A Separate Peace
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3.9 • 371 Ratings
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- $2.99
Publisher Description
Nominated as one of America’s best-loved novels by PBS’s The Great American Read.
An American classic and great bestseller for over sixty years, A Separate Peace is timeless coming-of-age novel about friendship, rivalry, and adolescence during a period when the entire country was losing its innocence to World War II.
Set at a boys' boarding school in New England during the early years of World War II, A Separate Peace is a harrowing and luminous parable of the dark side of adolescence. Gene is a lonely, introverted intellectual. Phineas is a handsome, taunting, daredevil athlete. What happens between the two friends one summer, like the war itself, banishes the innocence of these boys and their world.
APPLE BOOKS REVIEW
With his coming-of-age classic, John Knowles brilliantly captures the duality of adoration and resentment that’s so common in teenage friendships. The story is told through the eyes of Gene, a bookish boy whose free-spirited best friend, Phineas, makes everything fun and adventurous. When Phineas suffers a terrible fall, it’s unclear whether it was an accident or not. Meanwhile, World War II rages on in the world outside the boys’ New England boarding school, and the inevitability of the draft hangs over everyone. A Separate Peace has stood the test of time because the emotions here are so authentic and relatable. This dark, brooding story sparkles with life.
Customer Reviews
Good Story
I read this book twice once as a high schooler and once thirty years later and enjoyed it both times. Good story, good writing, and characters who you care about. Recommended!...EAF
Okay
Tbh the paper back book is only 5 dollars so why would I pay $10 so it can be on my phone ? I could go online and read it for free...
A Separate Peace
I read this book when I was in high school, then a few years later. I absolutely loved it. Reading it now, as an elder, I still felt it was a profoundly moving account of the relationships between young men at a difficult time in our history. It's a book that is both thought provoking and hard to put down.