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Summary: Patchett's Characters are amazingly real and passionate
Review: Ann Patchett lights up many diverse characters from all over the world to bring them together in an odd situation in Bel Canto. Each person has their own history, own background, and own personal story to be told. The way Patchett weaves the different perspectives into the story makes the novel an easy page-turner. You too will fall in love with Roxane and her beautiful voice after reading this story!
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Summary: Doesn't live up to the hype....
Review: I read this book after seeing the title on several lists - awards and whatnot - and I was very disappointed. I agree with other reviewers who say that any romance under these circumstances would be ridiculous. Once the romances started in earnest, the book became just another romance novel. I'm all for light beach reading, but I hadn't expected this book to be in that catagory. Maybe I should have waited for summer to read it!!
Rating: 
Summary: Not her best effort
Review: Was excited to read Bel Canto, since Magician's Assistant was flawless. This one is all in the language: Patchett writes like her character Roxanne Cross supposedly sings, but the story was weaker than usual. Didn't care enough about any of the hostages or terrorists til too many months into the saga.
Rating:
Summary: Exceptional!
Review: An intimate and catapulting journey into a world that is becoming sadly familiar to all of us. The richly developed characters leave you longing for more at the end of this modern day romantic tragedy.
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Summary: What was the point?
Review: A four and a half month hostage crisis. Hostages sneaking around at night to make love. And a Japanese translator that speaks any language the author can think of all tied together by an ending that will leave you confused and disappointed What kind of story is this? I will admit, however, that Patchett writes well, but I do not think that the story itself is worthy of the awards it has received.
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Summary: Deus ex macharena
Review: Any sympathy and sense of versimilitude that Patchett may have engendered in her characters in the course of the novel was destroyed by the utterly incredible and unfounded epilogue. What a letdown!
Rating:
Summary: A Beautifully Strange and Lyrical Story
Review: Without the publicity that Bel Canto received as a result of its recognition through the Pen/Faulkner Award I would have passed this book by in a hearbeat. The brief description on the back of the book didn't seem to indicate that it was the type of story I had any interest in reading. Yet, after hearing about its recognition, I picked it up again and took a look. I started reading the first few pages in a bookstore and before I knew it, I was hooked. Ann Patchett's writing is simple, elegant and almost lyrical. It quickly becomes somewhat hypnotic. While the story is one set in a South American embassy that has been taken hostage, it is much more a tale about how we build relationships with others by stopping all of our frenetic activity and paying attention to one another as human beings. In Bel Canto, some odd and beautiful relationships develop between the hostages themselves, and in some cases, between the hostages and their captors. Ultimately, Bel Canto reminds me that I need to slow down and hold myself hostage to more moments in my own life. As busy as I may become, there is no going back in time to simply pay attention to the people I have passed by and not given much thought to. I think Bel Canto is a wonderful story; a good lesson on the value of simple human encounter and the spiritual rewards that we find in paying attention to the people we travel the earth with every day. A really fine read. A deserving prizewinner! Daniel J. Maloney
Saint Paul, Minnesota
Rating: 
Summary: A Beautiful Fable
Review: Bel Canto is a beautiful fable, a story of the powers of art and love over the powers of evil and hatred. It could never in a million years happen in reality, but that doesn't detract from its beauty. Roxane Coss, a talented American soprano, is lured down to a nameless South American country to sing for at the birthday party of a visiting Japanese businessman. The party, with some 200 attendees, is invaded by a group of terrorists seeking to kidnap the president of this nameless country. He's not there, they won't leave, stalemate ensues. While some prisoners leave, a group of 50 remain, including the soprano and the businessman. The situation goes on for months and during those months, many of the young terrorists become involved with their captives, the music Ms. Coss sings somehow subtly changes things. Art triumphs over terror. Yes, it is very far-fetched, but it still makes for entertaining reading.
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Summary: Disappointing "award" winner
Review: The BEL CANTO story line is very contrived and contains far too much foreshadowing of future events. How fortunate to have so many talented individuals available to manage any situation. I prefer a story line that draws the reader in, allowing them to make their own conclusions about the events as they unfold. This story is utterly unrealistic and leaves very little to the reader's imagination. I wish I would have realized it was just another sappy romance novel.
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Summary: mp
Review: It is always a good sign when a book completely grabs the reader by the end of the second paragraph. "There were others there that night who had not heard her name, who would have said, if asked, that opera was a collection of nonsensical cat screechings, that they would much rather pass three hours in a dentist's chair. These were the ones who wept openly now, the one who had been so mistaken." Once again I was committed to reading a novel from my wife's book club simply because I was curious enough about the author's style to read a couple of pages. I had no interest in the plot described on the back cover. Terrorists taking hostages at a highbrow birthday party blah blah blah...please, I did see Die Hard. But this turned out to be no Die Hard. This turned out to be a deliberately paced gallery of character portraits and delicately sewn relationships, which develop in a story only marginally driven by plot. Of course some semblance of a plot is necessary to build the characters and relationships, and in this case that plot is the day-to-day activities of an extended captor and captee environment. Through that plot the author also develops some powerful and important themes. The desperate plight of the poor and uneducated is one. Communication is another. One character, Mr. Hosokawa's translator, speaks an absurd number of languages, and consequently is able to speak with all of the hostages and terrorist despite their disparate nationalities. Roxanne Cross, the singer, is able to communicate with their hearts, through music. Perhaps the most important theme developed is the idea that we are all human beings, and that as different as we sometimes seem, we all basically want the same things, happiness and beauty. The single complaint about this novel is that it seemed to drag some about 3/4 through. That opinion does not change my suggestion that this a highly recommended book, especially for those that have a profound love of language and/or those who know what it means to truly feel music in the depths of your soul.
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