A Tree Grows in Brooklyn

 (654 customer reviews)

Francie Nolan is a character who will long be remembered by anyone who reads "A Tree Grows in Brooklyn." Bright but lonely, poor but resourceful, Francie Nolan is captured from ages 11 to 16 with poignancy and love. Francie is her daddy's "prima donna" and she treasures his love while fighting to win her mother's. Although she never achieves the place in her mother's heart that her brother holds, her strength and sheer perserverance guide her through difficult times. Like the sturdy tree that grows outside her window and survives all catastrophes, Francie Nolan survives poverty, lack of formal education, sexual assault, extreme loneliness, and lost love.The reader first meets Francie at age 11 when, as an inquisitive young girl, her favorite time of the day is on Saturday when she can go to the library then rush home with her treasure and read the afternoon away on the fire escape of her Brooklyn tenement. As a young girl, she feels "rich" when she...Read more

I am in total awe after reading this book. In the beginning I thought it was going to be a boring and long novel. But throughout my reading I became to grow more attached to the story. The main character Francie was an intriguing and delightful creation that anyone would want as their best friend, should she not be a fictional person. I enjoyed reading how the poor family made ends meet and continued surviving when it seemed they couldn't hang on much longer. It seems that you shouldn't find it entertaining to read of suffering, but the author writes it in such a ingenious way as to that you're really reading about the magnificence of life, living, and death. As the family encounters dilemma after dilemma you find yourself encased in the wonder of how they do it. Throughout all the sadness and suffering the Nolans are still kind and considerate, loving and caring, fair and just; overall good people! Don't get me wrong, this is not a sad story, although some parts are on the sadder...Read more

In the first page of this book, Betty Smith writes very gently and calmly of Francie Nolan, a pre-teenager just beginning to step out on the edge of adulthood. And Smith ties the book up neatly at the end as if she's giving a present to the reader ... which she is. This is one of the sweetest, most eloquently written books I have ever had the pleasure of reading. Francie Nolan lives in Brooklyn with her brother Neely, mom Katie and dad Johnny. It is in the early 1900s where the book is set. The family is poor ~~ living almost on the edge of starvation. Francie has taken to reading like a duck takes to water ... once she discovered the joy of reading, she becomes a big bookworm. She is also a keen observer of life around her ~~ her thoughts are often witty and funny as she observes the strange behavior of her mother's sisters and their lives, the neighbors, her brother Neely, her mother and father's relationships with one another. Till Francie grows up to be this amazing woman set...Read more