Dine Lincoln

Dinner at the Homesick Restaurant: A Novel (Ballantine Reader's Circle)

Description

“Beautiful . . . funny, heart-hammering, wise . . . superb entertainment.”
–The New York Times

“A book that should join those few that every literate person will have to read.”
–The Boston Globe


Pearl Tull is nearing the end of her life but not of her memory. It was a Sunday night in 1944 when her husband left the little row house on Baltimore’s Calvert Street, abandoning Pearl to raise their three children alone: Jenny, high-spirited and determined, nurturing to strangers but distant to those she loves; the older son, Cody, a wild and incorrigible youth possessed by the lure of power and money; and sweet, clumsy Ezra, Pearl’s favorite, who never stops yearning for the perfect family that could never be his own.

Now Pearl and her three grown children have gathered together again–with anger, hope, and a beautiful, harsh, and dazzling story to tell.


“A novelist who knows what a proper story is . . . [Tyler is] not only a good and artful writer, but a wise one as well.”
–Newsweek

“Anne Tyler is surely one of the most satisfying novelists working in America today.”
–Chicago Tribune

“In her ninth novel she has arrived at a new level of power.”
–John Updike, The New Yorker

“Marvelous, astringent, hilarious, [and] strewn with the banana peels of love.”
–Cosmopolitan

Reviews

Rating: 5 / 5
Date: 2010-06-28
Summary: "Very pleased"

I was pleased with both the speed with which I received the item as well as the condition of it cassette tapes and case.

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Rating: 5 / 5
Date: 2010-06-08
Summary: "One of my Favorites"

Dinner at the Homesick Restaurant, has always been among my favorite Anne Tyler novels. The novel spans several decades in the life of the Tull family of Baltimore, Maryland. It begins with 85-year-old Pearl Tull, blind and on her deathbed, looking back at her life and that of her three grown children - Cody, Jenny, and Ezra. Told from alternating points of view, Dinner at the Homesick Restaurant is ultimately about how growing up in an unconventional, dysfunctional family affected the three siblings in very different ways. It can be a heartbreakingly sad story, as the Tulls repeatedly try to accomplish the impossible: complete a family meal together.


Anne Tyler is a truly gifted writer. Her character development and attention to detail is exquisite as she explores complex interpersonal relationships in the Tull family. Dinner at the Homesick Restaurant won the PEN/Faulkner Award for fiction and was nominated for a National Book Critics Circle award and the 1983 Pulitzer Prize. If you haven't read Dinner at the Homesick Restaurant, you really should. Very Highly Recommended

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Rating: 1 / 5
Date: 2010-04-13
Summary: "Depressing"

Let me start by saying I have always loved to read. I came across this book in our coworkers' shared library. After finally finishing this book, I can say it is a depressing book about a depressing "family" (who hate or are disappointed in themselves and each other). Everyone in this book is depressed! What a downer, I don't consider this fine literature no matter how well written. I was appalled to see these reviews and realize that it is on reading lists for students - what a shame! As bad as Silas Marner, which I remember struggling through in high school. WHY put boring, depressing books on a reading list if you want young people to enjoy reading???!

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Rating: 5 / 5
Date: 2010-03-05
Summary: "Possibly the Best Book of My Life!"

What an incredible book! My first Anne Tyler and I've gone on to read them all. This book is so incredibly sad, so incredibly sad, so heartwarming, so real, so searingly honest, it literally leaves you gasping. Nick Hornby (great author) has been quoted as saying this is the book that made him want to be a writer - I can see why.
This book literally tugged at my heart strings, I literally felt my heart constrict in grief and expand in joy. It's a masterpiece. Read it.

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Rating: 1 / 5
Date: 2009-02-11
Summary: "Absolute garbage."

This book was forced down my throat in High School and while that was quite some time ago, I remember it vividly. This book drags on seemingly forever without going anywhere. The characters are very bland and uninteresting. The story is entirely predictable. Anybody who would call this book worthy of reading must be comparing it to a street sign.