Clock Dance

If you're looking for great adventure or romance, you'll want to look elsewhere. This book, like many of Ms. Tyler's, is told from a complex, perhaps disappointed, middle-aged woman's point of view. Her small adventure takes her across the country and into the lives of child, her mother and their close-knit working class community.

Really anticipated reading Anne Tyler's newest. Many characters who never really grew or resonated. Willaok seemed to drift through her life. Nice to imagine a happy ending for her. Hope it happens. Maybe a sequel?

Anne Tyler writes heartwarming and sometimes heart-wrenching novels. In her latest effort, CLOCK DANCE, readers meet Willa Drake, an 11-year-old girl who lives an ordinary life in 1967 Pennsylvania. A shy child who always defers to her companions, she has a six-year-old sister, an unpredictable mother with anger issues, and an underwhelming father who is not moved by much. We follow Willa to her junior year in college, where she has a scholarship that she hopes will lead to a career. But in 1977, she meets a boy who knocks her off her feet and, after some fussing, is talked into marrying him. As a result, she abandons her studies and moves to California. She does enroll in college again, but must drop out when she becomes pregnant with her first child.

Part Two finds Willa married to a high-powered man and the mother of two teenage boys. One of her sons is an athlete and a great source of pride to his father. The other is a moody boy who wants to drop out of high school to take a cross-country trip to “meet the people.” Willa is just going along in her uneventful life when a road-rage accident kills her husband. As a young bewildered widow, she tries to adjust to her new status in life. Sadly, her boys are not a source of solace in her time of need. They are in touch, but the family is not close.

By 1997, Willa is remarried to another successful man and remains the get-along-with-it-all person she has always been. Then one day she gets a phone call from a stranger who tells her that her son’s ex-girlfriend, Denise, has been shot in a drive-by, and someone has to come to take care of the young woman, Denise’s nine-year-old daughter (who is not Willa’s grandchild), and the family’s dog, Airplane. A little befuddled, Willa thinks, Marriage was often a matter of dexterity, which she bases on her own experiences.

Peter, Willa’s second husband, is a self-absorbed individual who resents finding himself in Baltimore taking care of a woman he barely knows and her outgoing daughter. He does not hide his feelings and wants to go home. Since Denise has a coterie of friendly neighbors and friends, he sees no reason why Willa insists her services are required for an extended period of time. Willa finds herself feeling needed and affectionately becoming closer and closer to Denise and the little girl. She even has taken it upon herself to become the official dog walker; both she and Airplane have a regular, mutually satisfying relationship.

Finally, Peter has had enough and goes home in a disgruntled mood. He does not let Willa off easily and constantly berates her for not flying back with him. By the end of the book, this strategy forces Willa to think of herself in a whole new light. She longs to be a grandmother but realizes that this does not seem to be in the cards. Her sons are not married, and while they do have girlfriends, the relationships do not appear to be traditional ones. So far, Denise’s daughter, who thinks of Willa as a grandmother, is the closest she may ever get to becoming one.

CLOCK DANCE is a riveting and wholesome story of family, relationships, humanity and self-discovery. As always, Anne Tyler’s prose is pristine with not one word too many in any given scene. She is at the top of her writing game in this outstanding novel.

Reviewed by Barbara Lipkien Gershenbaum

Willa’s life hasn’t been extraordinary, but it also hasn’t been uneventful either. When she was 11, her mother’s sudden, but thankfully temporary disappearance, was an experience marked Willa’s young life. When she was in college, she married her sweetheart and abandoned her education to raise a family. When she was only 41, her husband died in a tragic car accident. Now, 20 years later, one phone call from a total stranger is about to change Willa’s life once again.

Once again, Anne Tyler brings us a late-stage, coming-of-age story of a woman who you might have seen dozens of time on the street, but who you might never strike up a conversation with, and more the pity. Because if you did get to know her, maybe she might be very different than you might have thought. What Tyler likes to do in her novels is draw people who surprise us, and sometimes themselves along the way. In fact, although Willa is the center of attention here, almost all of Tyler’s characters in this novel start out to be seemingly one thing and then, turn towards being something else. Yes, there are some more predictable characters here, such as Willa’s second husband, who never seems to stray from being self-centered; but in general, most of Tyler’s characters have a tendency to do unlikely things, and at the most unexpected times.

This is one of the attractions of Tyler’s books, and while we’ve come to expect this from these novels, Tyler succeeds in keeping from falling into any type of formula in her books. This is a good thing, because formulaic novels can be boring. Yes, they say that there are only a couple handfuls of essential plots in the world, but if an author can find a way to frame their stories to include some type of twist, they will continue to entice readers to grab their next work. For example, in Tyler’s 2015 novel “A Spool of Blue Thread,” she tells the story backwards, starting from the most contemporary part, and then moving backwards in time (until Tyler decided she’d gone far enough). Here, the three short pieces of Willa’s earlier life – at age 11, at age 21 and once again at age 41 – leave many gaps in her narrative when the story jumps to Willa aged 61. This, of course, was one of the major points of this novel. That being, that you never know which of the things you experience during your younger days will be the ones that end up shaping your later life. The other major point of this novel is that you may have taken the wrong thing away from any or all those formative experiences, but it’s never too late to realize the lessons you learned back then, might have been the wrong one.

Another thing that I always enjoy in Tyler’s novels is her very open and straight-forward prose style. It always feels like I’m listening to a friend tell me a story, it feels that welcoming and honest. While Tyler’s prose may feel simple on the surface, that friendly feeling is also underlaid with just enough of a poetic touch to make things feel alive and colorful. Add to this the way Tyler uses her language to set the atmosphere in her novels, and you have a winning combination. Mind you, Tyler’s stories aren’t always up-beat and this one has a somewhat gray tone to it that seems to prevail. It is almost like Willa is living in a type of fog, but as the story progresses, that fog starts to clear, leading up to a very concise ending that allows the reader to imagine what will happen to Willa and the other characters after the last page, which is exactly the way I like novels to end.

I should add here that even with all this praise, I didn’t find this novel to be as rich as her last one, “A Spool of Blue Thread.” As mentioned above, before we get to the main story of Willa at age 61, there are the three snippets from her past. These were wonderful but, I think she should have given us a little bit more of that, maybe even just one more to introduce us to her second husband, so we could understand better her later relationship with her sons. Also, perhaps in lieu of another snippet (or in addition to one), she could have done a bit more to developed the metaphor of the Saguaro cactus that appears on some of the covers. That said, who can resist sitting down with an old friend and hearing a captivating story that’s both delightfully told and heartwarming? That's why I still can very warmly recommend this novel and give it four and a half stars out of five.

Willa lived her life meekly. She loved her father, but her boisterous mother mystified her. From the time she was young she adored her calm, gentle father. Throughout her life, the men she selected to be in her life - including her own sons - were much more controlling and volatile. Her first husband was killed in an instance of road rage. Her second husband was domineering and controlling, even selfish in his lack of consideration for her. The women in her life baffle her; her sister grows in an opposite direction from Willa, and her mother remain's a mystery all of her life.

We meet Willa in stages; first when she is 11, and her mother has abandoned her family for some adventure from which she returns after a few days. Willa is content to take care of her father and younger sister, and is relieved when her mother returns home, and yet not. Throughout the progression of her life Willa is portrayed as meek and mild mannered, even-tempered. She steps away from conflict, accepting that others are more dominant and she allows her will to be bent to suit their needs. Until one day, when the course of her life changes with a phone call from a stranger to come and help the ex-girlfriend and young daughter of her distant son. Willa is compelled to go; she is secretly thrilled with an opportunity to disrupt the sameness of her life and daily routines.

This is the story of a small life lived in big steps, and about the opportunities for self-discovery, self-realization and the chance to change ones path. As a fan of Anne Tyler's previous books, I was thrilled with the chance to receive this preview copy in advance from Net Galley. It is a book I will be recommending for my monthly book group to read.

Anne Tyler’s typically quirky characters. I see a lot of Willa in me, walking on egg shells, not rocking the boat. Trying to get along with everyone.
So many different characters in the phases of her life. Mean mother, loving father, adorable little sister. That character changed pretty quickly
To a bitter self centered woman. But Willa never reached out to her as an adult, she just let Elaine be Elaine. She always felt the the other person should make the first move. She went thru life like she didn’t belong sitting, holding her purse, not being able to mingle with new friends
Because she felt they were better then her, not standing up to either husband. Even when her sons were home with their was no easy relationship between them. Then she visited Baltimore on a very strange mission. There she connected with kids & adults. Peter, her husband was not happy. He wanted to go back to sunny Arizona. Her new friends loved her & needed her. She felt alive. Her life was now in technicolor. The ending was abrupt but I think Tyler wanted the reader to create its own ending. I could have gone several ways. Yes, her husband did love her but she just went with the package, ideal lifestyle, sun, low humidity & lots of golf. I hope she followed her soul. Yes, this would be a great book for a sequel.

I wanted to like this book, especially since it's written by a proven, esteemed author. However, I'm almost a third into it, and it's deadly boring and disjointed. Is this a case of a bestselling author getting sloppy? I don't know, but I returned to Audible because my credit deserves to be used for books that keep my interest on a commute. This doesn't cut it.

Honestly, if a newer author submitted a book with a beginning that dragged like this and was all over the place, it would never see ink from an office printer let alone by the barrel. The main character simply doesn't stand out. When a reader can't really root for or get behind the main character, there's a problem. The flight scene with the gun made no sense to me.

Though other readers have commented that the end is less than satisfying, I might get this through the library to attempt to finish it....someday, if I can get through it. I'd have to force myself. For sure, it won't be on my dime.

This book starts out well but becomes very mundane towards the end, then has an abrupt, unfinished (to me) ending. There were so many unexplained things in the story, such as why Willa had such a bland and unaffectionate relationship with her sons, or why Denise had such an intense dislike for Hal, despite being his "friend". They were not particularly nice people, and I didn't find their neighborly involvement with each other to be believable, given the premise that Willa was called because no other person could handle the self sufficient, polite and very mature Cheryl in their home? It just didn't make sense. But even that I could overlook until I reached the abrupt end. It was like the author just gave up.

My favorite Anne Tyler book was "Searching for Caleb." It was interesting, mysterious and enjoyable to read. Since then, I have been disappointed in "A Spool of Blue Thread," and hoped that this latest novel, "Clock Dance" would an improvement. The characters in this book seemed to me to be stuck in another time, echoing frustrations from another time. The glacially slow action set my teeth on edge and I forced myself to finish it. I just hope that not many people's lives are like this because it was excruciatingly morose, filled with petty anxieties. I waited for this book to be available from the library and am shockingly surprised that there's been so much made of its publication.

Anne Tyler is a great storyteller and includes meaningful descriptions. This book is a miss for me. I liked the characters because they seemed authentic. There were two missing elements: how did the past stories connect to the present story and what was Willa's motivation?

Past stories: I truly missed seeing how the first story connected to the rest of the book. The second story was connected in that Willa is always looking to be rescued. The third story was a sad time for Willa, but how does that get her to the present day story? I just failed to connect everything together.

Present story: Because I couldn't draw a correlation from the previous stories, I feel like Willa didn't have motivation to go to Baltimore. The end makes sense for the present story, but does it make sense for the other stories? The end seems to be the only presentation of motivation in the entire book.

So, it was a miss for me.

Anne Tyler is a wonderful writer, but her most recent books have been a disappointment. Clock Dance (even the title seems forced) is best described as a compilation of the kinds of things that have made previous Tyler books successful. There is the somewhat aimless protagonist, the ensemble of quirky people who interact with her and a plot that moves toward the protagonist deciding to make changes in her life. Unfortunately, Clock Dance feels like Tyler simply followed a formula that has worked for her in the past (by the end of the book I felt like I was reading an updated version of Ladder of Years) and the formula fails her here. The characters are not well drawn, the quirky ones are too quirky to be believable and what little plot there is stretches credulity. There are many better Tyler books out there.

Anne Tyler’s 22nd book, Clock Dance, has a subtle plot—so much so—that I was surprised at the hypnotic effect it had on me while reading it. No thrilling cliffhangers were needed to keep me turning its pages. I cared about what was going to happen to its protagonist—Willa—early on.

Tyler is a master at creating quiet characters and plots that move at such a measured deliberate pace, that it is sometimes surprising when her writing becomes profound.

Such was the case with this book. The first half begins slowly when we meet Willa as a child being raised by a mother her father calls “tempestuous” . That is a polite way of describing someone who is emotional and unreliable.

Her father is a man “so mild-mannered that he thought it was impolite to pick up a telephone in mid-ring.”

So Willa at an early age becomes a very responsible person who does not draw attention to herself, but instead keeps her mouth shut and is quick to smooth other’s feathers at the first sign of anyone’s irritation or disappointment.

We progress to a college age Willa who ends up marrying a domineering man with whom she has two sons. She is left a widow at around age forty when her husband died in a road rage accident.

The book segues into the quiet hypnotic portion (at least to me) when a then sixty-one year old Willa, now remarried and living in Arizona, receives a strange phone call.

A Baltimore woman calls to say that Willa’s little granddaughter needs someone to look after her while her mother is in the hospital— she had been shot. That isn’t so strange you might say, but Willa doesn’t actually have any grandchildren!

No, this isn’t a scam.

When the stranger from another state calls ( having found Willa’s number on written on a board at one of her son’s former girlfriend’s house), pointing that out feels somehow rude. Willa tells her husband, “I haven’t felt useful in . . . forever.”

So, she flies to Baltimore to help out however she can.

Out of this quirky premise, Tyler creates a world in a Baltimore neighborhood with eccentric neighbors and a “daughter-in-law” who isn’t reluctant to accept Willa’s help. (Willa’s son is living in another part of Baltimore wIth a new girlfriend and doesn’t seem interested in spending time with his mother even when he learns she is in town.).

What makes the book endearing is Cheryl, her 9-year-old “granddaughter “ who isn’t a blood relation (or any relation) to Willa, but quickly grows close to her.

As one of Willa’s elderly neighbors tells her, “Figuring out what to live for. That’s the great problem at my age.” And that is the topic that Tyler rather quietly addresses in her newest book.

Thank you Knopf and NetGalley for the Advanced Reader’s Copy of this book and for allowing me to review it.

I have read everything I could find of Anne Tyler's work ever since <em>Dinner at the Homesick Restaurant</em> was assigned reading in college, and I've never regretted reading an Anne Tyler book. That still holds true as I read this latest book of her, <em>Clock Dance</em>.

Willa Drake leads a rather simple, somewhat plain life. She can easily recall the most unusual or extraordinary events in her life because there are so few of them. Then she gets a phone call that her son's ex-girlfriend, Denise, has been shot and needs Willa's help - with a number of things, but mostly looking after the ex-girlfriend's daughter, Cheryl.

Willa isn't sure why Denise would have her phone number handy that a neighbor would be calling, or why she should even consider getting involved, but she does. She packs up herself and her husband and they head to Baltimore to help Denise and Cheryl, nearly strangers, because she'd been called to action. Willa tries to add in that it makes for a good excuse to see her son, Sean, who has been a stranger to Willa for many years.

I'm not quite sure how to describe what it's like reading an Anne Tyler book to someone who's never done it. It's like carving a pumpkin. It's easy to do. It's a pretty common thing - for Americans anyway. And you have a rather good, though general, idea of what it will be like when you're through. But the intricacies, and finesse make all the difference between an expertly, beautifully carved pumpkin and an almost generic smiley or scowling jack-o-lantern.

I worked with a Shakespeare company for many years and we often talked about the fact that Shakespeare wrote about what it was like to be human perhaps better than any other writer. But I think Anne Tyler might be in the running for that title. Shakespeare gives us characters who are larger than life - sometimes kings or gods - to remind us of what it means to be human, while Tyler gives us Willa's and Pearl's (<em>Dinner at the Homesick Restaurant</em>) and Macon's (<em>The Accidental Tourist</em>). Tyler gives us characters who are smaller than life... characters who typically fly under the radar of extraordinary-ness but reach up and out and beyond their 'station' in life to do something extraordinary for a change (even if that something isn't earth-shattering or revelatory to the general public).

Tyler creates real people in a real world and makes it extraordinary by giving some people a renewed strength which promises hope for humanity Tyler is a delight to read.

Reading this, after reading some Fredrik Backman (the Swedish author of <em>A Man Called Ove</em> among other best-sellers), I can see a definite similarity in style and story. Backman also writes about ordinary people stepping out. But Tyler's been doing it for 22 years, and with much more consistency,

The title of the book, <em>Clock Dance</em>, is certainly symbolic and plays on a couple of different levels. We have Willa's past, as we're brought through the moments in her life that were extraordinary. And then we have the dance of time as Willa considers her future and what she will do with it. And then I also wonder if Tyler herself is teasing us by reminding us that we're all dancing with the clock and that we should make the best of it.

Looking for a good book? Clock Dance by Anne Tyler is a motivating look at Willa - an 'everyman' for the modern reader.

I received a digital copy of this book from the publisher, through Netgalley, in exchange for an honest review.

Clock Dance was the second pick for Barnes & Noble's  nation-wide Book Club. (The first was Meg Wolitzer's The Female Persuasion, back in May.) Like the first one, it was contemporary fiction, which I'm pretty meh about. When I learned it was set mostly in Baltimore, and written by a local author, I became more interested. I'm originally from Oregon, but Baltimore has become my home, and I enjoy reading about it. We had a slightly larger group than last time, but I was the only returning attendee besides the store employee, Sam, who led the discussion.

Sam opened the discussion with the same question that she started the last one with - "Did you like the main character?" It's an interesting question because most people ask "Did you like the book?" which can have a different answer. I don't usually read books in which I don't like the main character, but that's usually because I choose my books. I'm not choosing my Book Club books, so it's a good question. Unlike last time, I did like Willa. I disagreed with her judgment when it came to husbands, but I still sympathized with her. I mentioned that I didn't like that she just floated through most of her life without any real ambition, but to be honest, I've done that too. I'm not a very ambitious person - or my ambitions are quite low. I think that, perhaps, is the difference. I find a lot of fulfillment in being, effectively, my husband's personal assistant. It's fun. Willa did not seem to find it fulfilling, she just - didn't want to rock the boat.

I like how we saw each of Willa's "defining moments" - the book opens on her as a child, her volatile mother having stormed out of the house during an argument. Her mother really does a number on her as a child. I think it's why she hates to rock the boat so much. From here, we fast forward to college, and Willa's boyfriend proposing to her after gaslighting her about an event that happened on the plane. Willa's mother disapproves. Vehemently. I think that's part of why Willa accepts. Our next view of Willa's life is the accident that takes her husband's life, and its aftermath.

Then we finally start into the real meat of the book, twenty years after the death of her first husband. Her sons have grown and moved away, she has remarried, and both of her parents have passed. Her husband is a little distant, and she seems rather untethered. Then she gets the strangest phone call. It turns out her eldest son lived with a woman (Denise) and her daughter for a little while in Baltimore; he has since moved on, but "Sean's mother" is still a phone number on Denise's emergency contact list. So when Denise is shot in the leg and put in the hospital, a neighbor lady sees it, assumes Willa is the grandmother of the child, and calls her to come take care of her. It's a little convoluted, and Willa can't even adequately explain to her husband why she's decided to fly to Baltimore to take care of a child she has no relation to, but she does so anyway.

This is where we get to Baltimore, and, in Anne Tyler's own words, "when her story changes to Technicolor."

I actually live just outside Baltimore myself, but one of my best friends lives in Charles Village, and I could SO EASILY envision Willa's neighborhood as a street of rowhomes. (Turns out it's probably based on a neighborhood in Hamilton, according to the Baltimore Sun.) I was even mapping locations in Willa's house to my friend's rowhome! Anne Tyler really captures the spirit of Baltimore, and now I want to read more of her books, even if they are contemporary fiction!

Overall I enjoyed Clock Dance; Anne Tyler is very good at subtle character growth, which is quite realistic. People don't often change all at once. Sometimes it takes a lifetime of being told what to do before finally waking up to what you WANT to do.

My Rating: 4 stars

This is my first time reading Anne Tyler and it certainly won’t be my last! I like this author’s style – the way she is able to take everyday, mundane events and turn them into an interesting story, yet still keep the overall tone low-key, subtle, and rooted in reality. The story is divided into 4 major segments that highlight 4 particular “defining moments” in the life of the main character Willa Drake -- starting in 1967 when she is 11 years old, we get a glimpse of what her childhood was like and how her family environment helped shape the kind of person she would become; then the story jumps to 1977, when Willa is in college and faces a major life decision in the form of a marriage proposal; then it jumps to 20 years later, in 1997, when Willa is faced with yet another life-changing event, widowhood at the young age of 41 and having to figure out how to move forward with her 2 teenage sons; and finally, 2017 when Willa is 61 years old, remarried (to a man whose personality is similar to her first husband in so many ways), retired and contemplating her lot in life when she gets a phone call about her son’s ex-girlfriend and impulsively flies to Baltimore. Through these vignette-like “observations” into her life at various stages, we get to know Willa on a deeper level and by the end of the book, she has become like a dear friend whom we just finished spending quality time with. Granted, I didn’t always agree with Willa’s decisions and honestly, at times her passiveness and tolerance for things she shouldn’t have tolerated really frustrated me, but I still liked her as a character and enjoyed being in her company, even if only for a short few days (the amount of time it took me to read the book). The character development is definitely well-done in here, and not just with Willa but also with the other characters, even some of the ones who only make a brief appearance. I enjoy reading about characters that are relatable, which many times means that they also have to be realistic and yes, sometimes even “ordinary,” – a character that may not necessarily have much excitement going on in their lives, but yet encounter interesting enough moments where a story like this never once comes across as boring.

As other reviewers have said, the story here is simple as well as subtle and not much goes on outside of normal, everyday stuff, yet at no point did I feel the story drag. In the beginning, when I found out this would be a “slice of life” type of story, I was a little worried, as I usually don’t take to these types of stories too well – I prefer a continuous story where I am able to see the main character’s growth and gradual development. This book was very different from other “slice of life” books I’ve read in that this one went deeper in terms of characterization as well as emotional depth and to me at least, the transitions from one time period to another were seamless. I’ve heard that Anne Tyler is a masterful writer and I can definitely see why. I’m sure that the next time I am in the mood for a quiet, yet meaningful read with characters that are relatable and easy to connect with, I will be picking up one of Tyler’s other novels to enjoy!

Received ARC from Knopf Publishing via Penguin First to Read program.