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Oct 21, 2009

Lyn rated it:

I think that maybe I love Ivy Rowe more than any character I've read. The reader meets Ivy as a child and grows old with her. She's a natural-born writer, so the story is told in epistolary style through the letters Ivy is forever writing to her friends and family. Ivy believes she yearns to see the world, but as her life progresses and she has opportunities to escape the poverty of her Appalachian upbringing, she discovers that the pull of home and family are stronger than that of travel and ad More...

1 comment like (6 people liked it)

Dec 17, 2009

Ashley rated it:

This novel is one of my favorite books of all time. Polly Hollar gave it to me in college with two lines from the book inscribed in the cover: "Slow down, slow down, this is the taste of spring" and "I have walked in my body like a queen." It's an epistolary book that appears as a compilation of all the letters written by a poor Appalachian woman named Ivy Rowe throughout her lifetime. Some letters are to herself, a pen pal, or to individuals who will never receive them. Some More...

0 comments like (3 people liked it)

Jul 13, 2009

JG (The Introverted Reader) rated it:

I'm an Appalachian mountain girl. I felt like I knew Ivy from the first sentence. She truly seemed to come to life on the pages. I came along a few generations after her time, but I felt like she could be one of my grandmothers. She talked the way I probably still talk :-) Education was important to her, and she was very smart, but she never really got a chance. I guess, really, I felt like I could have been reading family history. That says a lot about a novel.

Re-read June 28 More...

2 comments like (5 people liked it)

Dec 16, 2009

Mike rated it:

Lee Smith is a jewel. She writes beautifully, often in vernacular, and tells stories that seem absolutely real. I wasn't born in Appalachia, but I had relatives there and knew many others there and from there. Early in my life I learned to not judge a person's intelligence or wisom by their accent or living conditions. Lee Smith writes of these people and, to me, this is her best book.
Fair and Tender Ladies is written entirely using letters mailed to and from the main character beg More...

0 comments like (5 people liked it)

Jan 17, 2009

Gail rated it:

Fair and Tender Ladies by Lee Smith is an enchanting epistolary (told through letters) novel about a life. There is not one specific antagonist or event that this novel is centered on, instead it is centered on the heroine, Ivy Rowe, and the events of her life as they unfold through letters she writes to family and friends. The story begins a few years into the 1900's when Ivy is 12 years old writing about her life to a hoped for pen-pal, and continures into the 1970's as Ivy writes to friends More...

0 comments like (4 people liked it)

Oct 28, 2007

Lori rated it:

I like this book because I grew up in Appalachia. This is a beautiful picture of life in the mountains, with a musical quality that is reminiscent of the region and draws you in.

2 comments like (2 people liked it)

Jul 11, 2008

Lynn rated it:

I really enjoyed this book. Once you got hooked into wondering what would happen to Ivy next you just didn't want to put it down. The whole time while reading it I had this feeling of da'javu. I'm not sure whether it's because I already read it in this life, another one, or it's resonating with part of my soul. I'm going to mail my copy to my mother in law because I really think she'll like it too.

I'd recommend this for people who feel like even normal life is a nonstop adventure More...

1 comment like (1 person liked it)

Feb 06, 2008

Diana rated it:

I went from reading about Tudor England to this book. I have to admit it was hard going at first, but once I did it was hard to put down. I definitely would include this book in my list of favorites up there with Tree grows in Brooklyn. I am looking forward to reading her other books now. The hard part is that I have one more Tudor England book to read...I don't know...now it's going to be hard to pick that up again. Lee Smith's characters are so much more lovely. Lee Smith puts so much de More...

0 comments like (2 people liked it)

Jan 05, 2009

sab rated it:

My sister, Pamela, sent this to me as a birthday gift. I LOVED IT!!!! The pacing is so organic, believable and rich. I care about the characters and Ivy Rowe is so whole, so human. I love her with all of her life foibles and precious discoveries. This book is a gem. The fact that Ivy loves Jane Eyre and compares herself to that character on many occasions is another true testament to how much I love her!
And, by the way,
Lee Smith and Jill McCorkle are the authors whose work was More...

2 comments like (1 person liked it)

Jan 05, 2009

Amy rated it:

I really didn't like this book. I just thought that the themes of sex and death were way overdone. The main character has some personality, but her focus in life, and thus the focus of the book, was just too strange. I didn't get it.

I did like how the story was told in all letters. I thought that made an interesting forum. And I LOVED the "accent" you got from the writings. I just didn't like the plot or point.

0 comments like (1 person liked it)

Dec 22, 2011

Rachel rated it:

It seems like every generation has those who look forward to a better future, and those who look backward at a better yesterday.
As Ivy Rowe begins to write letters at the age of 12, her Appalachian home in Sugar Fork seems completely shrouded and sheltered from the outside world. Her family is high up in the mountains, away from everything the world can offer - good education, good medicine, etc.
As she grows old, it seems in her letters like the backwoods, faraway quality of More...

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Nov 15, 2011

Kate rated it:

This satisfying novel of a woman's life in rural Appalachia during the first half of the 20th century rings so true that one would think she was a real person. We follow the story of Ivy Rowe in the first person and entirely in the form of letters, which enhances the realism and prevents too much detail. I was reminded somewhat of a more recent novel, The Guernsey Literary Society, which employs the same format, but Fair and Tender Ladies is better. Ivy meets the poverty and limitations of he More...

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Jul 20, 2011

Joy H. added it

Added 7/20/11.
On 7/20/11 I received the following email from our local public library, Crandall Library in Glens Falls:
=====================================
Crandall Public Library presents the free theatrical program:
Barbara Bates Smith in "Ivy Rowe"
Thursday, July 28 at 7:00 PM in the Community Room

"The spunky mountain woman character from the novel Fair and Tender Ladies, Ivy Rowe (portrayed by Barbara Bates Smith) takes us, in a flashba More...

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May 24, 2011

Elizabeth rated it:

Lee Smith (female) is the author of The Devil’s Dream, one of my favorite books from adolescence. Like so many of my books from that period, it’s a remaindered hardback I bought at Bookland in Corbin, Kentucky. The bookstore is no longer there, but whenever I pass Belk Simpson on 25E, I remember it. Bookland was situated to the left of one of the entrances to that southern chain department store.

Anyway, this is an epistolary novel. It begins by chronicling the life of Ivy Rowe, a gi More...

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May 08, 2011

Carolyn rated it:

I got this book expecting a Southern novel concerning the affluent set of the early to mid-1900s. Instead I the opposite - a beautifully written story of Appalachian poor of Virginia. It is a book written in letters and follows the life of Ivy Rowe from childhood through old age. She is smart, spunky, flawed, and beautiful. Lee Smith uses Ivy to explore religion, childhood, sibling relationships,friendships, the heartache of mothering children and letting them go, depression, marriage, old age, More...

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Dec 15, 2010

Jeannette rated it:

Yet one more I'd have passed over, if I'd lacked sense enough to ask another beloved heart, a mountain woman herself, why she so loves this epistolary novel, of all things.

And Margie's answer simply was, "Read it and you'll see."

Never one to shirk a challenge, especially one from a Scots/Cherokee who's been a guiding light in life to me since, yup, the day we met at a lil' litfest in Florida in 1977, I picked it up, began.

And stand amazed, to this da More...

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Sep 18, 2010

Leslie rated it:

Lee Smith. The name for me evokes memories of long days spent happily lost in books that speak to the minds and hearts of mountain girls everywhere. Oral History, Family Linen, Black Mountain Breakdown, The Devil's Dream, Saving Grace, and my particular favorite, Fair and Tender Ladies. I know so many of the women in these books, and I have been one or two of them. Thought provoking, funny, tender, haunting; each book has a meaning far beyond the story. The richness of detail about mountai More...

0 comments like (1 person liked it)

Jul 17, 2009

Kate rated it:

We read Fair and Tender Ladies for my book club, and I must say that the novel grew on me . I liked the main character from the get go--it was the epistolary structure that slowed me down. The dialect and the spelling was difficult to move through. I read the first couple of chapters and put it down for a week. But then, the rhythm of her letters, and the unraveling of Ivy's life, drew me in.

Ivy is spunky and smart, one of nine siblings living with her parents on a mountain farm More...

3 comments like (1 person liked it)

Nov 30, 2011

Kelly rated it:

Fair and Tender Ladies (alongside the Little House books)has been on my "comfort read" list for a long time. The boo is written in epistolary style, first person, and tells the life story of Ive Rowe, who lives in impoverished Appalachian in the early 20th century. This was my fourth time around, and I hadn't read it for at least ten years. An author myself now, and the survivor of around 15 workshops, my "critical brain" is more active that it used to be. I kinda miss the da More...

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Jun 05, 2009

Kristina rated it:

This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it, click here

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Feb 21, 2009

Ann rated it:

This book has given a look into the coal mining towns life at the turn of the century. This has been illustrated through letters written by Ivy. So real it becomes that it is hard to belive that someone wrote them.

0 comments like (1 person liked it)

Aug 09, 2010

Judith rated it:

I found this book devastating. It is written entirely in letters. I could only read a few at a time and I would set the book aside and think about Ivy.

FAIR AND TENDER LADIES chronicles the life of IVY, written in letters spanning the decades of her life,(beginning as a small child) to her various loved ones. They are written in Appalachian dialect and sometimes, I had to read it again to make certain I got the meaning.

The book paints a portrait (a very accurate portrai More...

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Oct 18, 2009

Rita rated it:

Thank you Sassy, for mentioning how much you loved this book, it was wonderful.

The entire book is written in letters to various people. Ivy starts out as a young, bright, but mostly uneducated girl living in the Appalachian mountains. Her life story unfolds through letters and you're left with a whole character who is as real as any living person.

I also enjoyed watching her spelling and grammar improve throughout her life, but also noticing that she never stuck with w More...

0 comments like (1 person liked it)

Jul 16, 2011

Mike rated it:

I've enjoyed several of Lee Smith's books. I heard her interviewed once and she is delightful, funny, smart and self-effacing. I'd love to hear her speak for an hour or two.
But this is supposed to be about Fair and Tender Ladies. I was tempted to give if 5 stars but I'm pretty conservative with my stars. However, this is my favorite Lee Smith book. Some people have a hard time with it because it's written in vernacular and is entirely in the form of letters. At first the vernacula More...

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May 23, 2010

Brie rated it:

Fair and Tender Ladies is one of those books you would have a dog-eared, tea-stained, cracked spine copy of on your shelf that you wouldn't lend to anyone, its that special.

From the first few pages, even paragraphs, I could tell this was quickly going to become a favorite book. And I was not disappointed, right down to the last word of the book.
The story is told via letters to friends/family from Ivy Rowe, who starts out as a young girl in the mountains of Appalachia. The lette More...

0 comments like (1 person liked it)

Dec 03, 2010

Carrie rated it:

Through letters Ivy Rowe tells her life story while growing up in Appalachia in the 1900 though the early 1970’s. At the young age of twelve Ivy starts her tale.

Ivy is a normal little mountain girl who has family responsibilities, adventures and trials. As she grows, with much potential and the opportunity to move from poverty and attend a University, she discovers that she is trapped back in her current situation. Trying to make the best of it and never looking back with regret, More...

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Oct 02, 2009

Anne rated it:

Told wholly through letters written throughout the life of a mountain girl, Ivy Rowe, born at the turn of the 20th Century, this story combines humor, pathos, and an insightful look at relationships and events which impacted mountain communities. The entire book is written in dialect, the spellings reflecting a lack of much formal education. The beginning of the book is written as a child would write letters, so it is difficult to read at first, but I found that I liked the fact that I had to sl More...

1 comment like (1 person liked it)

Apr 30, 2011

Gina rated it:

"Fair and Tender Ladies" is a story set in the hollows of Appalachian Virginia, and is told through letters written by the protagonist and narrator, Ivy Rowe. Her letters begin when she's a young girl and end at the end of her life, and she unfolds her own story by writing to her relatives and friends. Her life is filled with incredible poverty, struggles, opportunities, unusual characters, serendipity, and blessings galore. Lee Smith is a very fine writer, and the development of this More...

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Jan 12, 2009

Sarah rated it:

This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it, click here

0 comments like (1 person liked it)

Aug 19, 2011

Lori rated it:

This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it, click here

2 comments like

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