Irene Hunt (1907–2001)

When her mother dies, seven-year-old Julie is sent to live with her Aunt Cordelia in the big farmhouse a few miles outside of town. She's sure she will never come to like or understand her spinster schoolteacher aunt, but as the years go by and she is given opportunities to move away, she finds that the farm has become home.

This novel is notable for the delicate, almost imperceptible character development that Julie undergoes over the course of the novel. The plot is a fairly episodic show more midcentury coming-of-age story, with Julie growing from a grieving, self-absorbed child to a much more self-aware young woman. I didn't love the messaging about how falling in love makes a woman's life "complete," but it's accurate to the period. All in all, this book reminds me of old linens: worn, a little faded, and thin in places, but still comforting. show less

The narrator is superb, the Southern Illinois accent true to the way the people I know from there speak. The story is compelling.

My DH walked in right at the end and I was sitting on the couch crying. He asked what the matter was, and I said, "They've killed the President." He knows me fairly well, so he asked which President. I allowed as to how it was Lincoln. He left me in peace for the remainder of the book.

It's a masterpiece, plain and simple. Told through letters and seen through the show more eyes of Jethro who is 9 when the war begins, it's got a homespun tone and a piercing insight. Highly recommended. show less

I read Up A Road Slowly as a teen, and have always remembered it as a perceptive story about a young girl's un-extraordinary coming of age. Nothing very dramatic happens in this unassuming little paperback, but somehow the story has stayed with me all these years because of the carefully drawn characters and relationships described in deft prose. It's always a pleasure to read and find that one's memories are accurate. Up A Road Slowly, the 1967 Newbery Award winner, is a thoughtful, show more delightful book.

After her mother's death, seven-year-old Julie Trelling is sent to live with her schoolteacher aunt in the country. We follow Julie through the next ten years as she grows up and begins to understand her world and the adults around her. In some ways this story reminds me very much of L. M. Montgomery's Anne of Green Gables series. Though it incorporates many of the same events in the Anne books, Hunt's world is much less idealized than Montgomery's. For instance, both Anne and Julie have a schoolmate who dies young, but while Montgomery takes the romantic view that death can sanctify everything, Hunt is more focused on the grittier realities. Instead of a shy, loving Matthew, the male figure in Julie's life is her flamboyant drunkard of an Uncle Haskell. Aunt Cordelia (notice her name, Anne fans!) and Marilla are a bit closer in characterization as the older spinster who grows to love the young girl. Indeed, Cordelia is even closer to Aunt Hetty in Montgomery's The Story-Girl.

Anne has a love affair that turns out poorly; so does Julie. But the circumstances are very different indeed. There are little touches here and there, like Julie decorating the table with flowers because of her artistic eye (just like Anne) and the spinster aunt Cordelia/Marilla eventually revealing a sad love affair in her past. I imagine that Hunt includes all these nods as a tribute to the strong influence Montgomery has had on the sub-genre of female coming-of-age stories.

I also noticed many similarities to Norma Johnston's The Keeping Days, but they are less pronounced than the Anne likenesses. All three girls want to be writers, end up falling in love with a childhood friend who enrages them somehow when they are children, and have a strong older woman in their lives (whether aunt, mother, or guardian). Tish's and Julie's stories are narrated in the first person, while Anne's technically isn't (but Montgomery tells much of the story in Anne's words). All three girls are highly intelligent, and their education and academic achievements are extremely important to their development.

Though some of the characters in Up A Road Slowly are only thinly characterized (like Danny), there are others I still remember vividly from my first read. Uncle Haskell in particular is a fascinating and tragic figure, maybe because the good in him — though present — is buried so deeply. He is a lying alcoholic who has never taken any responsibility for anything in his life. Haskell has pretensions of being a famous writer, but it's all a show (and probably just as much for himself as the rest of the world). The scene when Julie and Aunt Cordelia discover the start of a story on his typewriter after he dies (commits suicide?) is so poignant. Indeed, it's one of the main things I remembered about the book. His sister Cordelia blames their mother for how Haskell turned out; she spoiled him shamefully and his character was warped because of it. Though she never appears in the novel, Julie's grandmother has left a terrible legacy and its effects are felt by the next generation.

The story leaves off as Julie finishes high school and looks forward to her coming college years. I wish that there were sequels! This is a gentle, wise, never oversweetened book that I'm happy to have rediscovered. Recommended. show less

While this 1967 Newbery Medal winner is not a page turner, nor does it have the gripping, heart wrenching events that occurred in some other Newbery award winners, such as Out of the Dust. Missing May or The Higher Power of Lucky, it is a book I would recommend.

The story is a simple one of a strong willed, stubborn, feisty seven year old who, when her mother died, moved in the country with an older, school teacher Aunt.

The beauty of the book is in the elegant writing of the author as she show more superbly crafts the stages of maturation and the examples set by the Aunt as she tempers the headstrong, impetuous girl through adult hood. show less