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    The Silver Star
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    The Silver Star
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    The Silver Star
    Ebook287 pages4 hours

    The Silver Star

    By Jeannette Walls

    4/5

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    About this ebook

    For readers who loved The Glass Castle comes a stunning, heartbreaking novel about an intrepid girl who challenges the injustice of the adult world.

    It is 1970. 'Bean' Holladay is twelve and her sister Liz fifteen when their mother, a woman who 'flees every place she's ever lived at the first sign of trouble', takes off to find herself. She leaves the girls enough money for food to last a month or two, but it's not long before Bean and Liz board a bus from California to Virginia, where their widowed Uncle Tinsley lives in the decaying mansion that has been in the family for generations.

    Once they've arrived, money is tight, so Liz and Bean start working for Jerry Madox, foreman of the mill in town, a big man who bullies workers, tenants and his wife. Bean adores her whip-smart older sister, inventor of wordgames, reader of Edgar Allan Poe, non-conformist. But when school starts in the autumn, it is Bean who easily adjusts and makes friends, and Liz who becomes increasingly withdrawn. And then something happens between Liz and Maddox...

    'Tragic and comic at the same time... an outrageous story, one that will break your heart' Sunday Independent

    'There isn't a shred of self-pity in this deeply compassionate book' Marie Claire

    'Has immense power and readibility... What it does with aplomb is to track the birth of a nation: the conjuring of modern America from a scorched, dusty wasteland' The Times on Half Broke Horses
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherSimon & Schuster UK
    Release dateJun 6, 2013
    ISBN9781471129100
    Unavailable
    The Silver Star
    Author

    Jeannette Walls

    Jeannette Walls graduated from Barnard College and was a journalist in New York. Her memoir, The Glass Castle, has been a New York Times bestseller for more than eight years. She is also the author of the instant New York Times bestsellers The Silver Star and Half Broke Horses, which was named one of the ten best books of 2009 by the editors of The New York Times Book Review. Walls lives in rural Virginia with her husband, the writer John Taylor.

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    Reviews for The Silver Star

    4/5

    72 ratings52 reviews

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    • 4/5
      This was the book chosen for work book club. And, it’s well written book covering that doesn’t really cover any new ground. There are really no surprises with this book. We have Bean and her sister, Liz, living with their mother who is trying to become a star (first in California and later in California) in typical dysfunctional family style, Mom runs off and the two sisters visit a barely remembered uncle in the town their Mother grew up in. Of course, the uncle is a kind hearted, but stubborn man, living in a past that doesn’t exist. When the sisters decide to find a job (against their uncle’s wishes), it brings them into the realm of Mr. Maddox, the much despised manager of the local mill. Of course, bad stuff happens, but all becomes mostly well by the end the book.The book is short, and while it is competently written, it’s missing back stories for Beans and Liz’s mom (Charlotte) and their uncle (Tindsley). We get that Charlotte got pregnant and her reputation was ruined, but this is glossed over, not really affecting the plot. The same thing happens with Tindsley. His wife passed away, but he doesn’t seem affected by her loss. There is no emotional connection to these two characters.The bad guy is written strangely. He has clear motives, but his domineering personality of controlling everything doesn’t go with his hoarding tendencies. Also, I have issues with how the situation was resolved. It was too... convenient. The race relations was handled realistically, but didn’t add anything to the plot. And I found the ending to be weird and a bit over the top.
    • 4/5
      This book is a tale about two sisters finding sanctuary in the ancestral home of their mother, a woman probably carrying a diagnosis of bipolar disorder, who frequently abandons her two children for days at a time in her effort to seek fame and fortune as a singer and songwriter. The themes explored include family relationships, especially those between sisters, abandonment, financial struggle, and coming-of-age issues. The narrator is Bean, the younger siblings, whose character reminds me of Scout Finch of To Kill a Mockingbird and the nurturing and protective power of family reminded me of the Boatwright sisters in The Secret Life of Bees. If you read and enjoyed either of these books, you would enjoy The Silver Star like I did.
    • 5/5
      I thought The Silver Star was absolutely superb. I would recommend the book to anyone who can handle a bipolar mother abandoning her children whenever she feels like it. The book made me think about how much more I should appreciate my mother and all she does for me.
    • 4/5
      Sweet, endearing, I need a second book so I can know more about the girls!
    • 3/5
      It was a flat tale
      But interesting. I really fell in love with jean the bean head
    • 4/5
      Very gripping indeed - didn't want to put book down any time
    • 4/5
      Love the author, love her writing. I really enjoyed this work of fiction, but I loved Half-Broke-Horses better.
    • 3/5
      A solid book, but short of the spectacular Glass Castle.
    • 4/5
      Having read the Glass Castle, after reading this I understood better why her mother was the way she was. In the Glass Castle she was selfish and self-centered. I had more empathy for the mother after reading this book.
    • 4/5
      Started reading and thought... same old same old for Jeanette, but this one is fiction and her characters are terrific! Quick read- worth it!
    • 5/5
      Its really emotional and i found it interesting. I have to admit i got addicted and couldn't take my eyes of the page. I just had to finish the story and wouldn't do anything else until i was done.
    • 4/5
      In The Silver Star by Jeannette Walls we meet 12 year old Jean "Bean" Holladay, her 15 year old sister Liz, and their mother Charlotte. Charlotte, an irresponsible mother and aspiring singer, leaves the girls on their own for a bit too long in a small town in California. When Bean sees a police car outside their house and senses that trouble may be ahead, the girls take a bus to Byler, Virginia, the small town where their mother grew up and where their Uncle Tinsley still resides in a decaying mansion. Circumstances surrounding their unstable mother result in the girls living with Uncle Tinsley, who offers them some measure of security, for the school year.

      The Holladay family used to own the cotton mill, but their glory days and wealth are long past. Knowing that they need jobs to earn some money for clothes, the girls eventually find themselves working odd jobs for the mill foreman, Jerry Maddox, a controlling bully. Bean also gets to know her deceased father's side of the family, where the inspiration for the title of the story is found. Once school starts, Bean finds herself trying to adjust and fit in while Liz is leaning toward nonconformity.

      Maddox is an evil, one dimensional character and it is clear right from the start that he will mean trouble. What was surprising was that Wall's didn't have the girls show the same kind of canny ability Liz had when they had a man on the bus bothering them. The Silver Star is set in 1970 during racial integration of the schools, which is a secondary story in the novel, and the Vietnam War. The novel mentions To Kill a Mockingbird, and takes some inspiration from it, as well as Wells' own personal background, especially in the character of Bean and her mother.

      Walls is known for her best selling memoir, The Glass Castle, and a true story about her grandmother, Half Broke Horses. Walls did many things right in The Silver Star, her first novel, addressing universal themes like societal injustice, peer pressure, bullies, and abuse. However most of the characters weren't fleshed out beyond Bean, and would have benefited from more development. It did grip my attention, though, and had me racing to find out what happened to the girls.

      highly recommended

      Disclosure: My Kindle edition was courtesy of Scribner via Netgalley for review purposes.
    • 3/5
      If you've read the author's memoir, then you've read a much better version of this book. It tells a predictable story of two girls who are left on their own after their nut of a mother picks up and leaves.
    • 4/5
      Another great book by this author. Loved her memoir and her historical fiction based on her grandmothers life. This one didn't disappoint. An effortless read with a strong plot and great characters.
    • 4/5
      I've read Jeannette Walls's The Glass Castle and Half Broke Horses and loved them both so when I had a saw she had written another book of course I had to read it. The Silver Star is the story of Bean (Jean) Holladay. Of course, every story is more than one character but I really felt that Wall wrote the rest of the characters to support Bean's story. Bean's mom is a washout as a mother ads so her sister, Liz, is much more of a mother figure. Bean has grown up with the story of how her sister had saved her when she was a baby and I think that helped Bean also think of her sister as a hero-figure.

      Bean and Liz's mom leave them on their own and when the "Bandersnatches" (Liz's name for cops and social workers) come around they decide it would be better to wait for them mom at their mother's hometown in Byler, where their Uncle Tindley lives. Of course Bean's mom doesn't show up for awhile so they end up going to school in Byler. Here Bean meets her father's family where she learns that her father earned a Silver Star and died while defending her mom. I this is where Bean begins to develop her own sense of self rather than on just being brilliant Liz's sister who needed saving or the mistake her mother is running from - she decides to do the right thing, not just for her sister but for those who might be next.

      I thought this was a little less smooth than The Glass House but was a terrific story of a tough girl-becoming a young woman and figuring out for herself what was the path she would choose. As in both her previous books it's one that I wanted to read out loud just to hear that "voice" of the main character. Where the story stumbles is when Wall moves away from Bean's story to try and explain what is happening.
    • 4/5
      I enjoyed this a lot. Jeannette Walls really knows how to write the dysfunctional family!
    • 5/5
      Bean and Liz Holladay are two sisters living in California with their unmarried mother, Charlotte, who has a habit of disappearing for days at a time. When she doesn't return after several weeks from her latest disappearance, Bean comes home from school to find a police car in front of her house. She and her sister decide to go to their mom's hometown, Byler, Virginia, to stay with their Uncle Tinsley, lest they end up in foster homes, leaving a coded message for their mom as to where they are. While there, Bean finds out who her father is and discovers that she has an aunt and uncle and cousins. When Charlotte finally returns and sees the note, she returns to her hometown, but refuses to stay, instead planning to taking the girls with her on a road trip. On the way, she has a mental breakdown and the girls are returned to their uncle. In order not to feel like a burden to him, they seek out jobs, and end up working for the manager of the cotton mill which the Holladay family used to own. Trouble ensues, and Bean takes the initiative to stand up for her family. This is in keeping withf Walls' dysfunctional family memoirs. I enjoyed it and found it to be a hard book to put down.
    • 4/5
      It's been quite a few years since I read Jeannette Walls' memoir, but I do remember appreciating it for its disturbing yet engrossing writing and for Walls' amazing storytelling skills. This novel, which I read on audio (read by the author herself), was a quick, engrossing read, once again about a dysfunctional family. In some ways the character of "Bean" reminded me of Harper Lee's Scout in To Kill a Mockingbird, yet it lacked something that I can't quite put my finger on. The writing was more simplistic & lacked some of the depth that I remember from Walls' earlier writing. Usually when an author reads his/her own book, I generally feel as though that either makes or breaks the book. Some authors were made to read their own; others, not so much. I'm in the middle with this one. While Walls did an acceptable job, I suspect another reader may have done better.
    • 3/5
      Jeanette Walls ventures into fiction with Silver Star in a tale that in many respects is reminiscent of both The Glass Castle and Half Broke Horses. There is the flighty "artistic" mother who loves her children, but is emotionally incapable of taking care of them, there is the salt of the earth aunt from the wring side of the tracks that dispenses homespun wisdom and there is the down at the heels uncle who seemingly cannot come to grips with his diminished presence, but comes through for his two nieces when the chips are down.The story in this quickly read novel revolves around two sisters - "Bean" and Liz Holladay - who are living in California with their mother who is an aspiring singer who often goes off leaving them for days with nothing but a supply of frozen chicken pot pies to eat. When she disappears for an extra long time after breaking up with what turns out to be an imaginary boyfriend, a concerned neighbor calls the authorities and the girls decide to head for Virginia an the family's ancestral home where their Uncle Tinsley still lives.The Holladays once owned the town of Byler, but that was before Uncle Tinsley sold the family's mill to foreign investors and then, in turn was pushed out of the company. Now he lives on the old family estate of Mayfield in the family's crumbling plantation house. Bean soon adapts to the new town & Uncle Tinsley's eccentric ways. She also discovers who her rear father was and also learns much more about who her mother really is.Everything would be great if money wasn't so tight. Uncle Tinsley tells the girls that they should make do & that Holladays "don't work for other people." The girls, however, want new clothes, so they go to work for Jerry Maddox, a foreman in the mill who is a broad caricature of a Southern bullying tyrant straight out of a Tennessee Williams play. When Liz is sexually assaulted by Maddox and Bean insists that they file charges against him, the girl come face-to-face with all the meanness that a small town is capable of.This would be a much better book if the characters were more realistically developed. As it is, they are all stereotypical cardboard cutouts and the book reads more like a YA novel than a work of adult fiction. If you are a fan of Jeanette Walls you will probably enjoy it. One hopes, however, that she develops her fiction writing skills before her next attempt at a novel.
    • 4/5
      This was a good book that I enjoyed reading. Charlotte is a pretty lousy mother raising her two children, Liz and Bean. The book is told from the youngest daughter, Bean's point of view and it takes place in 1970.After mom disappears for too long on another mission to find herself, Liz and Bean decided to leave California on their own and travel cross-country to Virginia to find their Uncle Tinsley.The story is a coming of age novel about Bean and her dysfunctional family and how she triumphs over adversity.The beginning and middle were great but then I felt the story kind of petered out. Something bad does happen, but then the ending seemed rushed and too tidy. It was a pretty good read and entertaining, but not very memorable when finished. I received a complimentary copy from Goodreads giveaway in exchange for a review.
    • 4/5
      The Silver Star does resemble Jeanette Walls' memoirs about her own childhood in that the protagonists are intelligent young sisters left to fend for themselves when their parent is unable to properly do so. It is clearly a novel, however, with a plot in which tensions build and then are resolved with a satisfactory ending leaving few loose ends. Walls is a talented writer and the voice of young Bean is that of a believable twelve year old. The story is fast paced, enjoyable, and easily finished in a day.

      1 person found this helpful

    • 4/5
      ilver Star by Jeanette WallsAudio (7 discs) read by Jeanette Wallsprimary characters areCharlotte Holladay...a wannabe actress, singer...narcissistic, unstable single mother of Bean and LizBean Holladay....12 year old spirited heroine and narrator of their story.Liz Holliday...15 year old, somewhat unconventional, yet practical older sister."coming of age adventure..bildungsroman....abandoned children...family histories...adversaries...self discovery...family relationships...survival" (library notes)The year is 1970.The story begins in southern California, with the majority of the story taking place in Byler, VA (a small, southern town "on the cusp of integration.")The book is defined as a "novel about triumph over adversity and about people who find a way to love each other and the world, despite its flaws and injustices."(publisher's notes)3.5 ★
    • 5/5
      Jeannette Walls's memoir, The Glass Castle, is one of my favorite books from recent years. She tells of a dysfunctional and often harrowing childhood with humor and love, and the author and her siblings have my respect.This novel, The Silver Star, contains many elements of the true Walls story: resourceful children must stick together and fight the often cruel world alone due to unstable parenting and the inconsistency of adults. There is both humor and meanness throughout the story, and, this being a novel instead of real life, the author is able to craft a neater resolution for the Holladay sisters than for her own siblings.I highly recommend this novel. Walls is a great storyteller and Bean Holladay is an admirable heroine!
    • 3/5
      Engrossing and one heck of a page turner, I read this in one night. A fairly simple story of two sisters making their way in the world, but nicely wrought. I'd like to give it another half a star at least.
    • 5/5
      I really enjoyed this book. It was about 2 sisters with an unreliable mother. They end up in 1970s rural Virginia. It was an interesting portrayal of a part of the country I am not very familiar with. The characters of the sisters were very compelling. It also had faint echoes of To Kill a Mockingbird.
    • 4/5
      Good book. Difficult to pick out the time period - late 60's and then maybe early 60's.
    • 3/5
      This novel is so much better than the author's famous memoir, although they explore some of the same themes (people do always say, "write what you know," after all).

      The Silver Star, while actually more than 250 pages, was quick and tidy like a novella. The characters were engaging and the plot well-constructed. The bad shit was negative enough to be realistic and upsetting but not infuriating; the good stuff, by the same token, was positive enough to be redeeming and hopeful but not cheesy.
    • 3/5
      This is not my first experience with Walls' work, as I read both The Glass Castle and Half-Broke Horses and loved both of these non-fiction works. I wasn't sure how her fictional story would go with me, but I had positive thoughts knowing that Walls narrated the story herself. Any previous books I listened to narrated by the author I just loved! Unfortunately, this wasn't the case with The Silver Star.If you have read Walls previous books it is obvious she comes from a highly dysfunctional family. She draws on her personal experiences once again to create Bean and Liz's story. Although Bean is our main character, I felt the story belonged as much to Liz as she is the one who faces the crisis head on. Liz and Bean live with their single mother in California, never in one place too long. It isn't uncommon for their mother to not show up at home for long periods of time, but this time the girls are worried. Since the girls don't have jobs, they can't pay bills or buy food so they have to come up with a plan for survival. Recalling that their mother comes from Virginia and still has family there, they decide to embark on a journey across the country to stay with their family until their mother gets her life in order. So they leave a note for their mother, hoping she finds it when she returns, scrape enough money together to purchase two one-way tickets to Virginia.The girls are surprised upon meeting their family in Virginia, to learn that her mother comes from a seemingly wealthy heritage. Since all that is left of the family fortune seems to be the original Holladay home, the girls decide to take jobs to help pay for their school clothes and personal expenses. Against their Uncle Tinsley's wishes, they gain employment with long-time family nemesis, Jerry Maddox. This decision sets a whole new set of events in motion.I did enjoy Liz and Bean's story of perseverance. They didn't have a family life until they took control of the situation and moved to Virginia. This finally gave them the opportunity to be part of a family that takes care of each other. This novel could be an instance where I may have enjoyed it more had I actually read it rather than listening to it. I just feel that Walls could have put more emotion and passion into her narration, I mean she created the characters! With themes of family, secrets, and perseverance, you may enjoy this story more than I did. Although I didn't love listening to the book I feel that it would make an interesting book club selection.
    • 4/5
      In her memoir The Glass Castle, Walls describes her harrowing childhood of poverty and parental neglect. In this novel, physical conditions for teens Liz and Bean are a little better, but their mother is somewhat flighty and their fathers deceased. When Mom takes a break from her responsibilities, the girls find their way to their uncle back east. Life in the mill town formerly run by the family has its ups and downs, and heroes and villains. The plot moves at a leisurely pace, but I was never bored and would love to meet these characters again.
    • 3/5
      This is another coming-of-age book and I did hold high hopes for it. It fell short somehow. Maybe becaue this type of book has been done so well before, and this one just fell short. I am a huge fan of Martha Grimes' Emma Graham series and wish there were more books about darling Emma. I also love the Flavia de Luce series by Alan Bradley. There are lots of others in this genre that are memorable. But in this noteworthy group, I'm sorry, Ms. Walls just didn't quite measure up. With the exception of wonderful, precocious twelve-year-old Bean (Jean) Holladay and her eccentric Uncle Tinsely, I found that the rest of the characters were flat and and typecast. Bean's 15 year old sister Liz shows some promise, but she kind of disappears about 1/4 of the way through the book. And Bean's mom Charlotte, well the less said about this flighty superficial character, the better. The book is set in Virginia in the spring and summer of 1970. Liz and Bean have found their way to their Mom's family home in Virgina after their gaddabout mother has left them alone in their home in California for weeks. There they meet their mother's brother Uncle Tinsley who sees the girls' plight and takes them in while they wait for their mother to make a reappearance. The story is about Liz and Bean's efforts to make a home for themselves with a kindly uncle. They take jobs with a local bigwig and a whole series of occurences arise from this that forever changes the two girls. This book is OK, but I just didn't find that it really went anywhere, and I didnt' care enough about the characters, with the exception of Bean, to really want to read what happened to them.