A Tree Grows in Brooklyn

De: Betty Smith

Narrado por: Kate Burton

A PBS Great American Read Top 100 Pick

The beloved American classic about a young girl's coming-of-age at the turn of the twentieth century.

From the moment she entered the world, Francie Nolan needed to be made of stern stuff, for growing up in the Williamsburg slums of Brooklyn, New York demanded fortitude, precocity, and strength of spirit. Often scorned by neighbors for her family’s erratic and eccentric behavior—such as her father Johnny’s taste for alcohol and Aunt Sissy’s habit of marrying serially without the formality of divorce—no one, least of all Francie, could say that the Nolans’ life lacked drama.

By turns heartbreaking and uplifting, the Nolans’ daily experiences are raw with honestly and tenderly threaded with family connectedness. Betty Smith has, in the pages of A Tree Grows in Brooklyn, captured the joys of humble Williamsburg life—from “junk day” on Saturdays, when the children traded their weekly take for pennies, to the special excitement of holidays, bringing cause for celebration and revelry. Smith has created a work of literary art that brilliantly captures a unique time and place as well as deeply resonant moments of universal experience. Here is an American classic that "cuts right to the heart of life," hails the New York Times. "If you miss A Tree Grows in Brooklyn, you will deny yourself a rich experience."

Beautiful and raw

Any additional comments?

This book was an interesting experience for me. It wasn't until a week or so after I finished it that I began to really love it. I guess I was processing it for a while and once it sunk in, I loved it. While listening to it I never felt bored, but I never got very invested either, and I think that was due to the narrator. She wasn't bad by any means, but she read it in a somewhat monotonous and quiet manner so it never felt very alive to me. But the characters were richly developed over the course of their lives and it was a beautiful look into one family's pain, joy, struggles, and accomplishments.

ONE OF THE BEST I HAVE EVER LISTENED TO

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Absolutely loved this classic novel. Even though written in the 40's, the story stands the test of time So many underlying meanings in the story but such a slice of history when many new immigrants arrived in the new world. I cannot stop talking about it!

Loved It Very Much

At first the accent of Francie put me off. As I listened and listened I learned to love her all over again. I read this book many times as a young girl and certain things that stood out in my memory when reading did not do so as a listener. I really enjoyed it.

Great for All Ages

I first read this when I was twelve, and I thought it was wonderful. I recently re-read it, and I can easily remember the beauty I saw in it when I was a young girl. It is stories like this that are timeless and touch the hearts of all people. In this book, I saw God.

Enchanting but Not a Sweet Childhood book. Real.

This lovely, engrossing book is beautiful, and very real. The story is simple and quiet and builds quietly. Francie Nolan is a wonderfully smart, bookish girl being raised poverty in the first decades of the 20th Century, Brooklyn, New York. Her life is often ugly and is filled with the difficulties of poverty and the tensions of the Irish immigrants in those days. And it is also filled with beautifully fierce love -- from her mother, father, brother and aunt. It is filled with moments of humor such as those found when the children sell junk or buy candy and pickles.

Francie is loyal, funny, smart, headstrong, loving, and sometimes angry. She is a character that I loved with an intensity that surprised me and which brought me to tears upon completion of the book. I will miss her and I am sure to revisit her. I fell in love with her very early in the book when I learned about her daily visits to the library and how she was reading everything in the library in alphabetical order. I recall vividly a day in elementary school when the teacher told our class how many millions of years it would take to read every book ever written. I was heartbroken. (I still am.) So when I read about her strategy for reading I had an affinity with her, and it grew throughout the book.

"From that time on, the world was hers for the reading. She would never be lonely again, never miss the lack of intimate friends. Books became her friends and there was one for every mood. There was poetry for quiet companionship. There was adventure when she tired of quiet hours. There would be love stories when she came into adolescence and when she wanted to feel a closeness to someone she could read a biography. On that day when she first knew she could read, she made a vow to read one book a day as long as she lived." - Betty Smith

I enjoyed Kate Burton's narration. It felt as though she were sitting nearby with a cup of tea reading aloud to me from her favorite novel. Her accents were good, her quietness and subtlety were spot on. However, I hated the very loud and inappropriate musical breaks between chapters. They completely destroyed the spell being woven by the words on the page.