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Foucault's Pendulum 394 reviews
Umberto Eco
Harvest Books, 2007
I can add little to the other wonderful reviews
+ The Pendulum Keeps Swinging
Okay, this WAS a hard book to read. So much going on and so many references to cults and phenomina. Reading this book is more of an education than an entertainment. But what fun! Eco is a true literary genius, in the same class as his italian brethren of musical fame.
Baudolino is perhaps ...
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Things Fall Apart: A Novel533 reviews
Chinua Achebe
Anchor, 1994
What makes fiction important
+ Things Fall Apart
+ Terrific
I know this is the classic debate of all time when it comes to literature: Is it about beautifully written prose (THE STORY OF EDGAR SAWTELLE, incidentally, is a good example of this problem) or does it tell a compelling story? (yet the prose itself is not its strong point).
It seems that many ...
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The Thirteenth Tale: A Novel 575 reviews
Diane Setterfield
Washington Square Press, 2007
Loved it!
+ Thrilling to the very end.
+ Took me 3 times to finally get into it
+ A perfect read...get your tea cup and plate of cookies on the table by your side and curl up for a great read!
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CivilWarLand in Bad Decline47 reviews
George Saunders
Riverhead Trade, 1997
A Message to America
+ A GREAT COLLECTION OF SHORT STORIES
+ Stories with a twisted, dark, and tragicomic american vision
+ Thank You, Mr. Saunders
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Boomsday90 reviews
Christopher Buckley
Twelve, 2007
Insanely Hilarious
+ Almost too true to be funny - but it still is
+ Killing yourself for the good of your country
+ Very entertaining...
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One Hundred Years of Solitude (P.S.)52 reviews
Gabriel Garcia Marquez
Harper Perennial Modern Classics, 2006
Garcia Marquez is great!
+ Excellent, but not typical of Marquez.
+ Well-written but very graphic
+ I saw a man with four hands on the street
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Another Bullshit Night in Suck City: A Memoir39 reviews
Nick Flynn, 2004
Senior Writers Seminar - Dominski
+ Having lived on the streets of Las Vegas...
+ Good memoir
+ I really liked this book!
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Will You Please Be Quiet, Please?: Stories15 reviews
Raymond Carver
Vintage, 1992
Very good
+ A Clean, Well-lit, Declarative Sentence
+ A mixed Bag
+ assortment of harsh, condensed, short stories
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The Third Chimpanzee: The Evolution and Future of the Human Animal (P.S.)99 reviews
Jared M. Diamond
Harper Perennial, 2006
Diamond is Brilliant
+ As Chimpy as You Wanna Be
+ This book is a Great Leap Forward
A good read for anyone who's interested in anthropology or evolution. One of Diamond's main points in this book is that humans are not so different from our biological cousins, the apes. In fact, he says, we are more genetically close to chimpanzees than some species of orangutans are to other ...
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The Year of Living Biblically: One Man's Humble Quest to Follow the Bible as Literally as Possible388 reviews
Simon & Schuster, 2007
Interesting and Entertaining Perspective on Religion
+ Light, Serious, and Reverent at the Same Time
+ Intelligent and Witty
+ And on the Eigth Day there was A.J.!!!! ; )
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A Long Way Gone: Memoirs of a Boy Soldier416 reviews
Ishmael Beah
Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2007
A Boy's Innocence Destroyed by War
+ Ishmael Beah
+ Courtesy of Teens Read Too
+ Great Audio Book! Authentic and Powerful
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The Virgin Suicides394 reviews
Jeffrey Eugenides
Grand Central Publishing, 1994
Time in a Bottle
+ Jorie's Reads on The Virgin Suicides by Jeffrey Eugenides
+ this is a true story
"... they were bound for college, husbands, child-rearing, unhappiness only dimly perceived -- bound, in other words, for life."
The Virgin Suicides is not just a story of the loneliness of being female. It is also a story of the loneliness of life and understanding what it is to be female; the ...
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The Pillars of the Earth (Deluxe Edition) (Oprah's Book Club)1289 reviews
Ken Follett
NAL Trade, 2007
Fantastic Story
+ Takes you on a journey
This book is delightful. It has everything one could want in a story; romance, adventure, thrill and suspense, good vs. evil, sadness, and excitement. I highly recommend it for a fun journey into your imagination with a good dose of accurate history (which I love). This book had me going to ...
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The Mosquito Coast71 reviews
Paul Theroux
Mariner Books, 2006
An Important Character Study
+ An English Teacher's Wet Dream
+ Good Character Study
+ Dark, disturbing and utterly enthralling
+ The Mosquito Coast
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I Am America (And So Can You!)428 reviews
Stephen Colbert
Grand Central Publishing, 2007
So far so good....
+ Funny book
Read the first few chapters and it is very Stephen Colbert. Whitty, funny, in depth, blunt...good book so far
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The Count of Monte Cristo (Penguin Classics) 123 reviews
Alexandre Dumas père
Penguin Classics, 2003
The perfect tale of revenge & redemption
+ Count of Monte Cristo
+ Very good
+ Pretty much the coolest book ever
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Lolita (Everyman's Library (Cloth))450 reviews
Vladimir Nabokov
Everyman's Library, 1993
A road movie of the mind
+ Beautiful writing confronts crude subject matter--A masterpiece
+ Upends your preconceptions and prejudices
+ Which book did you read?
+ The Most Beautiful Novel Ever Written
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Watership Down: A Novel950 reviews
Richard Adams
Scribner, 2005
A Classis Adventure Story
+ Yes , Rabbits!
+ Watership Down
+ Not for young children, but teenagers and adults will enjoy it.
+ Sometimes unbelievable or slow, but largely intelligent, compelling, and strongly written. A satisfying book. Highly recommended
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World Without End409 reviews
Ken Follett
Dutton Adult, 2007
Fabulous Epic!
+ A credit to historical fiction
+ World Without End
I believe this book may be better than Pillars of the Earth. It is similar, but has a different main story line. The characters and plot are rich and overlap. I was always surprised with the story events. It is a long book, but worth the read!!
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Things Fall Apart: And Related Readings (Literature Connections)1 review
Chinua Achebe
Houghton Mifflin Company, 1996
Simple and Fantastic
As an African American learning lititure in high school I always lamented the chance to read a novel OTHER than a European classic. Upon confronting my teacher I was told that we would read Othello the following month. Since this terrible experience I have been in search of African and African ...
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