Rating: 
Summary: An involving historical novel
Review: A new Irish immigrant family to the U.S. faces its first great challenge on Ellis Island, when the family is divided by illness and rejected by officials. Rose and her younger sister are left to fend for themselves and after struggles find work at a factory where working conditions are tough. When factory work ends in disaster, Rose must decide where her commitments and roots lie in this involving historical novel which blends insights on both immigrant experience and labor issues.
Rating:
Summary: Excellent Read
Review: America was the land of opportunity. The main character, Rose, seeks out that opportunity with her family in Ashes of Roses by Mary Jane Auch. Rose is known for her hard work and her stubbornness. This book shows the immigrants' struggles to survive in America. Rose's family has to learn to live in America from the different Ireland. Ashes of Roses lets the reader view an insight to the pressures of living in America.
In Ashes of Roses, Rose's family travels from Ireland to America for a new life. But at Ellis Island, tragedy strikes the family when Joseph, Rose's baby brother, has trachoma and cannot go into America. Roses' dad decides to take Joseph back to Ireland to stay with Grandma Nolan. While Rose's dad takes Joseph back, the family stays with Rose's uncle. However, Rose's mother hates to live for free, and Rose tries to find a job. A short while later, Rose's mother decides she does not want to live in America without her husband and Joseph. On the way to the boat, Rose asks her mother to let her stay in America with her younger sister.
Rose and her sister find a place to live in America with a father and his daughter, Gussie. Gussie helps Rose find a job at a cloth factory. BR> In Ashes of Roses, Rose and the readers learn not to take life for granted. The story line is easy to follow and keeps the readers hooked. The author did an impressive job bring the story to life. Ashes of Roses shows immigrants making their life in America by the trials they face.
Rating:
Summary: Ashes of Roses Enlighten
Review: America was the land of opportunity. The main character, Rose, seeks out that opportunity with her family in Ashes of Roses by Mary Jane Auch. Rose is known for her hard work and her stubbornness. This book shows the immigrants' struggles to survive in America. Rose's family has to learn to live in America from the different Ireland. Ashes of Roses lets the reader view an insight to the pressures of living in America.
In Ashes of Roses, Rose's family travels from Ireland to America for a new life. But at Ellis Island, tragedy strikes the family when Joseph, Rose's baby brother, has trachoma and cannot go into America. Roses' dad decides to take Joseph back to Ireland to stay with Grandma Nolan. While Rose's dad takes Joseph back, the family stays with Rose's uncle. However, Rose's mother hates to live for free, and Rose tries to find a job. A short while later, Rose's mother decides she does not want to live in America without her husband and Joseph. On the way to the boat, Rose asks her mother to let her stay in America with her younger sister.
Rose and her sister find a place to live in America with a father and his daughter, Gussie. Gussie helps Rose find a job at a cloth factory. BR> In Ashes of Roses, Rose and the readers learn not to take life for granted. The story line is easy to follow and keeps the readers hooked. The author did an impressive job bring the story to life. Ashes of Roses shows immigrants making their life in America by the trials they face.
Rating:
Summary: A Great Book
Review: Ashes of Roses Book Report By Dylan Schrode Imagine being in New York in the eighteenth century, with no parents, friends and barely any free time. The alleys are filled with hatred towards immigrants, and nobody recognizes you as an American, just an Irish maggot. From morning to night, you spend your whole day working in a factory for low payments, and then you come home late only to eat a bit of food and get a few hours of sleep before going back to work. Does it seem possible for someone to live like this, as young as age 16?
This horrible setting was very common for immigrants coming to America in the nineteenth century. Rose Nolan, the main character of Ashes of Roses, and her sister Maureen have a little, cramped room to sleep, limited amounts of food, a family across the ocean who they haven't written to, and no friends except their friend, Gussela, when they are in America, while many of us take for granted how we have access to lots of food, a good-sized house, a loving family and friends who care about you.
The setting takes place in New York, where Rose, Maureen and their whole family had originally lived Limerick, Ireland and decided to come to America to seek a better life. While in the customs line, the youngest child of age 3, Joseph, was told that he couldn't make the voyage to America due to trachoma, an ear infection that was real common back then. Roses father, who is referred to as "Da", decides to stay in Ireland with Joseph while Rose, her mom and two sisters, Bridget and Maureen go to America. They stayed with their Uncle Patrick and his family for a couple of months, only to find trouble with Patrick's wife and kids. After moving out of Patrick's house, the Nolan family faces a tough decision, which is leaving America, or staying. In the end, Roses mom and sister Bridget voyage back to Limerick.
The story provides the reader with many twists and turns when Rose meets a Jewish girl named Gussela and her father. Gussela takes Rose and Maureen in and provides them with a job. The story throws another curve in when tragedy strikes Rose and Gussela, and Rose is faced with another decision.
This story has many morals, one of them being to stay strong with your heritage and to hold on to your beliefs even if you are being persecuted or made fun of because your heritage. Rose remains loyal to faith and church despite numerous comments, including people calling her "greenie" and "maggot". Another moral is that even though times are tough, you should be fortunate to be alive because accidents happen, and you should be prepared for the worse. I'm not going to tell an accident in the story because I don't want to give the ending away.
All in all, Rose overcomes many challenges in America and meets a good friend to help her realize her destiny and teach her how to prosper in America. Ashes of Roses is a book on courage, love, friendship, religion and loyalty, which are all important aspects of life. Even though this story is set in an early timeframe, religious hatred and other themes of this book still exist in today's society. This book is a great story, and an insightful way to understand how religion and courage can lead a person to happiness and success, despite all odds.
Rating:
Summary: A real page-turner
Review: Ashes of Roses by Mary Jane Auch was a very inspiring book to read. Sixteen-year-old Rose Nolan and her family have finally reached America, the land of opportunity. They are so excited that they never think that something bad will happen. They are devestated when they find out that part of their family has to go back to Ireland. Well life must go on so that is what the Nolan family does.
With her mom and her two younger sisters, they set off to find where they are suppose to stay. Where? At her dad's brothers place of course! That is when it even goes further down hill. The family doesn't know that they are coming! What are they going to do?
Mary Jane Auch did a fantastic job of writing this book, I stayed up untill midnight reading this book because it was so good. I was camping, and my flashlight went dead and I was devestated that I couldn't read this book it was that good!
I reccommened this book to people who like a good historical book, a real page turner, and are not afriad to cry because of book. I sure liked it and I am planning to get my friends to read it too.
Rating:
Summary: Ashes of Roses
Review: Ashes of Roses is a work of historical fiction that tells of Margaret Rose, a newly-arrived 16 year-old Irish immigrant who desperately desires and struggles to 'become American'. Rose's journey begins in 1911 with her arrival at Ellis Island. Her first job, working in a sweat shop making paper flowers, marks her first step towards self-reliance, but she soon encounters trouble. The owner takes advantage of her innocence and of her need for money, and late one evening physically assaults her. Rose escapes without her pay and only winter coat. The daughter of the Jewish man she rents a tenement room from, Gussie, is a union worker that gives Rose the courage to go back to the sweatshop the next day, get her coat, and demand her pay. Gussie is then able to get Rose a job at the Triangle Shirtwaist Company, which pays better. Rose is able to worry a little less and enjoy her youth. She makes friends at the factory, sees a nickelodeon for the first time, and reads her first dime novel. But the real-life tragedy of the factory fire painfully jars her back to the harsh reality of the immigrant's life. (Of the 146 people that die in the fire, many of them are young girls who either jump to their deaths or are trapped in the burning building because of locked doors) Still, Rose finds within herself the strength to hope once again that she'd find America's streets paved with gold, and make a life for herself. "...I was a grown woman now, not somebody's little girl. The fire had changed me. Like a piece of iron in a blacksmith's forge, I had come out reshaped, stronger." Ashes of Roses tackles tough issues of the period like child labor, women's rights, worker's rights, discrimination, racial diversity, and class distinction. But never does one feel like she is reading a history book. Rather, the reader comes to care deeply for Rose, struggling along with her, and wanting desperately for her to succeed. The reader, and Rose, learn much along the way. This book stands alone as a compelling story, as does the author's other highly-praised works of historical fiction, i.e. her pioneer trilogy, Journey to Nowhere, Frozen Summer, and The Road to Home. Ashes of Roses is also a boon to history teachers wanting the past to come alive for their students. Furthermore, the author details the research that went into the making of Rose's story in the Author's Note, so teachers, librarians, and parents alike can feel secure in the knowledge that the people, places, events, and lifestyles portrayed in the novel are historically accurate. This book deserves a place on every library's shelf.
Rating:
Summary: Incredible!
Review: Breathtaking in its intensity, the vivid details of time and place put you right in the scene--from the opening with 16-year-old Rose and the other hopeful Irish immigrants crowding the side of the boat for their first glimpse of New York, through the disappointments and triumphs of an exuberant young working-class girl in New York in 1911, to the horrific fire that claims the lives of so many. Rose Nolan is a likable narrator: determined, impatient, and sometimes cranky. Her adventures range from amusing (trying, more or less, to fit in with the family's German in-laws) to heartbreaking--all told in a memorable voice whose realness will shake you, particularly during the scenes of the fire and its aftermath.
Rating:
Summary: Excellent Read
Review: I chose this book for my American Cultures project, and I thought it would be a pretty bland book. Turns out that it was very good book that gives a lot of facts, but everything is woven together so one does not tire of reading this book easily. I would recommend this to anyone wanting to learn a little bit more on the building of America all in a fairly easy read.
Rating: 
Summary: a good read
Review: I've been meaning to read Ashes of Roses for a long time, and I was not disappointed. Auch writes well and makes both her characters and setting believable. 16-year-old Rose, an immigrant from Ireland, is left to care for herself and her sister in early twentieth-century New York, and quickly finds work and friends at the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory. Tragedy befalls her when a fire breaks out at the factory, and Rose is faced with the difficult task of rebuilding her life. Overall I thoroughly enjoyed the book, but I have a few quibbles. Rose's mother makes a flash decision to leave her and her sister behind in New York while boarding a boat headed back to Ireland, and I thought this was too unrealistic. Women in early twentieth-century America were not safe on their own, and I just can't believe that a mother would leave her children alone in an unfamiliar place and trust that they would find their way back home. I also was dissatisfied with the ending; Auch seemed to run out of ideas and just slap on an inspirational, hopeful ending. I would have liked to see Rose develop a little more. Other than that, this was a good book. Recommended.
Rating:
Summary: A Moving Depiction
Review: Rose wants to stay in New York after arriving as an immigrant from Ireland, but she finds that it is much easier for a man to make the riches promised in America than it is for a woman. She ends up working in a sweatshop where the owner tries to take advantage of her. She leaves there and finally ends up getting a job at the Triangle Shirtwaist Company where she believes she has finally found a place where she can build a life for her and her sister. But tragedy will soon tear her new safe world apart.
Auch pulls you into the world of 1911 and creates an atmosphere that allows the reader to feel the desparation that accompanied the fight for women's rights in the workforce. The characters come alive and when many are lost in the Triangle shirtwaist company fire you grieve for them along with Rose. Ashes of Roses is a poignant book that will move the reader to a new, deeper understanding of the struggle for rights and the horror of the fire that took the lives of over 150 people in the Triangle Company fire in New York.
|
