Lovely | The Third Angel: A Novel

A Magically Delicious Read! | The Third Angel: A Novel | Alice Hoffman

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	• The Third Angel: A Novel Alice Hoffman Shaye Areheart Books, 2008 - 288 pages average customer review:based on 46 reviews view larger image
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highly recommended

Wistful and sad

I've given this book 4 stars for the beauty of the prose but must confess that I prefer, these days, to read books which uplift me and make me feel happy, rather than near perfect works which leave me feeling sad and hollow inside. There are three stories which interconnect through their characters and run backwards from 1999 to the 50's. The main theme is unrequited love and it all left me feeling miserable and empty. As good as this book undoubtedly is, I felt like reaching for the anti depressants after it ended.

Lovely

I read this book in one sitting. Sweet story that interweaves the lives of four women. It's about losing and finding hope, losing and finding love, and of course, death. I love the way Ms Hoffman writes so simply, but it's NEVER simple things she writes about.

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A Magically Delicious Read!

I always get excited when I find that a new Alice Hoffman novel is out and this one is as good or better than her very best books. The day I discovered her writing was like Christmas and my birthday all rolled into one. I love her mix of nature/fantasy/myth/magic. When people ask me my favorite authors, she's always on top of the list and I say rather wistfully, "I honestly wish I'd never read even one of her books yet so I could discover her all over again!"

I like the way she told this beautiful bittersweet story in three different time periods through the eyes of the three main characters in the story. The story of the heron made me cry more than once, as did the story of the third angel. Her magnificent, magical stories just get better and better and always take me outside myself --- the way a great book should.

I highly recommend this book to all Alice Hoffman fans. She doesn't disappoint!!!

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Hope and herons

We all make mistakes in our lives. Every one of us. Sometimes those mistakes destroy us, but, if we're smart enough to learn from them, they can make us better, more honest persons. In terms of mis-steps, the characters in Alice Hoffman's three inter-related novellas make some whoppers. Some of these characters are destroyed, but most most manage to go on, trying to figure out how and why they went wrong, trying to make something worthwhile of their lives, and learning along the way some important things about forgiveness and understanding.

Reading Hoffman's tale of love gone terribly wrong, of lives redeemed, is a rare pleasure. Her evocations of life during three different eras in London are spot on, her characters genuine. In places, her descriptions approach the poetic, beautiful and telling in their simplicity: "She didn't find any clues in all her searching, although she did discover that the single splash of color in the closet was a sheer pink blouse, a birthday present sent by Maddy last fall from Barneys. She couldn't help but notice that the store's tag was still attached." This one brief passage reveals much about the sisters, their personalities, their relationship. Images from the book linger after the final page has been turned: the purple jacket Frieda won on a bet, the hotel rabbit whose favorite nibble is wallpaper, the mossy lion statue at the hotel around which the stories revolve. There is a bona fide ghost, one of pain, loss, and regret, and then there's that eponymous third angel, who represents what? Possibility? Kindness? Empathy? You'll have to read the book to find the answer, for yourself, to this question.

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?Alice Hoffman is my favorite writer.?
?Jodi Picoult

Alice Hoffman is one of our most beloved writers. Here on Earth was an Oprah Book Club selection. Practical Magic and Aquamarine were both bestselling books and Hollywood movies. Her novels have received mention as notable books of the year by the New York Times, Entertainment Weekly, the Los Angeles Times, and People magazine, and her short fiction and nonfiction have appeared in the New York Times, The Boston Globe Magazine, Kenyon Review, Redbook, Architectural Digest, Gourmet, and Self.

Now, in The Third Angel, Hoffman weaves a magical and stunningly original story that charts the lives of three women in love with the wrong men: Headstrong Madeleine Heller finds herself hopelessly attracted to her sister?s fiancé. Frieda Lewis, a doctor?s daughter and a runaway, becomes the muse of an ill-fated rock star. And beautiful Bryn Evans is set to marry an Englishman while secretly obsessed with her ex-husband. At the heart of the novel is Lucy Green, who blames herself for a tragic accident she witnessed at the age of twelve, and who spends four decades searching for the Third Angel?the angel on earth who will renew her faith.

Brilliantly evoking London?s King?s Road, Knightsbridge, and Kensington while moving effortlessly back in time, The Third Angel is a work of startling beauty about the unique, alchemical nature of love.

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