Leaving Rock Harbor

by: Rebecca Chace

Published by: Scribner (June 1, 2010)

Reviewed by: Sara Porter

Leaving Rock Harbor is one of those types of books that seem to portray idyllic by-gone days on the surface, but only underneath the surface of this small town and the characters that inhabit does the reader see the darkness. In portraying the darkness in small doses, the reader is as unprepared as the characters are in this beautiful, but suspenseful world.

Frankie Ross and her family move from Poughkeepsie to Rock Harbor to escape a family tragedy (we find out gradually that her father attempted suicide). She becomes involved in the struggles between the wealthy cotton mill owners and their unionist workers personified in two men who would become her best friends and later romantic attachments, Wilson Curtis, the son of the mill owner and Joe Barros, a mill worker and union organizer. We see the years between WWI and the Great Depression through the eyes of these three impressionable characters as they tangle with real world events that slowly affect the town.

Rock Harbor seems to be characterized as a town of clear blue lakes, hot summer days, and undercurrents of tension that lie within. It’s not until something startling happens like when one of the characters shoots herself through the mouth do we see what a real depressing world these characters inhabit.

That line between fantasy and reality lies in Frankie’s first-person narration, where she behaves one way and thinks another. She begins the book as a bright naïve teenager who only lives for hanging out with her two best male friends, Wilson and Joe. She continues through the book as a society wife and mother forced to keep up with appearances. When she gives birth to a son, she has no maternal feelings for the child until he is older and communicates with her. When there are union strikes across the country, she keeps reading newspapers looking for signs of Joe while playing the role of Mrs. Wilson Curtis. She plays an icy cold reserve while only revealing her passionate feelings for the narration.

Leaving Rock Harbor describes a world that you want to inhabit, but by the time you finish, you are glad you don’t live there.

Reviewer gives this book 4 Stars