jul.jpg Juli­ette Ascend­ing by Rose­mary Poole Carter is my sec­ond keeper of the year. It’s a YA novel that I spied on the Barnes and Noble book­shelves the other day. I thought the cover was quite arrest­ing so I picked it up and read the syn­op­sis. The author is local (Dal­las) and so is the pub­lisher. It’s a slim book of 185 pages and a quick read. The story takes place in New Orleans, sev­eral days after the Civil War has ended. The nar­ra­tor of this story is Juli­ette Caron­del, a young lady who comes from a pen­ni­less, once well to do fam­ily, who learns what it costs to fol­low your heart. To quote Shake­speare: “This above all; to thine own self be true.”

When the story opens, there is much antic­i­pa­tion over a young suitor who has asked for Juliette’s hand in mar­riage. Her worst fears are real­ized when she learns that her father has arranged for her to marry a wealthy landowner. A gen­tle­man sev­eral years older and a stranger. Juli­ette, being the only sur­viv­ing daugh­ter, knows what this mar­riage means to her fam­ily, so she must do her part. Her par­ents are por­trayed as being cold and emo­tion­ally dis­tant which is typ­i­cal of most aris­to­cratic fam­i­lies where social class is more impor­tant than one’s char­ac­ter. Haughty, schem­ing and venge­ful are just a few words that best describe this won­der­ful family.

Juli­ette has pretty much led a shel­tered life. She is edu­cated and smart. She spends most of her time being still and obser­vant of every­thing around her and tries her best not to be noticed. Her par­ents pretty much treat her like prop­erty, sell­ing her off to the high­est bid­der with­out think­ing twice. Her mother is uncar­ing and refuses to hear any of Juliette’s reser­va­tions about the match. Thank good­ness much of Juliette’s nur­tur­ing has come from her old nurse, Matilde, a free woman of color, who raised her since birth and con­tin­ues to look after her. Juli­ette often con­fides in Matilde and sees her as her only ally in reveal­ing the secrets of her heart. Then there’s Juliette’s cousin who stays with them, Thibeaux, who is more or less a  two dimen­sional char­ac­ter who rep­re­sents the worst side of the fam­ily tree. His stag­ger­ing debts are what dumps Juli­ette on the mar­riage mart in the first place. Then there is Juliette’s father, who is a cold-hearted busi­ness­man and being the head of the house­hold, he is used to giv­ing orders and being obeyed with­out ques­tion. Ulti­mately, Juli­ette, with no one to turn to, keeps her thoughts and fears to her­self and accepts her fate and future.

How­ever, Juliette’s first sign of hope, of break­ing free comes from a young man wear­ing the uni­form of the enemy. His name is Roland Mont­gomery, a sol­dier with the Union army with a lin­eage that goes nowhere and impresses no one. The two would be lovers face many obsta­cles since Roland is so far below Juliette’s sta­tion. Her parent’s prej­u­dices would never allow them to accept Roland and so the two scheme together in secret and a plan is con­ceived. How­ever, out of a nowhere tragedy strikes and then there’s the after­math that leads to  the deci­sion that Juli­ette must make and that is: to break free now or remain a pris­oner forever.

One of the main themes of this won­der­ful novel is about hav­ing the free­dom of choice.  Mak­ing the choice to be happy. All Juli­ette wants is the choice to love some­one who will love her in return. This is a great novel for teens in learn­ing how women were treated in the 19th cen­tury. Par­ents need not worry about the sex­ual con­tent as it is kisses only. The story is set in post war New Orleans and the author does an excel­lent job of recre­at­ing the city with the atti­tudes and cus­toms indica­tive of the period. Her prose has a nat­ural flow to it that I found very engag­ing and lyri­cal. I love sto­ries that are set in New Orleans which is one of the rea­sons why I was drawn to this story in the first place.

The novel has a whim­si­cal feel to it with an end­ing that kept me on the edge of my seat. The novel does have it’s share of sus­pense­ful moments  added with a cou­ple of teary-eyed scenes. The title is apt and sym­bolic of Juliette’s tran­si­tion from a shel­tered young girl to coura­geous young woman who has to make some tough choices that may have irrev­o­ca­ble con­se­quences. Every once in while you run across a story that hits on all the right but­tons and this one was it for me. I’m sure there are flaws as no book is per­fect but this retelling of Romeo and Juli­ette gets high marks from me for char­ac­ter­i­za­tion, prose and pac­ing. The story is told in first per­son which I thought was appro­pri­ate since this about one woman’s journey. All in all, this is a sim­ple story with an admirable hero­ine. My grade, A.

This novel is avail­able in trade paper­back at your favorite bookstore.

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