Baker Towers

Rating:
Summary: A MOVING PORTRAIT OF LIFE
Review:
Named a Voice of the Century by AudioFile Magazine, gifted performer Anna Fields delivers a measured, almost stately reading of this story of women's struggles. Her voice is full, well developed, and a pleasure to hear.

"Mrs. Kimble" won author Jennifer Haigh the PEN/Hemingway Award for Outstanding First Fiction. "Baker Towers" will gain her added recognition. Setting this story in a western Pennsylvania mining town, Bakerton, Ms. Haigh focuses on one family, the Novaks. Mr. Novak is met briefly as he dies in the first chapter, leaving his wife, Rose, to raise their five children. She's of Italian descent and married out of her culture, thus the children are being raised on Polish Hill. It's a poor section of town without many redeeming qualities.

All of the offspring seem determined to escape Bakerton, each in his or her own way. It's World War II and George, the eldest son, is in the South Pacific, far from Bakerton. He returns after the war to marry a wealthy rather snobbish young woman. Dorothy finds a job in Washington, D.C. where she soon discovers the Capital City isn't what she dreamed it might be. Third in line, Joyce, is found at home where she cares for her mother, and good looking brother Sandy does find a way out of Bakerton. The baby, Lucy is happy wherever she is.

Ms. Haigh paints a moving portrait of life among the poor and the catastrophes which can engulf a mining town. She evokes a time gone by with artful grace.

- Gail Cooke

Rating:
Summary: An ultimately satisfying and compelling novel
Review: Although BAKER TOWERS sounds like it should be set in an upscale apartment complex or perhaps an exclusive prep school, it actually takes place in a less glamorous, but equally evocative, setting --- the small coal mining town of Bakerton, in western Pennsylvania. The "towers" of the title are actually "two looming piles of mine waste. They are forty feet high and growing, graceful slopes of loose coal and sulfurous dirt ... On windy days they glow soft orange, like the embers of a campfire. Scrap coal, spontaneously combusting; a million bits of coal bursting into flame." The Towers always remain in the background of the novel's action, a quiet but powerful reminder of the town's industrial base and, eventually, a reminder of its past prosperity.

Bookmarked by two major wars --- World War II and Vietnam --- BAKER TOWERS follows the fortunes of the Novak children in the wake of their coal miner father's death in the book's opening pages. Born to a Polish father and an Italian mother, the five Novak children seem to bridge the ethnic divides in their small town --- they live in a company house on Polish Hill, but grow up loving their mother's Italian cooking and customs.

Like many young people of their generation, the Novaks dream of escaping their small town. Handsome younger brother Sandy successfully and glibly leaves his industrial roots behind. Older brother Georgie, seduced by a life of wealth and glamour in suburban Philadelphia, escapes, only to regret his choice later in life. Sisters Dorothy and Joyce leave for a while, only to return after the outside world proves disillusioning or even dangerous. Only baby sister Lucy, whose talents and resources suggest that she would leave Bakerton at the first opportunity, truly chooses to stay.

As the five Novaks come to terms --- willingly or grudgingly --- with the hand their fate has dealt them, they find happiness in unexpected places. Their individual dramas and romances play out against the backdrop of a company town that is collapsing under its own weight --- first the company houses go up for sale, then the company store closes, the union goes on strike, and finally a catastrophic event changes the mine and the town forever.

As she did in her award-winning first novel, MRS. KIMBLE, Jennifer Haigh focuses on the trials and tribulations of women's lives, particularly in the years during and after World War II. With masterful plotting and small details, she brings to life the small joys and quiet desperation of the miners' sweethearts, wives and widows. If BAKER TOWERS has a fault, it is that Haigh, in effectively keeping five balls in the air, sometimes loses a grip on one or two --- it's not always clear how younger brother Sandy figures into the story, for example. However, readers will be more than happy to forgive a few dropped balls as they enjoy an ultimately satisfying, compelling story about a way of life that is fast becoming a thing of the past.

--- Reviewed by Norah Piehl

Rating:
Summary: buy it and read it and recommend it to others!
Review: I did. I was teary-eyed throughout the last chapters of BAKER TOWERS, as much at the thought of its ending as from the quiet, heart-wrenching story. Anybody who has ever enjoyed a family saga, watching how the catherine wheel of life turns and boosts some up while other fall away--and how it keeps spinning--will love this book. MRS KIMBLE was great--who doesn't like to read about a bad man--but BAKER TOWERS is even more of a triumph, illuminating both the dramatic and quiet moments that make up our lives against a backdrop of a town that could be a hand-tinted photograph come to life. Beautiful book, Jennifer. Thank you.

Rating:
Summary: A small mining town comes alive
Review: I just finished Baker Towers this morning and have felt an emptiness in my heart since putting it down. I miss Dorothy, Lucy and Joyce! Jennifer Haigh knows how to write a character better than any modern author I have read in a long time. She draws you in to each of their lives, turning the ordinary into the extraordinary with her unpretentious prose. I really cared what happened to the Novak family and felt a sense of having been a fly on the wall watching a poignant family history unfold. Thank you Jennifer, and please hurry up with the next one!

Rating:
Summary: WOW!! Best new book of 2005!
Review: I picked up this book after reading several excellent reviews in various publications. Now that I've finished reading it, I'm going to add my own "excellent review" to the list!

This novel is so well written, there is something for everyone inside. The book follows the lives of a single family living in a small town in Pennsylvania from the 1940's through the 60's. Each chapter singles out one member of the family, telling the story from that character's perspective. We see how each family member grows and matures, and how the ever changing world around them effects each one, and the direction that their life takes.

There's the oldest son, Georgie who goes off to war & then rushes into an unhappy marriage, Dorothy who moves to Washington to escape the "traditional" job of a woman in the dress factory of Bakerton, Joyce who becomes the "parent" to the rest of the family, including her own mother, Sandy the rebellious son, who follows his own path without ever looking back, and the "baby" of the family Lucy, who observes the older members of her family and decides early on which paths in life she definitely does not want to take.

The author has done a wonderful job keeping the readers guessing, and turning the pages to find out what happens next. Nothing is predictable, and there are many "surprises" along the way. I've read some reviews here, where readers have criticized the "jump" from time to time - I didn't find this distracting at all, and actually thought it kept the story moving along at an excellent pace. The story's not dragged out, and time isn't wasted on insignificant events. My only "complaint" (if you even want to call it that) is that there are times in the story where a character will refer to a future event that hasn't happened yet, and as the chapter progresses, the story actually moves backwards, as if the character is reminiscing. The times that this happens, however, are done very subtly - sometimes the reader may not even realize that a future event has been given away!

There are also many nostalgic references made throughout the book - everything from radio shows to early TV to the kinds of cars the characters drive and the clothing they wear. I'm sure many will find the story a "step back in time" which is certain to bring back many happy (or not so happy) memories!

While it's still early in the year, I'd have to say that BAKER TOWERS is probably one of the best books of 2005! If you haven't read it yet, please pick it up, and if you have already finished it, I urge you to recommend it to all of your friends. I haven't been as excited about a book since I read the LOVELY BONES back in 2002! With the right kind of "word of mouth" publicity, I can easily see this one becoming just as popular!


Rating:
Summary: phenomenal fiction
Review: It is not only extremely satisfying, but terribly exciting that a writer in only her second novel can deliver a story so remarkably mature in it's weave of voices and language.

Baker Towers is a wonderful novel, beautifully written and told, perfectly controlled, moving and evocative. The prose is acute and incandescent, full of small fires that burn within.

How the author got here, where she is, is some kind of miracle and mystery, but beyond anything except honoring.

Rating:
Summary: too much hype, too little payoff
Review: It may be that I expected too much, but I wanted more than character studies set back in a "nostalgic" time. This novel did not deliver. I recommend Cynthia Ozick's Heir to the Glimmering World as a better investment of your reading time.

Rating:
Summary: Proof that Mrs. Kimble Wasn't a Fluke
Review: One of the real pleasures of reading is seeing the coming of new writers to the scene. Jennifer Haigh has to be near the top of any listing of novelists who will dominate the next few decades. After the great success (for a first novel) of Mrs. Kimble she has topped that one with Baker Towers.

As with most great novels, the story is not one of excitement like a mystery depends upon, instead it is a snapshot of life in a family. It's a dysfunctional family (but aren't they all). The story is told from the view of five siblings in a hard scrabble coal town as the coal mining world disappeared in the years after World War II. It's a story of small town life, perhaps a life that never really existed, but that's what a novel is supposed to do.

This book is even better than Mrs. Kimble and is a good milestone in the development of a rising author.

Rating:
Summary: sad story but so worth reading
Review: Rose, an Italian, is married to Stanley, a Polish mineworker. They live in Western PA in a mining community. The father dies at 54 and the story weaves the lives of the children and Rose - how they coped with his death and what they did with their lives. The book spans several decades and brings you close into each character. It is true literature and while the ending isn't a cheerful pictorial, it is a solid testament to a strong family raised under harsh circumstances where family follows your heart no matter where you go.

Rating:
Summary: Pure enjoyment
Review: This second novel was captivating from beginning to end. My only hope is that Ms. Haigh has another novel up her sleeve. The characters were terrific and she certainly has a way of putting words together.