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Summary: 10 Minutes A Day, That's All I Ask
Review: An incredible debut. I was swept up in the narrative of this book. The attention to detail is nothing less than amazing. And the best part of all is that, even if you weren't around in the summer of '74, or didn't live in suburban Connecticut, or didn't have parents at each others' throats day in and day out, you still relate to this twelve year old kid because Dan Pope has reconstructed a slice of childhood probably better than any I've read before. It's that moment in the cusp between the carefree days of childhood and the angst of teenage life that he has captured here. It will be extremely disappointing if this novel doesn't eventually make its way onto the screen. It's every bit as engaging and precise as Stephen King's "The Body" (later turned into one of the greatest "coming of age" movies ever made, Stand By Me).
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Summary: Many animals:
Review: Crows, groundhogs, and everything in between are featured players in this sweet and readable novel. The condition of being twelve years old with some sort of obsessive-compulsive list-making thing going on while the brilliant summer sun is shining; these themes are of course universal. You might squirm. It is the non-human elements of this book who undergo real life and real death. The humans merely eat too many cherries or golf or masturbate or cheat or watch the television programming until sign-off. The animals are whacked and smashed, attacked with whatever is at hand, (SPOILER LEAVE NOW)and lose in the end when a full-length coat is the price of peace. If your adolescence wasn't interesting enough, here is someone else's. This book contains: (suggestive things and whatnot.)
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Summary: Getting That Warm Feeling All Over
Review: Dan Pope accomplishes what many authors have tried to achieve and failed. He gives us a story that hits home in so many ways. There is love of family, friends, pets, and generally life- there is loss of those things too. Overall, Pope gives us experiences that we have all had, but through the eyes of his very witty and bright narrator- young Timmy, a boy who seems closer and closer to being any of us when we were 12. On each page, we go deeper into Timmy's life - deeper into the novel, and maybe deeper into our own lives. In the end, it is all of the experiences of Timmy, that Pope allows us to live vicariously, which give you a warm feeling by the novel's conclusion. He proves that togetherness in life works to keep life moving forward and Pope must know this firsthand.
A great, fun, enjoyable read by an honest voice in literature.
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Summary: Copy of a letter to the author
Review: Dan,
I just wanted to let you know that I finished "in the cherry tree," and how much I enjoyed reading it. I finished it in three days, which is saying a lot, having three kids and two dogs. I'm sure you've heard this before, but it reminded me so much of my own experiences growing up in the Midwest. I thought you're characterization of Timmy, his thoughts, speech, likes, dislikes, were all very authentic. I especially enjoyed his interactions with the adults and kids in his neighborhood. The way you described the conversations is the way kids in that era talked to each other. There was a nice balance of seriousness and humor, and the pacing was adeptly handled, giving the reader another piece of Timmy's puzzle with eaach chapter. In Timmy, you depicted the confusion, the selfishness and detachment that is adolescence, side by side with the yearning for connections to something bigger. Nicely done. I'm looking forward to the next book.
Jim Ogle
Rating: 
Summary: Accurate memories.....and not all of them good....
Review: I am surprised this book isn't getting more recognition. Adult authors frequently try to recapture the memories of their adolescence or write from the perspective of a teenager, some with great results (Catcher in the Rye, Russell Banks' Rule of Bone, and best of all, CD Payne's Youth in Revolt), some mixed (Tom Petotta's Bad Haircut). I think Dan Pope has written an important period piece that recalls growing up in the 70s, warts and all. While the book generally reads more like a series of short stories, there is continuity and character development. Sensitive topics, such as parental infidelity and suicide are addressed without pulling punches, yet Pope clearly has a great sense of humor, from the hand farts of a big sister's friend to tongue twisters concerning the fig plucker's son. In The Cherry Tree is worth picking up and knocking off in a few nights of bedtime reading. I look forward to Dan's next book.
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Summary: Accurate memories.....and not all of them good....
Review: I am surprised this book isn't getting more recognition. Adult authors frequently try to recapture the memories of their adolescence or write from the perspective of a teenager, some with great results (Catcher in the Rye, Russell Banks' Rule of Bone, and best of all, CD Payne's Youth in Revolt), some mixed (Tom Petotta's Bad Haircut). I think Dan Pope has written an important period piece that recalls growing up in the 70s, warts and all. While the book generally reads more like a series of short stories, there is continuity and character development. Sensitive topics, such as parental infidelity and suicide are addressed without pulling punches, yet Pope clearly has a great sense of humor, from the hand farts of a big sister's friend to tongue twisters concerning the fig plucker's son. In The Cherry Tree is worth picking up and knocking off in a few nights of bedtime reading. I look forward to Dan's next book.
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Summary: I enjoyed the book
Review: I gave 5 stars to this first novel because I enjoyed it very much. A delightful book! It is a fair snapshot of a 12 y/o boy summer and reads like a very true story any boy could relate from this age.I liked exactly this that there was nothing special or too deep but was full of spontaneity and sincerity.I think it is a fair account of what a boy of twelve feels and how he looks at life.Family, friends, pop-music, TV, boy games, sex- these are pretty normal interests which fill a boy`s life in puberty.I don`t agree that Timmy is a weak and boring character -a boy of twelve usually cannot give himself an account of his deep emotions. A writer can elaborate on them,looking at him from the outside, but this would not be the boy`s true voice.I liked the idea of the cherry tree as a center of their games which possesses some unvisible magic that attracts the boys.Also,I was somehow amused by the rows between his parents- not that this was a very funny thing in itself but somehow I felt all the time that they would make it at the end.I think The Dad still loved The Mom,it was just that they were very different.The Mom acted funny and unadequate at many points but The Dad was a very cool character. I wasn`t annoyed by all that music listening,charts and Top 100,and lurking around...on the contrary,I enjoyed all the time the real life breathing through the pages of the book.The novel is fresh,well written,witty.Well done!
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Summary: disappointing
Review: I was very disappointed with this book. I thought it had very little substance. While it did take me back to my childhood, too much time was spent listing what actors the characters were watching on TV, what the TV episodes were about, or what music was on the radio and not enough time dealing with their actual lives. I thought this book skimmed the surface of a lot of important issues.
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Summary: Dan Pope's rites of passage
Review: In The Cherry Tree
by Dan Pope
Published by Picador
This is a novel I picked up by chance. I'd never heard of the author, and it's always exciting to start a book with no reviews influencing you. I sat on the train and was hooked in a few pages, before the train left the station. It's a convincing picture of what I can remember about growing up and growing apart from your childhood. The early self that was you suddenly seems strange.
Pope uses a refreshing and simple method to separate the generations. It's not something to reveal here because the reader needs to discover it for themselves. The conspiritorial world of the adolescent has been written about before, and brilliantly. But Dan Pope does the whole Rites of Passage thing with originality.
It's a great book, funny, insightful, touching, and authentic. I enjoyed it on several levels, all of them pleasurable. In a flowing prose style, The Cherry Tree offers an insight into US society that illuminates its essence more clearly than journalistic reporting. As a Brit, I recommend this book, especially to those who are so anti-American at the moment. They judge the States by the current awful administration, and that really isn't the whole story...
Pope's book reveals the affection and warmth I associate with the America I know. It's a wonderful read, and Timmy, the book's voice and conscience, will awaken a lot of people's memories of spots, sex, and discovery. I`m delighted I discovered this excellent book.
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Summary: I cannot tell a lie-TERRIFIC
Review: In the Cherry Tree connects with the kind of satisfying impact usually remembered and reserved for a first base hit or a first kiss. Pope's subject is the on-the-cusp life of Timmy, a boy who is being swept from childhood by events and personalities that work the edges of his world with passion and power. The bell is tolling on Timmy and he comes to the reader as wholly sympathetic. Yet Pope's real acheivement is making an original American profile like Timmy seem so utterly familiar and intimate. We experience Timmy's world in much the same way he must, through glances and episodes within the tightly drawn emotional paddock of his neighborhood life. Pope delivers Timmy to us freshly consumed by matters big and small, without sentimentality or despair. As close as we feel to Timmy, it is Pope's streamlined, athletic prose that evokes and shapes our impression of Timmy's choices and feelings. Pope is an Fine and authentic emerging American voice. In The Cherry Tree is the best novel I've read all year.
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