriend, who seems to be the only person who really understand how she feels. As in [Ordinary People], Nico's parents prefer not to talk about Margaret's death, but instead of being upscale suburbia types, they are more along the hippie line; Dad runs a used book store called Goldengrove. People start to remark on how much Nico, who has lost considerable weight while grieving, is starting to look like Margaret--which gives an edge to Aaron's interest in her. The book is well written overall, and Prose gives believable voice to the fears and ponderings of a young girl going through the grieiving process at a critical point in her own development.
    • 4/5
      The death of her teenage sister sends 13-year old Nico and her parents into a gigantic tailspin. They are shocked into immobility and pain and turn to dangerous diversions. Nico finds herself submitting to the strange requests of her sister's boyfriend. Francine Prose is a writer of epic proportions and she turns this seemingly depressing story into an exquisite, spare, quiet coming-of-age tale that will stay with you.
    • 4/5
      After the death of her older sister, Nico becomes a little too close with her sister’s boyfriend. This is the story of the summer Nico’s sister died and how Nico, her parents, and her sister’s boyfriend find a way to get through it.Although I had read reviews for this book, and well as the description, I was still surprised by the book. It was exactly the story that was described, simply about a girl who lost her sister and the grieving process she goes through, but I still expected to find more to the story. How could an entire book be so simple if it was going to be a “page-turner?” Well I was surprised when it was exactly that. The simplicity of the story was what enhanced the complex emotions.As depressed as Nico and her family are throughout the book, every time I stopped reading for a moment I found I was left with a strange sense of hope instead of feeling depressed like I would have expected.Overall I adored this book and was stunned how fast of a read it was. It was simply a fascinating look at what we do after we lose someone we love.
    • 2/5
      In a word, meh - by the way, is "meh" a word? The prose is beautiful and haunting - Goldengrove is an extremely well-written novel. Why then the meh? Well, I just couldn't manage to get involved with any of the characters. Consequently in the end, I was completely unmoved by their story. The plot is bland and just plain disappointing, and the characters were flat as pancakes. Goldengrove completely failed to hit the mark with me.Don't get me wrong, it's not a terrible book. Gracefully and elegantly worded though it may be, it just didn't work for me. Sometimes well-formed sentences and paragraphs cannot save a novel. It took another week out of my life to slog through Goldengrove - and without anything to show for it. I am a very disappointed reader.
    • 4/5
      Nico’s sister Margaret was four years older than her and all that she was not. She was slim, attractive to opposite sex, a talented singer, and looking forward to going to college in the fall. Although their family was close and their parents were former hippies, Margaret wasn’t especially getting along with them. Her father didn’t approve of her boyfriend, Aaron, and her mother fought with her about smoking because of her heart condition. One summer Sunday the sisters were sunbathing out in the lake on their boat. They could hear their mother practicing at the piano in their lake front house. Nico was curious about all the things that Margaret was and wondering if she would ever be like her. Even still, Nico couldn’t help bringing up her sister’s smoking habit. When Margaret had enough, she saluted Nico and dove into the lake. She was never seen alive again. At age 13, Nico had to learn to navigate the waters of a life of kept secrets while haunted by a sister who seemed so nearly perfect.Goldengrove is a lyrical look at life after a tragic loss. The way that time, place, and emotion are described is really beautiful. The language Prose used was interesting in and of itself, specifically just after Margaret dies. Her use of words made scenes where Nico and her parents couldn’t sleep very powerful. You could see them in different places within the house trying to keep quiet, knowing all along that they were fooling no one into believing they were sleeping. Their mourning was almost poetic.The loss of Margaret didn’t quite bring the family closer together. It cut a hole between her parents and between parents and “only remaining child.” Nico isn’t sure if there is anyone who can understand what she’s going through except for Aaron. As she kept Margaret’s secret dates with Aaron, Nico begins seeing him in secret as well. Together they feel as though they can cross sacred ground. They both were trying to recapture Margaret by using each other and it was when this storyline got deep that I felt that the beauty of the prose was lost for a while. It’s lyrical quality was broken. Going from lyrical to creepy just didn’t work well for me. I think this was true to Nico’s experience as well and didn’t really disrupt my enjoyment. I just wish some of the harder aspects of Nico’s summer with Aaron had that same poetic quality.Goldengrove is the first novel I’ve read by Francine Prose. It sounds strange to say that I really enjoyed a novel that deals with the aftermath of losing a sibling during childhood, but I did. The language was beautiful and engaging almost entirely throughout. I would be interested to know if this novel would seem as lifelike and honest to someone who has experienced the loss of a sibling during childhood. I was enchanted by the cover and the novel did not disappoint. I am looking forward to reading more of Prose’s work.
    • 4/5
      It was meant to be an idyllic summer – a summer like all the ones before it. But when thirteen year old Nico’s older sister Margaret dives into Mirror Lake and never surfaces, everything changes. Set in New England, Goldengrove is the story of that fateful summer. Narrated in the provocative and compelling voice of Nico, the novel reveals the cracks in a family which widen with the tragedy. Nico, on the cusp of womanhood, finds herself floating free without the sage advice of her sister. Nico connects with Margaret’s boyfriend, the artistic and slightly strange Aaron – a person whom she feels free to share her stories of Margaret and the pain of loss. But Aaron is also struggling with Margaret’s death…and in Nico he sees the young woman who he once loved.As the summer slips by, Aaron and Nico’s relationship inches towards a dangerous conclusion … and Nico must struggle to move from adolescence into adulthood, and come to an understanding of her own needs in the wake of her sister’s death.Francine Prose’s novel is that of grief, recovery, and the search for one’s identity. Tender, yet realistic, Goldengrove explores the impact of suddenly losing a child and a sibling. Although the story is told from Nico’s point of view, Prose gives the reader a glimpse into the devastation such a loss has on parents.Prose does a remarkable job building her characters. Nico’s father’s relationship with his youngest daughter is flawlessly portrayed. Nico clings to her father, wants the connection with him, but also pushes him away as she discovers her own sexuality and desires. Their love of art and reading binds them together, even when everything else seems to be changing.I read this novel late into the night – drawn to Nico and her journey through grief. Prose writes radiantly and with a deep understanding of her characters. If there is a flaw in the novel, it is the ending when Prose lifts the reader away from Mirror Lake and the adolescent Nico, and transports us into Nico’s life as an adult. I would have preferred the book end on page 264 – still drenched in late summer sun with a hopeful glimpse into the future.Despite this minor complaint, Goldengrove is a book I can recommend for its beautiful writing and tender look at a young girl growing up in the wake of tragedy.
    • 5/5
      My third read by Francine Prose bore some resemblance to Blue Angel, which was a disturbing book for an English professor to read. It involves a sexy, manipulative student who plunges an instructor into a world of chaos. Prose’s Reading Like a Writer, the first I read, had so much clarity and good sense, it drove me to her fiction. I foresee another dozen titles by Prose on my bookshelves.The narrator, Nico, lives in an idyllic, lake-side cottage with her father, who owns a book store named Goldengrove, her mother -- a piano teacher -- and her sister, Margaret. Margaret has a secret life, and after a tragedy, Nico seems headed into secrets of her own. I felt the same sense of foreboding I experienced with Blue Angel while reading Goldengrove, but her spectacular, lyrical prose has an element of poetry in every line, and that alone drove me on to the tense ending. I underlined numerous wonderful lines, for example: “Now we acted as if the tiniest pressure could shatter our eggshell selves” (84) and “That Sunday, that first Sunday in May, was so warm I couldn’t help wondering: Was it simply a beautiful day, or a symptom of global warming? Even the trees looked uncomfortable, naked and embarrassed, as if they were all simultaneously having that dream in which you look down and realize you’ve forgotten to put on your clothes” (2). Well, I have had that dream, and I know exactly how Nico feels in this scene.This psychological portrait of a family dealing with loss calls to mind Tolstoy’s opening line of Anna Karenina. To paraphrase, all members of an unhappy family handle their unhappiness in different ways. However, this book never really strikes a sustained depressing note. 5 stars--Jim, 10/11/09
    • 3/5
      The Short of It:An unsettling look at what happens to a family when a loved one is suddenly no more. The Rest of It:I've often wondered about death. Death that results from illness is quite different than a death that results from an accident or a sudden heart attack. In this novel, Margaret dies suddenly. Her family has no time to prepare themselves for the loss and for Nico, Margaret's younger sister, it's as if Margaret is there one minute and gone the next. How does a family deal with such a loss?As Nico struggles with her grief, she realizes that Aaron, Margaret's boyfriend is really the only person that understands what she is going through. They form an unlikely friendship which at times seems inappropriate but seeing what these two have been through, and what Margaret meant to them, all I saw were two people in a lot of pain trying desperately to overcome their grief.Francine Prose does a remarkable job of describing what Nico is feeling and although Margaret was not on the page for long, you definitely get a feel for her personality as these characters look back on their moments with her. Many have said that Nico seems older than her thirteen years. This may be true, but to me she came across as an 'old soul' which made her relationship with Aaron a bit easier for me to understand.As Prose takes us through the novel, Nico sees signs that Margaret is still with her. I've always been fascinated by signs. They function as a form of comfort and generally exist to help us through a crisis. Prose does a wonderful job of providing comfort to Nico in the way of signs and whether or not you believe they exist in real life doesn't really matter, because they exist realistically within the novel. I had one small quibble with Aaron. At the beginning of the novel, a comment is made which might lead the reader to think that all is not right with Aaron. As I was reading, I kept waiting for that secret to be revealed but in my opinion nothing was revealed. I felt that his actions were motivated by his loss so perhaps I missed something there.This novel was a very quick read. Once I started it, I could not put it down. The prose was easy to follow and I cared about the characters and what they were going through. This was my first experience with Prose's writing style but it definitely won't be my last.
    • 4/5
      Goldengrove by Francine ProseThirteen year old Nico plans to spend the summer with her sister before Margaret leaves for college. But Margaret drowns quietly in the lake and Nico is left stunned and devastated. She is unable to deal with anything that reminds her of Margaret until her sister's boyfriend, Aaron, suggests an experiment, that they together do the things that Margaret loved. Margaret, who could sing "My Funny Valentine" and bring people to tears, who loved jazz, poetry, and old movies. Nico's parents never approved of Aaron, so Nico has to sneak behind their backs. But her mother is busy self-medicating and her father, who owns a bookstore, is writing a book about how cultures imagine the end of the world. But Nico starts to get in over her head with Aaron, and is torn between her sister's identity and her own.Goldengrove is a beautifully written novel dealing with family grief and coming of age. While the plot suggests a depressing read, it isn't in the hands of Prose. It is moving and touching and hopeful. While her parents have their own issues, they are not neglectful and Nico has a very close relationship with her dad. Though their world has been shattered, they do attempt family normalcy. Nico and her dad eat lunch daily, before she goes to work afternoons in Goldengrove, the family bookstore and he discussed his book with her. Margaret had a heart problem and Nico is convinced she does, too and reads medical books while her dad writes, trying to diagnose herself, convinced she is dying. The only thing she looks forward to is spending time with Aaron, reminiscing about Margaret. But Aaron is looking for Nico to be Margaret.Nico is an interesting, sympathetic character, wise beyond her years, coping with a horrible loss. There are no real dramatic moments in this novel, but it is not a slow read. The words are lyrical and poetic. "When I think of that time, I picture the four of us wading in the shallows, admiring our reflections in the glassy, motionless lake. Then something -a pebble, a raindrop- breaks the surface and shatters the mirror. A ripple reaches the distant bank. Our years of bad luck begin."I have never read anything by Francine Prose before and discovered that she has written several novels. I plan to read more works by her in the future. I highly recommend this touching story.
    • 3/5
      The story of a young teenage girl grieving for her older sister. At the end of the school year, the sister drowns and Nico, the main character was the last to see her. The story is of the summer, where she and her family struggle to put their lives back togethier. Not a bad novel, but a little like tv movie where in the end all of them get on with life. A interesting sub plot is the relationship Nico has with the dead sister's boyfriend.
    • 4/5
      A nicely-written book about a young girl and trying to come to terms with her sister's death. The sister's boyfriend is trying to do the same thing, and they end up in a spooky relationship trying to almost resurrect her. The boy's character changed suddenly in the middle, and he became cruel and weird in a way that didn't quite hold my suspension of disbelief.
    • 2/5
      About a 13 yr old girl who looses her perfect sister- she drowns because of a heart condition- and the twisted, bizarre relationship she (Nico) has with her sisters boyfriend and how she comes to find herself and the will to move on.
    • 4/5
      “to a young child”Margaret, are you grievingOver Goldengrove unleaving?Leaves, like the things of man, youWith your fresh thoughts care for, can you?Ah! as the heart grows olderIt will come to such sights colderBy & by, nor spare a sighThough worlds of wanwood leafmeal lie;And yet you will weep & know why.Now no matter, child, the name:Sorrow’s springs are the same.Nor mouth had, no nor mind, expressedWhat heart heard of, ghost guessed:It is the blight man was born for,It is Margaret you mourn for.–Gerard Manley HopkinsGrief is such an individual, totally consuming, and heart-wrenching experience — especially when the death is by a young person or is totally unexpected. This book explores the grief process very well. Margaret and Nico are teenage sisters. While Nico generally seeks out her parent’s approval, Margaret is a little on the wild side. However, that is not what gets her killed. Margaret has a heart problem and ends up drowning in the lake near their home.The story is told from Nico’s point of view, and about her struggle to get through each day, each month, each year. She worries about her own health and about how her parents are coping with her sister’s death. She’s concerned for her sister’s boyfriend and how he’s dealing with it. She even endures those around her who try to make her into parts of Margaret instead of herself.Finally, the story ends with an adult Nico writing about how she and her family have recovered from their grief over the years. Although — as anyone knows who has been through it — you never really get over the death of someone close to you.
    • 3/5
      Francine Prose's latest novel, Goldengrove, is a subtle, quiet, reflective novel about a family's journey through overwhelming grief after the sudden death of the eldest daughter. The novel takes place over the course of one terrible summer. The action focuses on Nico, the surviving daughter, as she battles with grief, depression, and loss of identity…all at the same time that her body is awakening to its own budding sexuality. Nico is an awkward 13-year old, unsure of who she is, and how her life may unfold. Her identity has always been entwined tightly with that of her three-years-older, beautiful, and talented sister, Margaret. The novel builds suspense as we watch Nico's drift dangerously toward an inappropriate relationship with Aaron, her dead sister's boyfriend. Originally the two come together to help each other deal with their grief, but the relationship turns strange, disturbing, and unhealthy. Many times, I found myself unable to put the book down fearing that Nico was drifting into harm's way.I've enjoyed a number of Francine Prose's novels. A year ago, I reviewed her nonfiction work, Reading Like a Writer: A Guide for People Who Love Books and for Those Who Want to Write Them and I gave that book a strong five-star Amazon rating. Prose is an accomplished writer—I can count on her to deliver a finely crafted work of literary fiction. That said, I was definitely disappointed with this work. Don't get me wrong: I did enjoy it…but, for me, it only earned a three-star rating. I felt strongly that something was missing, and it took me a while to figure it out.I've waited for over a week to write this review, I needed to sort out where this book failed me. The writing was excellent; the characterizations, extraordinary—in fact, I can still conjure up vivid images of the main character, Nico, her mother, father, sister, and a host of other lesser characters. Prose made these people real in my mind, and that is no small accomplishment. The story is not complex—it is realistic in the extreme, almost pedestrian. That's okay, too. I'm one of those readers who actually yearn for novels with outstanding characterization and slim realistic plots. So what was it that failed me here with this lovely, subtle coming-of-age book about grief and identity? In the end, it was the lack of any deeper meaning—the lack of overarching revealing themes about the truth of the human condition. The authors tells the story well, but leaves it up to her readers to derive whatever meaning they may discover within the story. In a work of popular fiction, that's okay, but in a work of literary fiction, I expected the author to take greater risks delivering, from within the body of the story, sparkling intellectual depth and insight about human nature. Perhaps my disappointment was exaggerated because I read another books recently with a strikingly similar storyline about a young girl dealing with grief, sexual awakening, and inappropriate relationships—one that left a far stronger impression on me, and was in many ways in my estimation, a better book. That novel was The God of Animals by Aryn Kyle—a debut novel that won a solid four-star rating from me. The author's overarching themes about the reality of the human condition at the end of this novel seared their way into my heart and soul—I found my eyes brimming with tears because of the honesty and clarity of the vision…and I am one not easily moved by sentiment. I suppose I expected something like this from Prose's book and was deeply disappointed when it was not there.Of special note, Prose does an outstanding job of recreating the progression into and out of psychological depression. But again, for me, the author misses the mark: she gets the description right, but fails to reveal any insight—there are no stunning interior revelations.Although I enjoyed Goldengrove, I do not recommend it: there are better books being published that deserve your time. But I'll still keep an eye out for Francine Prose's next novel, and when it appears, I will probably fall in line to buy it and read it.
    • 3/5
      I'd allowed myself to drift into that hushed and watery border zone...Is an example of the word pictures created by Francine Prose. This is a story of sadness and loss, grief and discovery. A story told in the voice of Nico, the sister left behind.Nico's family struggles to survive the death of a beloved child. A whimsical, talented and loving girl just beginning to become a woman. The angst of the fear that it could have been prevented if only something were different, or someone had done or not done this or that.To be honest, this is a story that has been told before, but rarely in such a compelling and beguiling way. I read Goldengrove in one sitting. I had to know how it ended for Nico. It is her story.