[.ca] Clock Winder (ISBN 0449911799)

suicide in paperback form:
never, ever read this book for recreational purposes. all it did for me was cure my insomnia, i read it for a lit class in college and trying to read it brought back memories of catholic grade school when the nuns would slap my hand with a ruler when i zoned out during arithmetic. the thought of being inflicted with such pain again was the only thing that kept me going.

The Locked Door of Time:
Elizabeth is a wandering free-spirited college student of the mid-1960's. Though she does not wish to influence anyone, her influence is in fact enormous. Hers is the gift of making people want to live, as though their lives were actually turned back to a past point in time when they were younger, with a natural desire to persevere. When she accidentally convinces her employer's troubled son to commit suicide, she herself gives up on life, as though she finally understood that the past cannot be turned back. At last, a call for her help convinces her to take command of the uncertain future. A heartbreaker, and enthralling.

The Lady and the Handyman:
Reading an Anne Tyler novel is like settling into an easy chair to listen to an old friend. Though I've never been to Roland Park I feel like I know its old houses and narrow lanes. Mrs. Emerson, who dresses each day as if expecting ladies over for tea, is familiar too. And daffy though she is, you admire her strength in carrying on day by day. Few writers have as much appreciation of their characters as Anne Tyler. She seems to see the good in each one of them. She pairs them together like a teacher who wants her students to learn and grow from each other. So the irritable, elderly Mrs. Emerson is naturally drawn to easy-going, young Elizabeth. Elizabeth the "handyman," that is -- a quiet woman who enjoys being a competent fixer of loose doorknobs and broken chairs. Elizabeth wants to glide through life without affecting anyone. She won't take care of children, she says, because she does not want to have such an influence on anyone. She wants to be completely open to whatever comes along. "I accept all invitations," she says. But she finds that there are, inevitably, choices that have to be made and consequences of those choices. As with all Anne Tyler novels, the writing is admirable, beautifully crafted. The characters are woven together to form a story that is satisfying and complete.

Classic Tyler:
As with all Tyler novels, The Clock Winder is full of quirky, odd and lovable characters. While there is not much action in her stories, the writing is so well done and the characters so fully developed, by the end of her novels, you always feel like a part of the family. Such is the case with The Clock Winder. When the novel opens, Mrs. Emerson is a recent widow, who seems to aimlessly go about her days, always keeping up her image and trying to stay in tune with her grown children's lives. Never meaning harm, Mrs. Emerson seems to stress her children out, and doesn't seem to understand how she is affecting them. When she fires her lifelong handyman, she stumbles by chance upon young Elizabeth and before she knows it, Elizabeth is tangled up in the lives of the Emerson family. The rest of the novel details how Elizabeth is affected by the family, and they by her. Tyler's writing is so poignant, while not much is really happening, so much is actually happening. This is a book that Tyler fans won't be disappointed in~

An early Anne Tyler, and still one of her very best:
Anne Tyler's "The Clock Winder" is the story of Elizabeth Abbott, a sort of aimless 20-year old girl taking a year off from college. When Elizabeth wanders into the lives of the Emerson family, she becomes, as Mrs. Emerson so tellingly describes things early in the book, "the center of the asterisk." Elizabeth is trying to earn money to go back to college for her senior year--even though "my grades were rotten"--and on her way to interview for a long-term babysitting job, she ends up helping Pamela Emerson move some porch furniture. Mrs. Emerson asks her to stay on as a handyman, to replace the one she fired that morning, and Elizabeth cheerfully agrees as long as she can "live in." This innocent beginning to the story belies the complexities and emotional connections that are made and broken in the rest of the book. Without giving away too much of the plot to those who've never had the pleasure of reading it, it's safe to say that Elizabeth's presence has an emotional impact on several of Mrs. Emerson's sons--one of whom feels strongly enough about her that he does something terrible. This is the event which finally completes Elizabeth's long metamorphosis from determinedly carefree, irresponsible girl to full-grown woman--a woman who understands, finally, the effect that one person can have on another without even meaning to. The writing is superb and the plot develops organically, fully, and with a resolution which makes perfect sense. Anne Tyler was in full control of her considerable gifts back in 1972 when she wrote this, and aren't we lucky that she was!