Skip to content
Scan a barcode
Scan
Hardcover Walk Softly, Rachel Book

ISBN: 0374382301

ISBN13: 9780374382308

Walk Softly, Rachel

Fourteen-year-old Rachel remembers little about her brother, Jake, except that he died in a car accident when she was seven and he was seventeen. Her parents rarely talk about him, but his presence in the family can be felt and his room has been left untouched. It's by means of Jake's journal that Rachel begins to know her brother and learns that his death was a suicide. With candor and humor, Rachel filters Jake's anguished journal entries through her own experiences - her relationship with her parents and grandmother; the departure of her best friend, Adrian; and her growing involvement with the likable son of family friends who may be as troubled as Jake. In unraveling her family's secret and examining her own shortcomings, Rachel gains sympathy for her parents, realizing that they are all survivors. Kate Banks explores inner lives with exquisite sensitivity and precision. Sometimes funny, often sad, but painfully true, Walk Softly, Rachel is a story of love, loss, and letting go.

Recommended

Format: Hardcover

Condition: Very Good*

*Best Available: (ex-library)

$6.69
Save $9.31!
List Price $16.00
Almost Gone, Only 2 Left!

Customer Reviews

3 ratings

Sensitive and thoughtful...

This is a really nice book. Rachel wanders into her dead brothers room and happens upon his journal. Journal entries are combined with happenings in Rachel's life to illustrate how hard it is not only to truly listen to one another, but how hard it is to let go when the time comes. I was expecting more from Jake's journal, that he had some sort of deep, horrible secret, but that wasn't to be. Thinking about it, there was a lot of me in Jake- or, I should say, the teenager I was with horrible undiagnosed and untreated depression and anxiety. Life was rough for me, people kept pushing me without giving me direction and without acknowledging that I needed help, and it all felt like some huge horrible out-of-control whirlpool, much like Jake describes. Hard to relive that kind of stuff. But it's a good story, one that gently leads the reader to the conclusion, without being condescending or in-your-face as some teenage novels about death can be. Very good, I highly recommend this.

Walk Softly, Rachel

Four teen-year-old Rachel lost her brother sever years ago. She went into his old room one night and found his diary. She decided to read the diary so that she could get to know her brother more. Everyone was always telling Rachel how her brother was the most prefect person in the world. They always talked about how he was a local track star and an A+ student. Rachel had to find out for herself if all of this was true. When she read her brother's diary she found out that, surprisingly, all of that gossip was not true. Jake (Rachel's brther) was not the perfect person that everyone saw him as. He hated the people around him and most of all, he hated himself. All that Jake wanted to do was die, so on the night of graduation' Jake floured his car and drove himself off of a cliff. Meanwhile, Rachel had many problems too. Her best friend ,Adrien, was leaving town for Africa, and her parents were talking about moving. In the book, Rachel becomes best friends with her mom's best friend's son. His name is Bowman. Bowman is a senior in high school, the same age that Jake was when he died. Bowman is not sure what he wants to do with his life, whether or not he wants to go to college, or if he wants to get a job. Bowman has alot of anger bottled up inside. He is feeling pressured from everyone, so he burns down a historical mill in the town as a way to purify hus feelings and get rid of all of that bottled up anger. He then has to be put on trial (With Rachel's mom as the judge of that trial) to decide on whether or not he will graduste. I really liked this book. It was very practicle in the scense that it dealt with realistic issues. The book was really good for teenagers because they could easily apply themselves to it. I give Walk Softly, Rachel five stars!

Walk Softly Rachel

?Walk Softly Rachel? Can you imagine losing your brother, then your best friend moves away, and you share the same name as your mother and grandmother? Well that is the life of Rachel the 3rd. At the age of seven Rachel had lost her brother and then at the age of thirteen her best friend Adrian moves away to Africa. Rachel thought that nothing in her life was exceptional and that she herself was nothing but a string bean. Through out the entire book Rachel is convinced the death of her brother was her fault because at the age of seven she hardly knew her brother. That is until she meets and falls for her enemy?s brother, Bowman. Bowman was a sixteen-year young man who had no idea that Rachel felt the way she did, and could hardly care less until? Well I don?t want to give it a way. Then Rachel?s family thinks that they want move, and Rachel thinks that it?s a bad idea because all of their memories of Jake [her brother] were in this house and she and her brother had grew up in this house, she told her parents that their spirits were melted into this house. So I think this book is very good and is readable for middle school kids and adults because it deals with real life situations that happen in every day life.
Copyright © 2025 Thriftbooks.com Terms of Use | Privacy Policy | Do Not Sell/Share My Personal Information | Cookie Policy | Cookie Preferences | Accessibility Statement
ThriftBooks ® and the ThriftBooks ® logo are registered trademarks of Thrift Books Global, LLC
GoDaddy Verified and Secured