I am usually a fan of this author but I found the subject matter somewhat dull and the violence portrayed in the family too unpleasant to make me continue reading beyond the first half of the book. Disappointed.

Why has it been so long since I read something by Tracy Chevalier? I must have forgotten how good she is. This book was so atmospheric and seemed more true to what America must have been like in the mid 19th century than what you see in movies and on TV. Why anyone would choose to settle somewhere like the Black Swamp is beyond me - the name says it all. The only reason can be exhaustion from having travelled so far!
The characters were sympathetically drawn and grew through the story. I loved the way Robert's letters improved with his level of learning. The inclusion of Johnny Appleseed was also interesting as he is someone even non-Americans have heard of.
Altogether an intelligent and well-written book.

First I just want to specify that there will be no spoilers in my review, so read at will!

Thank you very much to NetGalley for facilitating, and to the publishers & Tracy Chevalier for allowing me to read this book in exchange for a review.

Oh gosh, where to start? I am a huge fan of Chevalier so when I saw this book on NetGalley I was thrilled. The Lady and the Unicorn and The Virgin Blue are two of my all time favourite books. I very rarely read the same book twice, it has to be really special and those two have probably been read 10+ times each. So I was so excited to read this one... but oh how disappointed I was. This was nothing like the old Chevalier stories, full of wonder and excitement and multiple storylines all intertwining. I can only describe it as dull to the core. It felt like a chore to read it because it was page after page of apple trees. Just apple trees. There were some interesting characters within the book that could've gone a lot further but it felt a bit like the storyline took up 20% of the book and that didn't hit the page quota so the other 80% was bulked up with descriptions of trees and apples. At one point it seemed to get interesting and it gripped me and then I looked at the time remaining in the book & it said 14 minutes. So the last 15 minutes of the book were actually interesting and worth reading but the rest of it bored me to tears.

I cannot tell you how much it pains me to write this review because it feels like a betrayal of one of my favourite authors, but this just wasn't right. It wasn't Chevalier to me and I wish I hadn't read it, up until now I had never read anything of hers that I remotely disliked - and this was more than remote. If it hadn't been for the author I would've stopped reading after the first few chapters, but I held out because I know how talented she is as a writer, I thought there would be something beautiful to come and it never did.

So sorry, but I really didn't like this one.

I have read all the author's previous books, but found the sections in Black Swamp a bit heavy going because Sadie was such an unpleasant character. Once the book settled on Robert and his life it was an enjoyable read, and moved along at Tracey's usual pace.
The plant collection details were interesting to me as a keen gardener.

At the Edge of the Orchid by Chavalier, Tracy

What a strange book – but in a good way. I just love books that introduce me to a subject that I know little or nothing about. At the beginning I was a bit unsure of where this book was heading but as it unfolded I found that I was becoming more and more interested in the characters and the content.

It is a story of Sadie and James Goodenough and their five children who leave his father’s farm in Connecticut as it could not sustain his family and his brothers’ families. So they headed West and kept on going until they reached the Black Swamp in Northwest Ohio where fatigue and mud ended their journey. Here they could stake a claim as long as they could plant 50 trees. The first half of the book describes James fascination with the apple trees that he and his family struggle to establish. Meanwhile Sadie is defeated by their marriage, the births and deaths of their children and their continuing struggle with the trees and the Swamp and resorts to alcohol and camp revival meetings. At this point the business of propagating apple trees and the importance of the crop to these settlers is described which I found really interesting.

The second half of the book describes the youngest son, Robert’s escape from this and his many years travelling further, and further West. Each New Year, he writes home to his brothers and sisters to let them know where he is and what he is doing – always hoping for a letter in reply –which never arrives. Finally in 1853 he reaches Gold Rush California. It is here where gold fever has hit the miners where this lonely man discovers a job he can love. Chavalier’s descriptions of the lawlessness of the mining towns; the difficulties experienced by women; the discovery of the giant redwood trees and the giant sequoias and the business of transporting, seeds, seedlings, saplings and cones from California to England is both fascinating and revealing.

This a beautifully crafted book as one would expect from the writer of Girl with a Pearl Earring, and her characters are so vibrant and at times totally heart-wrenching.

Thanks to NetGalley and to HarperCollins UK, HarperFiction, The Borough Press for providing me with an ARC copy of this book that I voluntarily choose to review.
Tracy Chevalier was one of the authors that I had wanted to read for a long while but somehow never got around to it. When I saw this title on offer I decided it was now or never. For me, it was well-worth the wait, but more about that later.
The book follows the story of a family who moves from Connecticut to Ohio in the XIX century and later of their youngest son, Robert and his adventures. It is divided into several parts, and it is symmetrical and beautifully composed. We first get to know the parents, James and Sarah (Sadie), whose first-person narrations alternate, and whose points of view and personalities couldn’t be more different. Then there are the letters that Robert, their youngest son, writes back home, which give us a brief insight into his adventures, without narrating every little detail. Then there is the narration of Robert’s adventures, this time in the third person, and how he goes full circle and after trying many things ends up working with trees, his father’s life mission. There follow the letters for his youngest sister, Martha, who tries to find him and also tell a story that would have been much more difficult to read if it had been told in detail. (I’m trying to avoid spoilers, but let’s say her way of talking about her experiences make them more poignant for me. Robert was right when he told her she was stronger than she thought she was.) Then we go back to James and Sadie’s story, picking it up at the time where it had been disrupted, and by the end of the novel we’re back to Robert’s story. Although the story goes backwards and forwards in time, I did not find it difficult as the times and the narrative voices are well and clearly delineated.
Life in the swamp is vividly described as harsh and demanding. It kills animals, people, and crops. It also can destroy the spirits of some individuals. The only bright spot are the apples (be the sweetness and the joy of growing them, for James, or the cider and Applejack for Sadie). Here I found myself fascinated by the description of the trees, the process of looking after them, what they came to represent, the fights over the different types of apple trees, and later about the love of people for the sequoias and the business involved in exporting trees. It has happened to me more than once that when I read about a subject I’d never thought much about; I become entranced by it, not because of the subject itself, but of the passion and beauty with which it was written about. I remember, as an example of this, American Pastoral by Philip Roth. I’d never given a second thought to glove making before reading that book, but I the way the craft was described, so lovingly. In this case, to Chevalier’s advantage, I like apples and trees, although I’ve never studied them in depth, but I loved the factual knowledge, the beauty of the language, and the use of true historical figures, as the author explains in her notes. As a note of warning, having read some of the reviews, not everybody found that part interesting. I guess I’m more of a James (or a Robert) than a Sadie in that respect.
The characters are not immediately relatable to or even likeable, but they do ring true. Both parents seem to be trapped in relationships and roles not of their liking but unable to do anything else, at a time when survival was the main object and most people had to put up with their lot in life, like it or not. Robert is a quiet man, who prefers nature to the company of others, but he is also loyal and more attached to people than he likes to acknowledge, even to himself. The book is built around a secret he keeps, although for me that was incidental and not the hook that kept me reading. He ends up becoming fonder of people and, like the trees of the story gets to move around and see the world. Martha, his sister, is a great character (she would have made an interesting protagonist too, but perhaps her story would have been too bleak) but does not get a lot of space in the book. Some of the secondary characters, based on historical ones, like John Chapman and William Lobb, deserve whole volumes dedicated to their endeavours, and some fictional characters, like the housekeeper and Molly, are larger than life.
I can’t compare it to any other of Chevalier’s books, but I enjoyed the story, the characters, the historical detail, the beautiful language and yes, the trees too. I recommend it to lovers of historical fiction who are happy to delve into the texture and the feel of an era or an occupation. And now I have to try and catch up with the rest of her books.

I loved this book! It’s the first Tracy Chevalier book I have read but hopefully won’t be the last. I loved the insight into life in the United States in the 19th century – her writing really brought it to life. It reminded me of some of Frances Parkinson Keye’s books which are set in the same period, also in the United States.

The Goodenough family have moved to Black Swamp in Ohio from Connecticut with a few seeds, seedlings and saplings from their Golden Pippin apple trees back there. They have claimed some land but in order to legally own have to grow fifty fruit trees on in within three years to demonstrate their intention to remain. As the land lives up to its name of Black Swamp this is easier said than done.

The trees are at the mercy of the harsh climate and animals but also from Sadie, matriarch of the family who is apt to attack the trees in one of her drunken rages. It is not a happy family situation with Sadie’s drinking and outspokenness and James, the father, being completely focussed on his trees and little else. There are many children when they move out to Ohio but consumption and swamp fever are rife which takes its toll on the family.

The story mainly follows Robert, the youngest child who 8 in 1838 where the story begins. Robert makes some momentous journeys and finds very varied work in his travels as we follow his life for a couple of decades. He is separated from his surviving siblings for many years which we hear about via a series of letters which he write home to the Black Swamp farm every New Year’s Day. There are potentially a few more books from Tracy in what happened back at the farm in these intervening years but I liked the style of jumping over some of this period by way of Robert’s letters home which are heart-rending as he doesn’t receive replies.

There is a lot of detail in this book about trees and seeds which doesn’t sound the most gripping subject but Tracy Chevalier writes in a way that makes this subject so interesting you can easily visualise and appreciate these magnificent trees for yourself.

It was only when I finished the book that I found it is based on some real life characters. Billy Lapham who discovered and developed Calaveras Grove of giant sequoias in California figures a lot in the book. As does William Lobb, an Englishman who spent much of his life collecting trees and plants from all over the world for an English nursery and private estates in Great Britain.

Despite the title of this book, I hadn't realised quite how much there would be about apples and the science of growing and grafting. I must admit to having skimmed some of these parts to follow the story of the Goodenough family and their lives in the wretched conditions of 19th century American settlers. I was pleased to find after such a tortuous journey there was a hint of optimism at the end!
It was only by chance I noticed in the "acknowledgements" section at the end of the book that some of the characters were based on real people (John Chapman and William Lobb for example) and personally I would have liked to know this at the beginning as it would have added an extra authenticity to the book.

A wonderful piece of descriptive writing by Tracy Chevalier. Her words draw the reader back to 1838 and we find ourselves deep in the black swamps of Ohio where James and Sadie are struggling to eke out a living on a plot that requires them to grow fifty apple trees or lose their land. Whilst James loves his apple trees - especially the few sweet golden pippins he has carefully grafted on to the hardier spitters - Sadie loves the applejack but loses control when she drinks too much of it. As a result life is desperately hard for this ever growing family. Death, misery and betrayal all combine to bring real tragedy and a vicious bitterness that ultimately tears the family apart. The ultimate rupture is both unpredictable and horrific. The novel spans a period of 18 years throughout which Tracy Chevalier continually draws the story back to the golden pippin apple tree. It is emblematic, with its wonderful sweet taste, of how sweet can survive even when surrounded by bitterness and that is indeed what happens. A beautifully crafted story of real originality.

This is a very bleak book full of misunderstanding and quarrelling and violence. The Goodenoughs have travelled to Black Swamp in Ohio as settlers growing apple trees, but as their marriage festers, the trees grow only slowly; swamp fever kills the children one by one, and the mud sticks to everything. Chevalier does a fine job of creating a character out of the landscape but we do feel that we, too, are bogged down in the mud. Everything is hopeless and there seems no way out. Only later, one of the sons makes his way to California during the Gold Rush and may have escaped...

This is a book where I appreciated the research and the writing but it's hard to keep reading something that feels plotless and so relentlessly downbeat. There is a little solace between characters by the end but overall I found this hard work. It feels like a kind of homage to Thomas Hardy, The Woodlanders perhaps, where landscape is destiny - but where Hardy keeps the story ticking over, narrative drive feels stalled here.

There's lots of metaphorical potential with apple trees and a kind of anti-Eden setting - careful writing throughout but a slow and slightly stilted storling for much of the book.

I always love Tracy Chevalier - she has such a deft touch with historical fiction, bringing the world of whatever time she sets her tales in to life so vividly. This novel about American pioneering in the 1800s is full of the richness of growth alongside the privations of poverty and I was entranced by her vision. One scene had me craving apples, so evocative was her description of a Golden Pippin.
The structure was interesting too - some epistolary chapters, some told through the viewpoints of alternating characters, building tension and enlisting the reader in their lives. Some of it was wrenching: a young girl writing of her rapes as men being 'unkind', the euphemism making the act even more horrible; the central relationships so flawed and human and violent that you can't help empathising while you deplore them.
I love to learn as I'm being entertained and Chevalier makes this possible in At the Edge of the Orchard. I kept Wikipedia close as I discovered Johnny Appleseed, the redwood and sequoia groves, mining towns and a bustling, dirty San Francisco - if she makes me want to learn more about aspects of the world she writes about, then I think an author is doing a great job of enriching my world.

I feel that this book is about trees as much as it is about people and all of the trees are much nicer than some of the people!

The Goodenough family start out in Connecticut where the family farm and orchard is not enough to give all of the brothers a living. James, Sadie and their ten children set out for Ohio.
The black swamp lives up to its name but they get their land with the only codicil being they must have planted fifty fruit trees within five years.
Seeds and saplings come from a man whose life is spent sailing along the rivers with two canoes. John Chapman, known now to generations as Johnny Appleseed, holds a pivotal role in the novel.
I could write a novel as a review as so much happens to and around this family but I will jump to Robert- the youngest child and one of only five who survived the swamp fever.
Aged nine he sets out on his own. His travels see him working in stables, with cattle, mining for gold and more. Ultimately he meets another 'real' person. William Lobb travelled constantly collecting botanical samples to send to Kew Gardens in England. He and Robert bond over the great Sequoia trees in Calaveros.
This story is so rich in content, so well written. It was a joy to read.
My thanks to Netgalley for providing an ecopy in return for this honest review.