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by John Grisham
ISBN: 0385511612
Binding/Media: Hardcover - 176 pages
Condition: Used: Very Good
Comments: Sold with pride. No writing, no highlighting. Copy in very good condition with minimal reading wear.
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Customer Reviews
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Bleachers
Rating  (5)
Date: 2010-07-28
The book arrived in very good condition although there was a name sticker inside the cover. I will just place my own name sticker over it so it will be okay.
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Outstanding
Rating (5)
Date: 2010-07-26
When students ask for an exciting book to read, BLEACHERS, enters my mind. My recommendation comes from personal experience at having read the book at least three times myself and would be anxiously willing to read it again. The two great lessons which the book looks at shows how coaching sports extremely, toughly can teach a person values he/she can use later in life and it asks how far a person can push someone else physically in athletics to learn or achieve a goal. Many young people can relate to football in this small town because I teach in a small town. However, they do not always see the consequences of those who cheat or take the easy way. BLEACHERS tries to provoke some of the questions that we do not always want asked. This book took Grisham away from the expected lawyer subject into a field that I love, football. We all accept the fact that the disciplinarian should discipline the player, but who disciplines the disciplinarian when he crosses the chalk line? Does this book begin to ask how far are we willing to let sports dictate our lives?
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Is the game over so soon?
Rating  (3)
Date: 2010-06-28
It is disquieting to finish a novel in less than 24 hours....I read Bleachers in 10. The New York Times Book Review proclaimed that Grisham is "A sure-footed storyteller with an undeniable mastery of plotting, pacing and tone." Fair enough; he takes you quickly to the end of the book. But you think, shouldn't this have taken longer?
This is not to say that John Grisham missteps with this non-legal thriller. Others, such as The Testament suffered from Rachel, a character who proved to be unconvincing in her goodness. Skipping Christmas was tedious, but the Painted House and Bleachers convince outside a courtroom. It was a good read....but too short.
Neely Crenshaw comes back to his southern home town 15 years after high school for the funeral of Eddy Rake, his larger than life, tyrannical football coach. Many former football players do the same as Rake's shadow still falls over their lives. What sets Neely apart from many is that, while he was one of the greatest players in the school's history, he doesn't want to live in the past, in glory days that peaked too early.
It is difficult to say the story is character driven. Some do stand out: Neely, Mal, Nat and Eddy Rake, whose good side comes to light as the story unfolds, but the novel is too short and we are left more with sensations than depth. The book's achievement, understated so that it is easy to miss, is that it ends without a bang or climax. Neely does not come to peace with Cameron, the high school sweetheart who he dumped and never forgot: she moved on and is happy without him. His eulogy, the third of three at the funeral, is the weakest and tepid at best. His real estate business will continue to be aimless, much like he is, and he is now open to returning home more regularly to be with old friends. Small pleasures in a small town for one whose glory days peaked at age 19.
Bleachers is good, and Grisham is "A sure-footed storyteller with an undeniable mastery of plotting, pacing and tone." But the game ends too early; we hardly had a chance to cheer.
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Bleachers...
Rating (5)
Date: 2010-06-17
Former football players have come to sit in the bleachers of the stadium named for their former coach. The coach is now dying. Neely Crenshaw was one of the coach's finest players. Crenshaw sits and reminisces about his senior year. He has to forgive his coach for the past, but he can't forgive himself.
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A great sports book because it is not all about sports
Rating (5)
Date: 2009-11-26
0 out of 1 customers found this reveiw helpful
Most sports books involve a team that is struggling, there is conflict, both internal and external and then they manage to rise up and win "the big game at the end." Fortunately, and that is one of the most powerful features of this book, that formula is followed, but largely in reverse. There was a big game that the team managed to win, but that was years ago, yet it is still a powerful memory in the participants and the town where the team was from.
Neely Crenshaw was an outstanding quarterback for the Messina Spartans, he went on to play at a major college and was on his way to All-American status and perhaps even the Heisman Trophy when he suffered a career-ending knee injury in his sophomore season. Since then, he has bounced around, never enjoying any significant success; Neely was never able to psychologically recover from the drop from major sports idol to the minimally competent at life.
Legendary football coach Eddie Rake is dying of cancer, so many of his former players are coming back to Messina for the funeral. They are joining a town in deep mourning, under Eddie high school football was a local religion and Eddie was extremely successful. There were long winning streaks and multiple state championships and during that time Eddie was close to a semi-god in the eyes of many of the people. Known to many but tolerated because of his success, Eddie was a sadist in his treatment of the players; most of them hated him but could do nothing about his abusive policies. Finally, when a player collapses and dies during a workout, Eddie is fired by a powerful local political figure, an act which leads to deep divisions within the town.
The past is no longer the past as people begin to come together for the funeral, the former players gather together to share stories about their football careers and their lives. Eddie Rake is a constant topic, but in this case their big game is one that they relive. The divisions in the town, past relationships and regrets all come to the surface as everyone tries to come to terms with their successes and failures, both in and out of football. The funeral allows many to experience closure as they get a long-delayed grip on their feelings for the man that took them through hell in order to win football games.
This is one of the best sports books ever written because it is about sports intertwined with life. In the modern world, Eddie Rake would have been in prison for his actions and his success provides the perfect backdrop for the "what have you done since high school" story. There is something in this story for every person that graduates from high school and then ends up living a life that is completely unexpected.
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by Anna Quindlen
ISBN: 0812969812
Binding/Media: Paperback - 237 pages
Condition: Used: Like New
Comments: Sold with pride and shipped with confirmation for US addresses. Like new - no shelf wear, no marks.
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Customer Reviews
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I am now an Anna Quindlen fan (audio book version)
Rating  (4)
Date: 2010-07-26
I had never read Anna Quindlen before. Whenever I had heard about her work, or heard her interviewed, it sounded like her work was too sappy for me. I picked up the audio book because I was in a hurry and it was the first one at the library that caught my eye. I am so happy I did.
Quindlen herself reads the book, and reads it quite well. Most authors do not have the ability to read their own work, but she does. This appeals to me because the author can read the work as she heard it in her own head.
Loved the subject matter, loved the characters, loved the gentle unfolding of the story. I couldn't wait to get back in my car to hear what happened next.
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books
Rating (4)
Date: 2010-07-02
I wasn't sure about this book at first but I ended up really liking it
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Okay, but ultimately forgettable
Rating (3)
Date: 2010-06-15
0 out of 1 customers found this reveiw helpful
Blessings is the second Anna Quindlen book I've read with the first being Black and Blue. Since I thought Black and Blue was so great, my expectations of Blessings were fairly high. Unfortunately, those expectations weren't necessarily met.
Don't get me wrong, I liked the premise: a baby is abandoned outside of a caretaker's garage and he then decides to keep it while simultaneously keeping it a secret. The premise is great. However, there were just so many other things mentioned that I really didn't care about. Case in point: Mrs. Blessings early life. I seriously didn't care about how she got to be that way she was. And the character of Jennifer was so unnecessary. I really couldn't get the point of her at all. My main interest were of Skip, Faith, and Mrs. Blessing (her current life, not her past one). So, the parts of the book that had these three characters together were naturally my favorite parts of the book and the ones that went by more quickly.
Another issue that I had with the book was that for a 230 page novel, this moved way to slowly. While I enjoyed the book while I was reading it, the slowness of it really didn't have me anxious to pick it back up once I put it down. However, I was anxious to finish it. So, this book was just okay. Nothing ground-breaking and wholely forgettable.
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Wake me up when it's over
Rating  (1)
Date: 2010-06-01
0 out of 1 customers found this reveiw helpful
I had to read this for book club or I would have never made it past page 40. Nothing happens except for endless paragraphs of torturously detailed descriptions of things I could care less about, which did not advance the story at all. I had no affinity for any of the characters. It felt like a short story written by an earnest high school student that somehow morphed into a full length novel.
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A simple tale, lovingly told
Rating (4)
Date: 2010-02-08
1 out of 1 customers found this reveiw helpful
The hick with a heart of gold - you've surely met him before in other novels, but Skip Cuddy is one of the best such illustrations I've read. I was expecting an excessive parody of the poor rural white guy from the wrong side of the tracks, because that's what we usually get. But it turns out that Anna Quindlen has a knack for subtlety and nuance in character development, and Skip is a remarkably accomplished character sketch. Lydia Blessing IS a bit more of a parody of the rich old lady with a sordid past, but still a reasonably believable one. It all makes for one of those novels where not all that much actually happens, but you don't mind because you're having such a great time getting to know the characters and thinking about how they deal with what does happen. Because the prose is fairly thick, it might take longer to wade through than you expect, but I never found it boring.
If you've read any of Quindlen's other novels, you know to expect a fairly bleak tale. This one, however, is also somewhat uplifting in that the reader sees the changes in Skip's life and his outlook, and they're mostly for the better. If I were to boil the story down to one line, it would be: "you can do more than you think you can, and it's never too late to start". Nothing bleak about that. I'm ready for the sequel!
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by Frances Fyfield
ISBN: 0670878898
Binding/Media: Hardcover - 272 pages
Condition: Collectible: Like New
Comments: Sold with pride and shipped with confirmation for US addresses. Copy signed by author. Stated as First American Edition.
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Customer Reviews
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Really readable-- strong and edgy book
Rating (4)
Date: 2003-04-13
2 out of 3 customers found this reveiw helpful
I picked this book up in a discount book store somewhere in Philly after being snowed in on my way back to Europe. It looked like the best of the offerings they had, but I frankly wasn't expecting very much. I was pleasantly suprised, and found myself very quickly drawn into the book and its main character. I liked Elizabeth Kennedy and I liked the way her character developed. The tension between her and her sister were a good way to open the situation and the way that it developed further was impressive. Small points off for some coincidences that strained credulity, but in general it was believable, and well worth the time that it took to read.
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The TV movie by Ben Miller in 2000?
Rating (3)
Date: 2002-11-04
1 out of 3 customers found this reveiw helpful
I guess this book should be the one which has been adapted to the UK TV Movie "Blind Date" starred Zara Turner, Mark Letheren and Ben Miller. But nothing about "Frances Fyfield" was mentioned in the production, violated anything concerning copyright?Just curious. Good TV movie and reading the book now.
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Very Entertaining
Rating (5)
Date: 2000-02-07
3 out of 8 customers found this reveiw helpful
Well written with lots of interesting characters! I can't wait to read more Frances Fyfield books!
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Tantalizing, but disappointing; the plot defies belief
Rating (3)
Date: 1999-10-12
4 out of 5 customers found this reveiw helpful
The main characters are well realized and the scenes with Elizabeth and Joe are quite good, memorable, and do keep the book afloat. However, the plot is entirely unbelievable; it's as if London contains about 20 people--the figures in this book, all crossing paths, all knowing each other, all related in less than interesting ways. There is a sub-plot, which I could have done without; namely, mother and the vulgar rich American, of course, which did nothing to move the more interesting story along; that of Elizabeth and her past, dealing with her present and unknowable future. Also, a nit-picky thing: the volume I read contained too many typos and a couple of grammatical howlers. The book was that riveting that I noticed. I wait for the next and hope for better.
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Not Just Another Pretty Face
Rating (4)
Date: 1999-03-15
1 out of 3 customers found this reveiw helpful
There are mysteries within mysteries in Fyfield's latest. The characters are wonderful, fully realized, believable..with all the attributes that make us care what happens to them. And without that caring, no mystery can be a success. I recommend it!
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by Richard Price
ISBN: 0395977738
Binding/Media: Paperback - 288 pages
Condition: Used: Like New
Comments: Sold with pride and shipped with confirmation for US addresses. Gently read copy in like new condition. No reading/ shelf wear.
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Customer Reviews
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Bloodbrothers: May I have more, please?
Rating (5)
Date: 2009-04-22
Richard Price. I was going to keep this review strictly to Bloodbrothers. However, I am compelled to expand it to anything and everything that Richard Price has had published. Now and in the future.
I'll keep it simple.
He IS a master of dialogue.
He tells a story that even if you have absolutely no interest in, will respect and absorb.
He(Price) is possibly the greatest living American storyteller of his genre.
He writes it. I buy it. And I love it. Bloodbrothers is a sterling example of what I am trying to impart.
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"There's sharks in them waters and you're gonna get eaten."
Rating (4)
Date: 2009-03-03
2 out of 2 customers found this reveiw helpful
At eighteen, Stony de Coco's future is predictable, the distillation of his family's expectations. His father, Tommy, and uncle, Chubby, are middle-aged union men, electricians who anticipate Stony joining them on the job mid-summer. Hard-working, hard-drinking womanizers, Tommy and Chubby have waited for years for Stony to carry on the family tradition. Residents of Co-Op City in the Bronx, the de Coco brothers are working guys who spend their off-hours drinking and carousing, holding their failing youth at bay. But Stony isn't sure he wants to follow in his father's footsteps. Lately, he has been yearning for something else, another path than a union paycheck. But this isn't a family where "no" is tolerated.
Given an opportunity to work with children in a local hospital, Stony finds the work exhilarating. But telling his father and uncle is another story, Stony at odds with his own needs and the demands of family. And it doesn't help that Stony's mother, Marie, takes her rage and unhappiness out on eight-year-old Albert, who is showing signs of anorexia. Stony is conflicted about watching out for Albert, while Tommy, as usual, remains oblivious. Making a Faustian bargain with his father, the moment of decision fast approaches. The closer the confrontation with Tommy, the more confused Stony gets, an emotional rollercoaster exacerbated by the increasing chaos of his family's dysfunction. Stony can't find a quiet place to think things through and Price doesn't provide one, the de Coco home rocked with rage, violence and frustration. In a drama filled with expletives and threat, this working class family loudly excises demons and without restraint.
Price's canvas is bloody, splattered with the detritus of failed expectations, assailed by the blunt force trauma of reality. Ambushed by his feelings, Stony lurches from one inclination to another, trapped in a family dynamic that chains him to the past. Reflecting the stifled spirits of middle-aged men, their depressed, unhappy wives and the children who shadow them, Price holds nothing back, bitterness poisoning every relationship, Stony about to hurl headlong into the same nightmare. Choice looms like a bad dream, Stony caught between saving himself and breaking his father's heart. It's almost too much to ask. Luan Gaines/ 2009.
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Pleasantly surprised
Rating (4)
Date: 2009-02-24
I really liked this book, but the most important thing I would tell a reader who knows Price from his crime-fiction work is that it's not crime fiction. Although, ultimately I wasn't disappointed with it. It reflected the same urban energy as the crime novels, with the extra heart of rooting for Stony as he tries to realize his dreams and protect his little brother.It's touching and well-written if not perfect.
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Teen Grows Up With Dysfunctional Family In The Bronx
Rating (4)
Date: 2009-02-01
Stony De Coco is a sensitive person under the gruff exterior. At seventeen he's grown up with a working class Italian family. His mother treats his younger seven year old brother terribly. His father Tommy is an electrician who is a big drinker and is on the prowl for extra-marital sex. Tommy's brother Chubby is more of the same. His father and his uncle want Stony to become an electrician and follow in the family tradition. Stony gets a job in a hospital where he seems to truly enjoy relating to and working with kids. However, the family pressures are too much for him. And, with misgivings, he follows the family route. Along the way, Stony had several romantic involvements. Neither of which worked out. To me, Stony was a somewhat sympathetic character. Particularly how he tried to look out for his younger brother and the kids in the hospital. Good read.
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first experience with Price, and I'll be back for more
Rating (5)
Date: 2008-04-11
1 out of 1 customers found this reveiw helpful
I decided to tiptoe in from the shallow end and read one of Price's shorter novels.
I've heard so much about his ear/imagination for dialogue, but found myself surprised by how much I enjoyed learning about Stoney DeCoco. This is one that you won't forget
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by Nora Roberts
ISBN: 0515141399
Binding/Media: Paperback - 464 pages
Condition: Used: Very Good
Comments: Sold with pride. No writing, no highlighting. Copy in very good condition with minimal reading wear.
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Customer Reviews
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Fantastic Read!
Rating (4)
Date: 2010-07-11
I picked this book up in the local library just for some fun reading and became a fan. Currently I have been in love with J.D Robb series with Eve Dallas. I figured I would give Nora a chance in winning me over with some romance. I loved this book! I loved how at the very beginning something exciting jumps out to keep you on your toes! The book follows Catarina Hale over twenty years of romance, hardship, and the love of a great family. I simply could not get away from this book for three days! Thanks Nora for keeping me entertained!
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You won't be able to put it down...
Rating (5)
Date: 2010-07-08
This is the first Nora Robert's book that I have read; it was passed on to me from a friend. I have to say that I was impressed and really enjoyed the book. I liked it so much that I had to pass it along to my sister. She loved it too.
A great romance laced with suspense. Even though I knew who the culprit was before Roberts revealed it she still keeps you guessing as to what is going to happen next. One sceen towards the end of the book is a little grafic so I don't know if it is suited for young readers but still a wonderful book. I would recomend it again.
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Not a Roberts Fan - but this is good
Rating (3)
Date: 2010-03-28
I'm not a Roberts fan. I started reading her books as the result of a positive article about her in The New Yorker in 2009.
If you like her Silhouette novels, you can ignore this review. I got one of those compilation books and hated every one of the stories in it. I am, in case you haven't guessed, not a fan of romance novels.
I have, however, now read about a half-dozen of the Robb novels and a half-dozen of the "non-romance" novels.
To my mind, this book is the furthest that Roberts has moved from her Silhouette days (hints of which, to a greater or lesser degree, are present in all the other Roberts books that I have read, including the Robb books.)
Blue Smoke avoids most of the romance cliches. The characters are richly drawn, people you'd like to know. I could do without the serial killer plot - there's plenty to like in the book without that - and this is the one Roberts book I would recommend to somebody who, like me, has ignored her because of her "romance" reputation.
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I'll give her another chance, but only one more
Rating (1)
Date: 2010-02-28
I wasthinking I'd really found an author I would be very happy with. But as the book progressed and the language got worse, and the dialogue became 50's B movie stuff and worst of all the graphic human torture made me sick to my stomach I knew I'd picked up the wrong book. I don't like graphic sex scenes, never have so I just skim over them.
I'm going to try another Roberts book because so many people adore her writing. But I'm going to read something else first so I can get this terrible book out of my head.
If most her books have as wonderful characters as she set up as parents and friends in this book I could become a Roberts fan.
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Blue Smoke
Rating (5)
Date: 2009-07-17
Reena Hale learned at an early age what fire could do. She was a small child when she had to watch her family's' restaurant burn to the ground thus beginning her love/hate relationship with fire. As she grew up she devoured everything possible to expand her knowledge because she continued to be tortured to fire. In college, her boyfriend was burned to death, and this is just another event that directs her to her career as an arson investigator.
Renna feels content with her life when she becomes a member of the police department, and buys her first home. She is surprised when she meets neighbor Bo Goodnight to find out he has been trying to find her since college. He saw her at a party across the room and has been trying to find her since. As they grow closer and fall in love, Renna is horrified when Bo's life is threatened again with fire. As they investigate further, it is revealed that two of her other boyfriends were touched by fire, and it is all perpetrated by the same person.
I loved this story. It is definitely one of my favorite NR tales. The characters were phenomenal. Reena and Bo are a good match, but all the supporting characters were an important part - from her loud obnoxious loving family to the creepy villain.
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by Murray Jackson, Ted Pearson, Kathryne V. Lindberg (Editor: Ted Pearson) (Editor: Kathryne V. Lindberg)
ISBN: 0814331947
Binding/Media: Paperback - 112 pages
Condition: New
Comments: Sold with pride and shipped with confirmation for US addresses. No publisher marks, no shelf wear.
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by Iris Johansen
ISBN: 0553582143
Binding/Media: Mass Market Paperback - 400 pages
Condition: Used: Very Good
Comments: Sold with pride. No writing, no marking. Minimal reading wear. Copy in very good condition with normal creasing in the spine from previous reading.
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Customer Reviews
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Great Read!
Rating (5)
Date: 2009-11-12
If you like forensic mysteries this is a great book to read. I love this book and all of Iris Johansen's forensic thrillers.
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Not Well Written at All
Rating  (2)
Date: 2009-09-30
Ms. Johansen keeps trying to combine a love story & a thriller. It doesnt work. The thriller/mystery part of the novel is very good. The ending isn't great; but it's good. The title fits the story perfectly. Please, Iris, stick with that & develop it.
The personal love story part reads like an elementary school primer & ruins the novel. How many pages can be devoted to the same soupy lines in the middle of life threatening situations? Throw in a 12 year old girl who has the mind & dialogue of an adult and it just helps the book to fail even more.
Johansen's books (I have read 3) seem to follow this scenario. Alas, this is my last one. It's unfortunate. If she stuck to the suspense & thriller section, the novels would be very good. Leave the soupy story to another sort of novel.
Buy it used at a cheap price, borrow it from the library, or just take a pass on it
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Interesting story, poorly written
Rating (4)
Date: 2009-07-31
1 out of 1 customers found this reveiw helpful
If poor writing really distracts you, then pass on this one. I enjoyed the story Johansen told, just not how she told it. There were three or four times when the poor writing really annoyed me; however, i was able to enjoy the mystery.
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Quick Review
Rating (1)
Date: 2009-06-23
1 out of 1 customers found this reveiw helpful
Eve Duncan is a forensic sculptor, specializing in recreating heads from skulls. She has been summoned to the bayous of Louisiana to identify the remains of an unknown murder victim. She has barely begun her work when someone close to her is killed. What follows is a frantic race to finish the skull recreation and identifying the body while trying to avoid those who do not want the victim identified.
Unoriginal story (secret world-wide organization that uses its power to plot the course of the world, anyone?) with uninteresting and unsympathetic characters. Even the dialog was annoying.
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Awesome Book
Rating (5)
Date: 2009-02-18
Awesome addition to the Eve Duncan life stories. I never get tired of reading about her life. Eve and Joe are of course my favorite characters that Iris has created. I love the awesome balance that Iris can always seem to create between action and love to keep her audience on the edge of their seat. This is a great story. This is a must buy and a must read.
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by Robert James Waller
ISBN: 0446518581
Binding/Media: Hardcover - 256 pages
Condition: Used: Like New
Comments: Sold with pride. Gently read copy in like new condition.
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Customer Reviews
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Much todo.......
Rating (2)
Date: 2010-03-25
I was breezing through this book when I realised I had read about 90 pages and nothing has happened. Not a single interesting thing has occured. It didn't get much better either.
I was not sure at first if I should like the main charachter , Jack Carmine , or not. Was he the likable hero ? I did not like Jack Alpine at all. The other main charachter is Linda Lobo and I liked her even less. Jack meets Linda , a stripper at.....a strip club. Jack instantly likes Linda. Why ? She has large breasts. We are told repeatedly that Linda has large breasts. Jack will do anything to get them. Jack has reduced anything and everything about women to the size of the above mentioned attributes. Linda decides , even though I know nothing about Jack , I will drive away and leave my life behind to be with Jack. They decide to go back to Texas where Jack has a home. First they must pick up her young daughter who is living with Lindas mother in another state. We are supposed to believe Linda loves and cares so much about her daughter. So why is she working as a stripper in another state. Why is she now taking her daughter to Texas with a man she does not even know. At one point in the book Jack and Linda stop at a clothing store so Linda can get a new wardrobe. We are supposed to believe that all the store employees are charmed by Jack and Linda who are putting on a "fashion show" while she tries on the clothes. Do we remember where Jack met Linda ? It was in a strip club. There was nothing charming about the image of Jack leering and drooling over his stripper friend putting on another strip routine at a clothing store.
Things predictably don't go well in Texas. Jack is haunted by his Vietnam memories. Jack starts taking longer and longer leaves of absence until Linda finally realises she made a big mistake.
It was a very easy read because it is pure fluff.
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TERRIBLE BOOK
Rating (1)
Date: 2009-09-09
0 out of 2 customers found this reveiw helpful
I PLACE THIS AT THE TOP OF A LIST OF 6 BOOKS. THE WORST BOOKS THAT I EVER READ. BOOKS I VERY MUCH WISH I HAD NEVER READ. I STILL CANNOT FORGET THE DISGUSTING IMAGES FROM THIS BOOK, ESPECIALLY NEAR THE END.
ANOTHER BOOK ON THE HORRID LIST IS SWIMSUIT BY JAMES PATTERSON.
IT WAS A VERY SHORT TRIP TO READING EVERYTHING BY WALLER TO NEVER READING ANY OF THEM. THE SHORT STORIES OF "Old Songs in a New Café"
IS VERY GOOD.
BORDER MUSIC HAS A COUPLE OF SAD, UNHAPPY, DEPRESSING CHARACTERS.
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Postured Story of Lost Love
Rating (2)
Date: 2009-04-21
I did not like this book. It is a postured story of lost love. Waller makes a point by repeating it over and over; he does not seem to believe that the reader can get it if he says something only once.
He appears to have a Platonic image of western romance that is fluffy and pretentious. His earlier books are better.
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Prose - Not Plot - is Why I like it
Rating (5)
Date: 2008-08-30
The best thing about this book is not the plot but the language Waller uses to describe the thoughts of the characters. I felt that I was reading F. Scott Fitzgerald. Fitzgerald's plots were fairly simple but his descriptive prose and making the reader get inside the characters was his specialty. Waller does the same thing. You can feel what the lonely housewife was feeling in the BRIDGES and you can identify with Linda and Jack and all the other characters in this novel. You know what they are thinking and you can understand their internal strife. It reminds me of Jack Kerouac or even Steinbeck in TRAVELS WITH CHARLEY. The uncle and his sojourn in New Orleans was classic. He was truly a Walter Mitty but unlike Mitty he followed his instincts and headed for Mexico. This may have been a sub plot but it all tied together. A really good book if you look beyond the plot and concentrate on character development and the way Waller writes.
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Border Music, a review
Rating (4)
Date: 2007-06-30
Robert James Waller is also the author of "The Bridges of Madison County", of which nearly everyone has heard. I haven't read that one or any of his other books, but this one caught my eye. When I picked it up and flipped through it, I saw references to Alpine, TX (the seat of the county Terlingua is in) and the Holland Hotel (wherein lies the brewpub where I had lunch, on my first visit to Alpine). At that point, I had to read it.
I guess a given book can have different meanings to different people, depending upon their viewpoint, interests and experiences in life. The official description on the inside jacket has "Texas" Jack Carmine and Linda Lobo, two complete strangers, heading out the back door of a bar in Dillon, Minnesota; bound for wherever the road takes them, but eventually to Southwest Texas and the ranch Jack has called home since boyhood.
I can't disagree with that version, but to me that is but a part of the larger story; a Skeeter Skelton-esque story of a man hanging onto the modest ranch his father left him, living in the small ranch house with his dog and his best friend, the Mexican hired hand who has worked for Jack's father and then for Jack for over 50 years. Living in that simple but safe harbor, and going out every summer to lay pipe or work with a traveling combine crew in the Midwest during the wheat harvest for some operating capital, and also to experience life in the wider world for awhile before retreating to the ranch again for the winter.
The story is about that, and about some of the more important people Jack has known in his life; and about how those people feel about Jack.
Here is an excerpt from the book that somewhat describes what sort of person is Jack Carmine: "Few months before his thirtieth birthday, in that ol' Jack Carmine way of his, he just drove over to El Paso and enlisted. That was in the summer of '69. I dunno how he ever got through basic trainin'. Jack never has done well with orders. What was it he used to say?...said he had a built-in taste for anarchy of all kinds. I asked him what he meant by that, and he said he liked situations where the borders weren't in sight and you had to go out and find 'em or make 'em up yourself." That quote is from page 183.
Did I like the book? I think that's pretty obvious.
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by Paul Celan (Translator: Pierre Joris)
ISBN: 1557132178
Binding/Media: Hardcover
Condition: Used: Acceptable
Comments: Sold with pride and shipped with confirmation for US addresses. EX LIBRARY copy in a very good condition. Hard covers preserved with plastic cover. Library markings present. The first page, which had library stamps, was removed by the library.
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Customer Reviews
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Wonderful
Rating (5)
Date: 2007-04-16
1 out of 1 customers found this reveiw helpful
This extraordinary volume of the great Paul Celan marks his `turn,' in the final phase of his career, in which his work grew more abstracted, with more esoteric and wonderful neologisms and curiously primordial imagery.
Pierre Joris has completed a fine translation from the German; the works remain highly creative and retain Celan's remarkable play with structure and phonemes. Look at the creativity:
"Eye-
less
scooped from you, eyes:
the six-
edged, denial, white,
erratic.
A blind man's hand, it also starhard
From name-wandering,
Rests on him, as
Long as on you,
Esther." (111).
The tragic undertow of Celan's poetry will pull you in. Enjoy.
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"Breath, that means direction and fate..."
Rating (4)
Date: 2000-08-30
3 out of 3 customers found this reveiw helpful
Celan himself described the meaning of the word "breath" that way. And so, the title "Breathturn" indicates clearly what these poems are about: a change, a turning point in Celan's life. When he wrote them in between 1965 and 1967, his mental suffering was already so strong that he went to a psychiatry for half a year.In spite of that, "Breathturn" might be the most convincing of all of Celan's poetry. At this point, he had completely given up the language of his early poetry that had made him famous - full of images, colours, dark metaphorics - and turned to the "grey language". It is very elusive, and I think I will have to read his later poems very, very often until I get a feeling for them because they are beyond all conventional poetry and can't be interpretated like they use to do it at school. The poems of "Breathturn" are rather short, few lines, few words in them. "Growing dumb" is a central word in this book. Celan did no more trust into language, and so he wanted to concentrate his thoughts and to tell things in a way they have never been told before or that have never been told before at all.
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This excellent translation echoes the ice-pure German text.
Rating (5)
Date: 1997-06-07
7 out of 7 customers found this reveiw helpful
Pierre Joris' translation of Paul Celan's _Breathturn_ captures the unique quality of this Jewish exile-poet's work more than any other attempt published to date.
In this new English rendering, Celan's crystalline words float through the page with the same clarity and intense focus of mind as in the original texts. The blank page is always present as a timeless mirror reflecting the poet's soul--a mirror on which condenses the dark breath of speech, the alienated and alienating words to which the poet so desperately clings. These difficult, tense and multi-faceted poems are broken open here with a jewel-cutter's skilled grace. The expert translations hauntingly echo the parallel German, resonating so as to remind us that Celan's experience of the world belongs in every language.
This scholarly translator has newly introduced a much-needed poet into the English language, and in so doing has enriched our experience of language, literature, and the exiled spirit.
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