Follow Me

by Joanna Scott

On a summer day in 1946 Sally Werner, the precocious young daughter of hardscrabble Pennsylvania farmers, secretly accepts her cousin's invitation to ride his new motorcycle. Like so much of what follows in Sally's life, it's an impulsive decision with dramatic and far-reaching consequences. Soon she abandons her home to begin a daring journey of self-creation, the truth of which she entrusts only with her granddaughter and namesake, six decades later. But when young Sally's father--a man she has never known--enters her life and offers another story altogether, she must uncover the truth of her grandmother's secret history.

Boldly rendered and beautifully told, in FOLLOW ME Joanna Scott has crafted a paean to the American tradition of re-invention and a sweeping saga of timeless and tender storytelling.

Genres: Fiction, Historical Fiction, Novels, Literary Fiction, The United States Of America, Adult Fiction

420 pages, Hardcover

First published April 4, 2009

About the author

from the backcover:
Joanna Scott is an Assistant Professor of English at the University of Rochester. She has also taught in the creative writing programs at Princeton University and the University of Maryland. She was awarded a Guggenheim Fellowship during the writing of Arrogance.

Librarian note: There is more than one author in the Goodreads database with this name.

Joanna^^Scott

Reviews

[Miriam · Rating 5 out of 5]

A truly lovely novel about family secrets and the unexpected path that life takes us on. I am amazed at what Joanna Scott can pack into one sentence, one paragraph. It is more than I could imagine doing in a whole book. She is a master.

[Lisette · Rating 4 out of 5]

Rating: 4.7/5
Age R: 15+
Release Date: April 22, 2009
Thoughts:
The writing in this is....out of this world. Seriously. It's just so freakin' beautiful!
Follow Me is one of the most beautiful books I have EVER read! The story is just too, too wonderful and unforgettable, it's one I am definitely going to revisit.
The story starts off with a girl who (we later learn is Sally's granddaughter) is talking about how her father tried to kill himself, failed, then just packed up and left. Sally, the narrator's grandmother, blames herself for this. Why you say? Well, Sally (granddaughter) tells us why.
And so begins the story of Sally Werner, a sixteen year old girl who gets knocked up by her cousin. She decides to run away, leaving her baby behind on the kitchen table, only to later become Sally Angel, then Sally Mole, then Sally Bliss. Each time she runs away she changes her last name. And each time we read about a story that seriously pulls at your heartstrings. One in particular almost had me in tears. If my tear ducts worked properly I would have totally cried my eyes out. :(
Joanna Scott takes us through the amazing journey of a girl who's life ends up bringing her down, and down, and down. I completely admire this girl for having the strength to start over again more than once. In a way it was kind of cowardly, but then again, imagine if you went through that? What would you do? Not that you'd do the exact same thing but she was young and it is hard to think straight sometimes. Either way, I loved this book so much you have no idea. I'll admit at some points it was a bit slow, but that didn't last more then a minute.
I absolutely loved the way it was written. Some of it was written in the POV of Sally's granddaughter, most in the POV of Sally herself, and some in the POV of Sally's (granddaughter, kinda confusing huh? hehe) father.

Gosh darn I'm still thinking about this one particular part that made me soo dang sad you've no idea. :( I'm not gonna give any spoilers but I will say this, it has to do with one of Sally's loves. :(

[Holly (2 Kids and Tired) · Rating 2 out of 5]

Follow Me is a beautifully written book. It is slow starting and difficult to get into, but at times the writing is almost lyrical and vivid. I've had a difficult time putting my finger on why I didn't love it, when I know that so many people did.

In 1947, 16-year old Sally Werner runs away from home, leaving her newborn son in a basket on her parent's kitchen table. Running away is what Sally does best. She runs away, lands on her feet and when things get difficult, runs away again. Fortunately, each time she runs away from a difficult situation, she finds good, caring people who help her.

The words, saga, tragic and secret come to mind when describing this novel. Sally's story is a saga full of tragic family secrets that destroy relationships.

The story is told by Sally's namesake granddaughter as Sally shared it with her. Sally's story is vivid and interesting and as soon as you get into it, the modern day granddaughter steps in, dropping hints of what is to come. Towards the end, the narration changes to become the granddaughter's father telling her his version of what happened between himself and Sally's daughter.

Occasional, unnecessary, and graphic profanity, which is the main reason it didn't get 3 stars.

Thanks to Miriam Parker at Hatchette Books and the Early Bird Blog Tour for the opportunity to review this book.

[drey · Rating 3 out of 5]

Sally Werner is not quite my type of gal. She's flighty. Makes rash decisions. Runs away from her problems. But Joanna Scott's writing drew me into Sally's story, and I could not stop reading. I felt horrible when she left home, going away and not looking back. I was happy for her when she landed on her feet. Proud when she sang and others listened, admiring her voice. Sad when she left, again. Resigned when it seems as though Sally's doomed to repeat her mistakes, in yet another town. Run, Sally, run!

This is not just a story. It is a story that tugs you along emotionally on its journey. Sally doesn't always make the best decisions, but she manages to get along just fine regardless. She finally stops floating, only to confront the fear of her daughter repeating her mistake. Not all of them, just the big one. And finally, to bring it all together, is the voice of Sally's granddaughter, her namesake. Who pieces together her grandmother's story, and finds out once and for all the truth behind it.

What a beautiful piece from Joanna Scott this is!

[Sarah B · Rating 3 out of 5]

I've not read anything else by Scott, but I am tempted to, especially if it were shorter. From that you can tell that I felt this novel was unecessarily long. Some of the story threads took too long to recur and wrap up and so ended up feeling rather contrived. That said, it was an enjoyable, if not truly engrossing, book. I liked the focus on what is in many ways one person's small life and all the ways in which it can wind and wend its way, as well as all the ways one life affects many others. I found myself wishing that the attention Scott paid to the intricate prose describing nature had also enriched the prose of describing the complications of relationships.

[Andrea · Rating 2 out of 5]

It took me a while to read this book. It is not one that you can sit down and speed through. You need to take your time to read all the details and get all the information about Sally's life. Sally has her ups and downs and this story takes you along for the ride. There are a wide variety of characters, and while I had a hard time feeling the warmth from them, they each tell their own part of the story. I found this book to be well-written and I couldn't wait to see how things tied together at the end.

[Anne Marie · Rating 4 out of 5]

I enjoy books that tell about families through generations. This book told the story of a grandmother, Sally, and how her life changed when she got pregnant by her cousin, Daniel. When the baby is a day or two old, Sally leaves him and there she starts her travels up the Tuskee River.
Her first stop she meets Swill and Uncle Mason. Georgie, a war widow, takes Sally in, then Sally goes to live with Uncle Mason, being his housekeeper. She leaves the town abruptly after singing at Georgie’s wedding and overhearing someone who knows the circumstances of her baby.
Next stop is Helena where Sally stays with a friend she knew from the beauty parlor, Gladdy. But she turns out to be an alcoholic. Sally falls in love with a boy named Mole, but he is tragically killed in a car accident caused by Benny Peterson, who drives away. Sally actually gets pregnant by Benny and leaves, being that he is abusive.
Tuskee is the next town where Sally works in a hardware store. She has her baby, Penelope. But several years later, Benny finds her and beats her up. Sally leaves with Penelope.
Sally now works in a department store, but Benny finds her again through lawyers. He knows about Penelope and wants to get to know his daughter. Sally tries to hire a lawyer and winds up working for the law firm as a receptionist. She has an affair with Arnold Caddeou (who she later marries) and has to live with the fact that Penelope wants to live with Benny. But within three years, Benny is remarried with twin boys and Penelope is another mouth to feed and the abuse starts. Penelope goes back to Sally.
We now learn about Abe Boyle, boyfriend of Penelope, and father of Penelope’s child, Sally. After many years, Abe finds his daughter and sends her recordings, explaining why he left her mom. Her grandmother Sally thought he was her long lost son. She was led to that conclusion by her cousin Daniel’s sister and Sally’s family. The truth was Daniel took the baby and the baby was killed. Sally will pass on thinking she did the right thing by telling Abe, but Abe later learns that his mother is not Sally but his aunt. Abe tells his daughter everything, and Abe and his two other daughters will come to Sally’s wedding. I thought we would learn if Abe and Penelope get back together.

[Colette · Rating 2 out of 5]

2.5. This book was slow and had a weird plot. I expected a mystery of uncovering a family's past, but the father didn't even come in and explain another side of the family history until literally page 300. The only thing that salvaged this book was the writing style. It was very detailed with a lot of depth and it was almost hypnotic.

[Katie Elmer · Rating 3 out of 5]

Boomer seeks meaning in the midst of unfortunate life events. Snail-pace writing that's not bad but repeated descriptions of muddy river motif will put you into a deep sleep. Characters are interesting, but the biographical nature of the book does nothing to foster emotional investment. No dopamine hits acquired from this book.

[Molly McGeehin · Rating 1 out of 5]

Did not finish - maybe one of the other 3 books with the same title would be better?

[Mary · Rating 1 out of 5]

strange and confusing; waste of time

[Vicki · Rating 3 out of 5]

Great story line, and beautifully written, but it seemed to go on and on well after you had all the answers.

[Tara · Rating 2 out of 5]

After slogging through 174 pages, waiting to care about the characters or for something interesting to happen, I'm throwing in the towel.

[Serena · Rating 1 out of 5]

At more than 400 pages, Joanna Scott's Follow Me is a very detailed account of Sally Werner's background as told by her granddaughter, Sally. Scott has a gift for detail, which can become a drawback when Sally Werner is wandering in the woods after leaving her baby with her parents. The twists and turns Sally's life takes are driven by her fear and her desire to fit in without revealing her true self in each new location, but often the poetic prose gets in the way. It isn't until page 53 that readers discover Sally has red hair, and readers find this out at the moment when Sally is getting her hair dyed blond. Scott's writing vacillates from run-on sentences to short fragments, both of which readers may find slow down the plot.

"Running, Running, Running up the jagged slope behind the rows of new corn, over the stone wall, through the woods and meadows. Sting of nettles. Gray sky of dawn. Bark of a startled deer." (Page 15)

In some cases, the narrative opts for telling the reader what's going on, rather than showing the action and development through character interaction. Moreover, detailed backgrounds of side characters like Gladdy Toffit are asides that do not propel the plot or character development forward.

"Other days she'd [Gladdy:] dress in one of the three rayon skirt-suits she owned, gather bills from the rolltop desk in the living room, and get in the car and drive to the bank in Amity to confer with the person she called her financial adviser. Late in the afternoon she'd come back home to pour her bourbon, urging Sally to join her because, as she claimed, she didn't like to drink alone." (Page 119)

Scott introduces Mole into Sally's life, and that's when readers will begin to cheer her on, hoping she will take this new opportunity to turn her life around, grab onto her responsibilities, and emerge a stronger woman. When these characters come together, the scene is full of playful tension and drama as he and his friends sit in a room playing Russian Roulette.

"It was similar to a dream, inevitable and natural and illogical. A slanting light shone from the lantern; the radio crackled its song; the river splashed; the crickets chirped; the tension made breathing impossible; the air was so thick the boy could hardly lift his arm, raising the gun to his head in an attenuated motion, the effort exhausting him, drenching him in sweat, the heat of fear turning his pale skin into melting wax." (Page 104)

About halfway into Follow Me--which as a title works well for this journey type of novel--the drama heats up forcing Sally Werner to make a tough choice, and these scenes were the most vivid and well crafted. These scenes are the most vivid because they propel the plot, they are full of action, and you are right there with Sally in the thick of it, watching how these events bring out her inner strength and how they are bound to impact and force her to take conscious action.

"It meant she had to cover her face, so the next time he hit her his knuckles struck the back of her hand, bouncing her head away from him but not actually hurting her, which only enraged him more, and with a swift movement he yanked her arm away . . . his fist caught her in the mouth, driving into her gullet, shattering bone, filling her vision with a blank darkness that matched the sky." (Page 206)

"But Sally could guess what the sound signified and looked up in time to catch a glimpse of Leo leaping from the peaked roof above the door. But she didn't know he had landed on Benny Patterson until she felt her attacker veer backward. He would have pulled her with him if she hadn't ripped herself free from his grasp. He stumbled, tripped over the corner of the step, and as the cat leaped forward, Leo's weight exacerbated Benny's fall; he plunged backward, his feet came out from under him, and his head snapped hard against the brick wall of Potter's hardware." (Page 208)

Overall, it takes a long time to be drawn into this book, and readers may have a difficult time getting a fix on Sally Werner's character. It was hard to feel sympathetic toward her when many of the problems she faces are self-created and she often portrays herself contrary to her own actions. For instance, she considers herself a hard worker and reliable, but she gives birth and leaves her child within 24 hours of bringing him into the world, which is not a prime example of a reliable woman. Scott's prose is beautiful, but readers can easily lose their footing in the world Scott tells rather than shows her readers. Clearly, Scott is a gifted writer and uses description well to create a vivid scene, but this story may have worked better if it was told in a different way. Those readers who enjoy generational novels and coming of age stories may be interested in this novel unless they have a rough time with overly descriptive novels.

[Marie Burton · Rating 4 out of 5]

The book opens up with a guy jumping off a bridge.. and then we meet Sally the younger who decides to write the story that her grandmother, also Sally, told her to never write. I found myself getting lost in the family saga that began with Sally Werner/Sally Mole/Sally Bliss and reaches the granddaughter Sally.. Sally Werner is a teenager in 1947 when her life takes a left turn as she gets pregnant and ends up walking away from her newborn son. The aptly titled "Follow Me" has us following Sally as she meanders through her turbulent life. She has no real goals, she hops on buses or bumps into people and then lives off of the good-will of others. Eventually, we read about Sally falling in love, getting older, making strange choices and just getting used to life where she finally settles in some imaginative town in New York. The characters she meets are pretty much one dimensional and predictable yet the descriptions of what Sally sees and endures are easily rendered through the author's imaginative writing technique, which you could either love it or leave it. This is her life story for all its worth, and the fact that there is a lot of drama and issues that Sally endures is what keeps it going, however incredulous some events may seem.

The narrative is told with a concurrent storyline by the granddaughter of Sally, with the focus switching back and forth between the granddaughter and the grandmother. I am not a big fan of this, especially when we are talking about bouncing between 20+ years. Once the story gets going with the elder Sally, it feels like you are chugging along on a train and then the whistle blows and the brakes are squealing and STOP you are smack back into 20 years later again listening to the younger Sally. I think the author was trying to go for suspense, since she always squealed the brakes right when we reach a climax to Sally's storyline. But we don't see the younger Sally for too long of a period during the middle, it gets back into the elder Sally's life pretty quickly so it's a minimal complaint. Towards the end of the book there is even another way the book reads, as we are hearing word for word the contents of a recorded tape.

The writing itself is again in a league of its own, with one liners or phrases that are streamed together as if to show the subconscious thoughts of Sally. One can only take so much of the chatter (at some points it seems to be paragraphs of mumbles, questioning) although again I think the author is pulling for a sense of whimsy. And Sally the elder is definitely an impulsive one; she gets herself settled after one hardship, then she is off again running. The author at one point used an analogy of a theme park ride, going around in circles and no matter how much Sally ran she always came back to whatever it was she was running from. How logical and believable it can all be is an entirely new ball of wax..

And yet, even with these few criticisms of the book, I enjoyed the pace of the novel and the fact that I was always eager to pick up the book to see what foolishness Sally would get herself into next, no matter how mad she made me sometimes. I found myself caring for Sally and her legacy, and hoping she would for once make a sound decision. The viewpoint is unique due to the nature of the younger Sally discovering the wonders of her parents' union through the journey that the elder Sally had told her. And then it all finally ties back to the original guy jumping off the bridge, hence the notion that the choices Sally Werner made in her crazy life affected a lot of people.

The book teaches us about the bonds of the family, the strength of love and what the outcomes are when people are selfish with their love. Putting the book together with all of the writing techniques and Sally's idiosyncrasies, this is a book to be enjoyed for the package deal. The saga of Sally Werner, along with the wide array of people she meets is actually overall a page-turner and I do recommend it for those interested in feeling better about their own dysfunctional families.

[Lori · Rating 4 out of 5]

(Disclaimer: Joanna Scott was one of my English professors in college.)

A sure sign of literary skill is the ability to gain the reader's sympathy for a potentially irritating protagonist. (My mother actually abandoned this book around page 100.) Sally Werner/Angel/Mole/Bliss, as her litany of names implies, is an homage to America's celebration of continuous renewal and grand tradition of reinvention. (Salman Rushdie, however, in his novel Fury, asserts that this is actually a more general "human capacity for automorphosis, the transformation of the self," but we Americans like to claim as our own because we are "always labeling things with the American logo: American dream, American Buffalo, American Graffiti, American Psycho, American Tune.") Yet what this also comes down to is that Sally is forever running and hiding. In other words, taking the easy way out only to find herself in even more trouble because she simply never dealt with whatever she fled from in the first place. Sally is highly self-reliant (another prized American virtue), sure, but there are times the reader just wants her to grow up and start taking some responsibility. The whole cycle, after all - develop a problem, run away from said problem, said problem follows, another problem arises, run from that, while somewhere a snowball is charging down a hill - begins when Sally Werner, age sixteen and hailing from a deeply religious family, leaves her newborn baby on the kitchen table and abruptly takes off.

Scott's beautiful writing and ability to evoke time and place nevertheless transform the tale of a woman who constantly messes up into a vivid portrait of mid-century small-town Pennsylvania. Scott takes a neutral stance towards Sally and never tries to defend her actions or depict her as particularly admirable. Follow Me is basically a character study and portrait of a time and place. One's behavior is always influenced by one's surroundings, and it is this interconnectedness of things that informs the novel's plotline. As Americans, we treasure individualism, and yet no one person exists in a vacuum. At the core of Follow Me, in all its Americanness, is this contradiction between self and other. True, we applaud personal independence but in reality, we live in an external matrix of people, ideas, customs, and events that both influence what we do and are profoundly affected by it. The full force of Sally's tumultuous past is not felt until near the end, when a daughter sits listening to tapes made by a father she's never met. He is a kindhearted man, a teacher, who poignantly digresses into science trivia. The chapter is a true emotional tour-de-force. You want to live life only for yourself and bolt every time other people get in your way? Well, you can't.

Although it does drag in places and the ending felt drawn-out (probably because I was too infuriated with Sally's #1 screw-up to have any more patience for her), I enjoyed reading Follow Me and found the characters to be well drawn and the suspense positively nail-biting at times. I wish my mother would pick it up again and try seeing the story for the art rather than the annoying protagonist, but alas. Of course, some may also find they can't stand Sally, but I would encourage my fellow readers to look at the bigger picture and see a time as it was and humans as they are.

Original Review

[Valorie Dalton · Rating 4 out of 5]

Sally Werner, a Pennsylvania farm girl, decides to throw caution to the wind and take a ride on her cousin’s motorcycle. This choice will change her life forever. A teenager mother in 1946, she abandons her baby boy with her family and runs away to start a new life only a few miles away. Sally runs to escape the people she feels judges her for her mistakes. Yet the unfortunate nature of her life is that she always feels like she has to run away and start over again. Most of the time, this is the result of her own feelings of threat and failure. With each new place that Sally runs to, she adopts a new name, a name she feels will change her fortune and reflects something she has left behind or wishes to be.

Along the way Sally has another child, a daughter named Penelope. As Sally runs, so too does Penelope until Penelope meets auburn haired Abe and falls in love. Sally’s story is told by her namesake and granddaughter, the child of Penelope and Abe. Towards the end of the book, the shocking family ‘secret’ is revealed by Sally and drives Abe away.

Scott has a beautiful way with words. The imagery she uses to describe the world around Sally invokes a clear picture of the trickling Tuskee River and the small, rural Pennsylvania towns Sally hops to and from. There are times when Sally expresses a self-doubt and detachment that I have felt many times. I can see a lot of myself in Sally, especially in the way that she regards the world as a struggling outsider looking in, always waiting for her moment to feel connected. Sally’s internal dynamic is interesting as well because she is a contradicting mixture of strong and assured, but also weak and afraid. It takes a lot of guts to pick up and start over again, but Sally does this each time because she wants to escape the people around her. So, it’s hard to tell what Sally is and that makes her more realistic. Sally is a bundle of one inconsistency after another as most of us are.

Sally has a hard life, but she doesn’t make it any better for herself each time she runs away. The thing she is good at, singing, she purposefully stuffs away for a long time. Again, this is something that I find familiarity in. Sally is not without remorse for leaving her son behind, or for leaving some of the people who helped her early on as she was just getting on her feet. Even as she runs away, she always looks back on the people she has left behind.

I honestly enjoyed this book from page one. Since Sally’s life is cut up into chunks, each stage is paced just right that I didn’t feel any lag in the plot. As I said above, the descriptions are both beautiful and believable. Scott is a truly talented writer. With just a few words, she is able to evoke emotion and reality all in one breath. It takes talent to captivate, which Follow Me certain does.

[Kathy (Bermudaonion) · Rating 4 out of 5]

When Sally Werner was 16, she had a baby boy by her cousin, Daniel. Two days later, she left the baby on her parent’s kitchen table and ran. This is a pattern Sally followed for years - she ran when someone from her old town recognized her, she ran when she found out she was pregnant, and she ran after an old boyfriend found her and assaulted her.

Sally finally settled into life in a small town and raised her daughter, Penelope, on her own. When Penelope’s father showed up, she decided to allow him into her daughter’s life. He and his mother do their best to win Penelope over by buying her gifts. Sally found a job at a law firm and was able to earn enough money to send some home to the son she abandoned years ago. She also began an affair with one of the lawyer’s in the firm. Feeling neglected, Penelope decided to move in with her father. She came home to her mother’s after he became abusive.

When Penelope was in college, she fell in love and became pregnant. She and her boyfriend, Abraham, are devoted to each other and decided they would share a life together. That is, until Sally tells Abraham a secret from her past that caused him to run away.

FOLLOW ME by Joanna Scott is a wonderful character driven story. At first, I was a little frustrated with Sally because her solution to every problem seemed to be to run away. After I read this,

"It was all so confusing. She had always intended to live a righteous life. In the midst of any decision, she’d always thought she was doing what was justified and necessary. But how could she know, how did anyone know what the repercussions would be?"

I realized that Sally is just like most people, doing the best they can in life. This story really captivated me, and I found that I flew through the book (especially the second half) even though it’s over 400 pages long. If you love character driven novels or family stories, you will love this book.

[Brenda · Rating 3 out of 5]

The story was interesting kept me reading through a trial of my own, my mother in law had emergency surgery a colon resection, which was good.
Every day when I would go to the hospital to sit with her, I would take my book and read. At the point where the Father and his story comes in and the granddaughter starts following her grandmothers story, I got a little confused. I didn't go back and reread which is what I should have done. I don't know if it was just me or if it was the book, that I got confused or lost in the story for a while as to who was who.
Anyway, the book is one of those where you need to read word for word and not race through it to keep up. Sally goes through her life searching for some things I'm not sure she even knows, but always looking back at that baby she left behind. It is a good book, and it will keep you interested. Here is the info from the back of the book:

"On a summer day in 1946, Sally Werner, the precocious daughter of hardscrabble Pennsylvania farmers, accepts her cousin Daniel's invitation to ride his new motorcycle. Like so much of what follows in Sally's life, it's a decision driven by impulse and a thirst for adventure, a decision with dramatic and far-reaching consequences." Soon Sally abandons her newborn baby, the result of her impetuous joyride. Shamed, confused, and filled with a yearning to have a bigger life than the one ahead of her, she finds work, she finds love, she finds people of great kindness and others whose cruelty would crush a weaker woman. Fueled in equal measure by her eternal optimism and her mercurial moods, she embarks on an odyssey of self-creation that spans six decades, the story of which she entrusts to only one person: her granddaughter and namesake. It's an uncommon legacy that young Sally believes until her father - a man she has never known - enters her life and offers another story altogether, forcing her to uncover the truth of her grandmother's secret history.

[Christa Avampato · Rating 4 out of 5]

As a writer, I read a lot, always looking for new styles and interesting turns of phrase. Joanna Scott has become my new favorite author. I quickly ran through her book, Follow Me, in a week. I couldn't put it down and wanted to enjoy every word of this consuming, at once bitter and sweet, story that spans several generations of women. Mistaken identities, family complications, love, and a sense of place dominate the books intertwining themes. At points I loved and hated all of the main characters, a sign that Joanna Scott is capable of creating personalities that are so true to life that I have found myself thinking about them as if they are my neighbors and friends.

Even more lovely and intriguing than the plot twists and turns, Joanna Scott uses language that made me realize that English can be just as beautiful as any romance language. Her poignant sentiments are dramatic without being saccharin. For example, early on in the book one of the characters runs away from her life and family after a traumatic event. "But still she runs. Running, running, running. How many lives start over this way, by putting one foot in front of the other?"

I considered how many of us today must start over because our investments have decreased so dramatically in value or because we, or someone in our family, lost a job. Starting over is frightening and painful. And yet, Joanna Scott is right: starting over is simply putting one foot in front of the other in a different direction. What I find so inspiring about Follow Me is that its characters are not afraid to start over. Indeed, they find it almost impossible to not immediately start over when life doesn't go their way. A lesson that at least bears consideration, if not emulation, by all of us.

[Bonnie · Rating 2 out of 5]

This is the story of a young woman's search for herself and as readers, we follow her along this journey through her life. Sally Werner was born and raised on a farm in Pennsylvania with her siblings and immigrant parents. She makes many impulsive decisions as a young girl and along the way into adulthood. She abandons her home and family and follows a path along a river that continues to be a focus throughout her life. She finally tells the truth of her life, six decades later, to her granddaughter and namesake. Sally, the granddaughter, then finds herself on a journey of uncovering the truth to her grandmothers secrets and past history.

The story unravels slowly and in the style of a saga or epic. It was a slow start for me, and I had trouble immersing myself fully into this long story. I found Sally and her impulsive decisions annoying at times but I certainly felt empathy for many of the situations she went through. She was a strong lady who persevered through many trials and tribulations. I enjoyed the parts told through the eyes of her granddaughter Sally and how she unwound the truth about her grandmother and unraveled many family secrets. Joanna Scott is a true storyteller and she weaves a strong and intense story. If you enjoy a saga or epic style novel rich in details and storytelling style you will probably enjoy Follow Me by Joanna Scott.

[Edith · Rating 4 out of 5]

This story "follows" a young 16-year-old girl who abandons her baby with her parents and takes off to try to make a better life for herself. The story follows her through her whole life...a life which involves making some poor decisions and keeping the birth of her first baby a secret. I found myself thinking a lot about the keeping of secrets. It can take a powerful amount of energy to keep secrets and the "danger" of having your secrets revealed must surely create a constant nagging tension which can't be good for the psyche. But we all do it anyway...even when a little more truth would "set us free".

I was constantly disturbed by the protagonist's disregard for her abandoned firstborn in that she carried on in making a new life for herself and never checked back on her son in a definitive way (until very very late in life). Her ability to move on with living her new life without really knowing what was happening to him was beyond understanding to me. But I guess dealing with the immediacy of life at the moment is about all most people can cope with. My overall feeling about this book is sadness.

[Catherine Woodman]

This is a well written book that might resonate better with someone who likes to revel in the way it used to be. FGor some reason, things set in the 1050's abound and this is not one of those that rises to the top of the list for me. Sally is the star of the book--she gets involved with a fast and furious cousin, and ends up giving birth to a baby at age 16. She leaves him on the kitchen table, like a loaf of bread, and takes off. She works in upstate New York, which is where she is from, but she never hears a word from her family. It turns out, the reason is two-fold. One is that they do not frgive her--but the other is that something terrible happens to the baby and no one wants her to find out, or to get the law involved in looking into it. Sally sends money home to care for the baby, which her family gladly accepts, but never acknowledges or tells her to stop, which deepens the guilt around what happened. THe tragedy then begins (as if this wasn't bad enough) when Sally is led to believe that someone that her daughter is seeing romantically might be her other child. Oh dear...

[Susan Coleman · Rating 2 out of 5]

I am less than 100 pages from finishing this book. Very disappointed that the plot took the expected turns. And I've found the device used to lead up to the conclusion (the younger Sally's father's introduction/confessional tapes to her) awkward, as if the author knew the story had already gone on too long so she tried to wrap it up quickly...but not too quickly, as the tangents and dream sequence descriptions also tend to run a bit long. Wouldn't really recommend this, as there seems to be no payoff for a rather intensive investment of time in reading over 400 pages.

...Now finished with the book and was rather disappointed. There were some strange political rants that seemed to come from nowhere, the story took too many sudden shifts toward the end, and the style was just a bit too haphazard. There were some out-of-place lyrical riffs toward the beginning that didn't continue throughout the story. I don't know if the author just didn't want to keep using that tactic or why the change in style, but I found it odd. I couldn't nail down any real reason to be drawn into the characters, story, or style, so this one will be donated to the local flea market.

[Shannon · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a book I grabbed at the library because the cover caught my attention. Thanks to a power outage and waiting for a repairman I read the entire thing this weekend. The story really pulled me along even if I was mildly annoyed at the main character at some points. One small mistake as a teenager sent Sally Werner on a lifetime of one thing leading to another. I really couldn't tell where the story was going to go until it got almost there and even still there was enough of a twist that it didn't feel overtly obvious. I enjoyed the telling of the story, had sympathy for the main character Sally. The story is interspersed with a narrative from Sally's granddaughter that I found a bit off putting, but I think that was only because her story wasn't entirely clear until the you get closer to the end of the book and then it seems to fit. In the early chapters I found it hard to switch gears from Grandmother to Granddaughter. Overall it is a read I recommend!

[Kate · Rating 3 out of 5]

It's dreamlike, in the sense that we follow this Sally character around from one lifestyle to another, and when things get hot or intolerable she takes off in a random direction, changes her last name and starts over -- just as you do in those long, action-packed dreams. And her scrapes and escapes are written, I think, to emphasize that dreamlike quality; the passages where she runs away are usually are accompanied by weird, ghostlike, italicized voices from her past, & etc.

So I was hooked, and I was interested, and I was fully immersed in this character and this hazy world, and then about 3/4 in the book starts shifting perspective, which woke me up. And it was all downhill from there. If the twist ending hadn't been so depressing, maybe I'd be kinder about the change in style, but as it is, I'm just bummed out.

Cool cover art, though.

[Laura · Rating 5 out of 5]

I really enjoyed this book. Joanna Scott's writing style reminded me from the very beginning of Faulkner's "Light in August" and perhaps the story reminds me of that book as well. The characterization in the book is so distinct and memorable - I love stuttering Uncle Mason, Leo the cat, Mole who is Sally's first real love, Abe the seemingly deadbeat dad, and of course Sally herself. The mythical creatures of the Tuskee river complement the dream-like prose of the story. Perhaps the only part that didn't feel genuine and natural to me was the singing theme, but it was still a part of the characterization of Sally. I like reading books that leave me thinking "wow, the author is a genius" - and I definitely felt that with this book. Brilliantly and beautifully written, it's a realistic story with a magical touch that will stay with me for some time.

[Tony Daniel · Rating 1 out of 5]

Quirky-voiced stab at a coming-of-age, biographical life story of a woman who ran away from home as a teen, leaving a newborn behind, and then lived in several small towns in the state until men stopped beating women, which apparently happened sometime in the mid-1970s. Scott never got me to care about any of the twists and turns of fate in the novel as her character reacted to one non-catastrophe after another as if it were the end of her world. Finally toward the end there's a bit of Sally the elder (a frame narrator is the grand daughter)trying to DO something interesting and figure out what became of her son, but by this time I didn't care enough to be able to enjoy unraveling the details, and found the last pages tedious instead.

[Diane · Rating 2 out of 5]

Okay, I didn't actually make it through this book. Got to about page 150 and decided to throw in the towel. The protagonist is a character I could not like. She's a teenage girl who gets pregnant, has her baby, then abandons it and leaves town to start a new life. She searches for people who will take care of her, takes advantage of them, sucks them dry, steals from them, and then when she's taken all she can, goes off again to find the next meal ticket. She's lazy, immoral, irresponsible, and generally unlikable. I just wasn't interested in reading more about her.

[Kristin · Rating 5 out of 5]

I picked up this book because I liked it's cover and I am glad I did.

A women is telling the story of her father's attempted suicide. She begins by telling the life story of her Grandmother, or at least, her grandmother's version of it. The story of her Grandmother alone would have made a great novel, but then she adds in surprises and twists. The whole book was great and suspenseful, I couldn't wait to find out what happens. The last chapter is a little pointless and unnecessary, but everything else about it is great.