Rating: 
Summary: The way the Germans feel?
Review: As you read through the reviews of this book, you will find that they are less consistent than reviews of most books. So many people could not relate to the characters at all, yet so many were profoundly moved. While I read this book, I was, (like many others who have written reviews here,) amazed, shocked, and intrigued to find myself trying to "forgive the unforgivable" and sympathize with the incomprehendible. How amazing and shocking for most of us to be on the other side of a Holocaust survival story and try to resolve loving a perpetrator of autrocities. It is the fact that the author puts us in this, never-before-imagined position that gives this book power and identity, and makes it ultimately a literary achievement. After putting the book down though, I thought about the other comments you will find in the reviews, and I thought about the five years I spent living and working in Germany. TO quote from another review, "Most German books never make it <to the best seller list> because they are almost all devoid of any emotional colour; austere." Just as Italians are noted for being gregarious the German national character is described as lacking empathy, compassion and void of deep emotion. As the author tries to go international with a novel that will move us to sympathize with the German plight, and paint a different picture of the German character, he falls victim to the same lack of depth that has forever plagued the international perception of Germany. ALTHOUGH his character struggles with trying to emapathize and trying to understand. He does so at a distance. Guarded, safe, without heart. He gives the least of himself as he can. Never giving to the point of risking himself... the very same crime that Hannah is guilty of. Compassion without cost.( ) The author seems to be struggling with whether or not he did enough, did he betray her - yes he did, as surely as she betrayed the Jewish women she befriended. They both befriended to the level of their own convenience, so we, loyal, sappy, emotional Americans, are left cold
Rating: 
Summary: A roller coaster read...
Review: Although I found this book to be entertaining, the plot development was rather inconsistently done. At times I felt like the author was rushing through the story and trying to paint the pictures with as few words as possible, and at other times I felt as if the narrative got so detailed that it bogged down the storyline. Overall I felt that it was a good read, but most certainly not the outstanding piece of literature others had claimed that it was.
Rating: 
Summary: Schlink Stinks
Review: Well, maybe he's not that bad, but it sort of rhymes. From the title of my review, one knows that I did not enjoy this book. Almost the entire time I was reading the book, I felt grey on the inside. Only when Michael begins recording his readings aloud for Hannah do I ever feel a little warmer to this story. I thought the book was predictable and simple. Hannah's "secret" was apparent to me after the first few hints. This novel was no fun, and I read for fun.
Rating:
Summary: a quick read
Review: Michael is 15 when he becomes transfixed by an older woman, a much older woman, Hanna. (Please keep in mind that I found the point of this book more interesting than the book itself.) After they meet, Michael enjoys in sex and bathing, while Hanna finds comfort in his way of reading to her. (I cannot get passed an older woman having sex with a 15 year old, but I guess something may have been lost in the German to English translation.) Months of the sex, baths, and reading go by and Hanna disappears. Michael is devistated in different ways. Then he sees Hanna, years later, while attending a trial where Hanna is among many defendants. The trial is to conclude who is guilty of taking part in the illegal acts that took place in Nazi Germany. One thing leads to another and Michael finds out one important characteristic in Hanna that could keep her from imprisonment... I normally enjoy any and every book in some optimistic way, but until I got through this particular one I almost lost faith. Overall, this is not one I would recommend to just anyone. Try something else, you may thank me.
Rating: 
Summary: the reader
Review: though i devour most books i come across, i had to force myself to finish this one. it is not one of oprah's better picks. realizing we all appreciate different books at different times in our lives, depending on "where" we are and "what is going on in our lives" at the time, this book left much to be desired. the characters were flat. i had no empathy for any of them. although there were sentences that caught me up, most of the book left me down. a major disappointment.
Rating:
Summary: The Reader
Review: The New York Times Book Review describes "The Reader" as "moving, suggestive and ultimately hopeful." While I do concede that "The Reader" is partially suggestive, I did not find it to be in any way moving or hopeful. Perhaps there was something lost in the translation (isn't there always?) but I found the novel to be ultimately disjointed. My main dislike of the novel was the lack of chemistry between Hanna and Michael. It was unfathomable to me that certain people described it as a love story. Where is the love, the chemistry, the connections? Furthermore, I was not at all empathetic towards Hanna, in fact I found her to be a very poorly drawn character. I cannot understand why anyone would go to jail to keep their illiteracy a secret. The novel is set in the context of the Holocaust, and the biggest "secret" of all is illiteracy? Please. Although I did enjoy some of Michael's philosophic musings, they were not fleshed out, and the disjointed language made them hard to understand. As to the length, just because a book is short doesn't mean the author has poetically reduced the information to the bare essentials--it may simply mean the author either didn't have the time or the desire to resolve any of the questions being posed. Unfortunately, that's how I ended up feeling about "The Reader"--lots of valid questions, no answers and no characters to care about.
Rating:
Summary: Going nowhere
Review: This book's concept is good, BUT the story does not develop. The characters are not developed and the more importantly the story does not develop well. You don't care about Hanna because you really don't know who she is. I couldn't understand why the narrator so tirelessly obsesses over this girl when we the reader has not had an opportunity to sympathesize for either of them.
Rating:
Summary: Emotionally Dead
Review: Its fast, its brisk, its well written and it could have been about cardboard cut-outs. The characters are not human beings but plot elements. Michael our deeply boring narrator is involved with a much older woman then he, Hanna. At first I thought she was a person of few words, but as the book progressed I came to realise that Hanna's lack of depth is deliberate, so that her judgement would be more of a philsophical, theoretical issue rather then about a character that we have come to care about. She is not a character, but a plot element to provide our narrator with a moral dilemma. By the time the second half the second half of the book rolls around we are reading about a trial of a person we hardly know and morally dillema of a passive, weak and humorless young man. Even when the author hints at character complexities as the Michael's relationship with his father, he immediatly withdraws back to his plot thread and the not very original philosophical ramblings about the holocuast. It would be more rewarding (and definitly more moving) to read a historical book about WW2. Inspite of the extremely negative tone of this review there is something to be said for the pace and simplicity of this novel. But by the time the end of this novel comes around you're be feeling lousy, unmoved and not very illuminated.
Rating: 
Summary: Deceptively simple
Review: For anyone who likes their stories transparent and easily digestible, this novel will prove disappointing; for those who love Ford Madox Ford's 'Good Soldier', it will exceed our expectations. Its control of point-of-view is masterly. It is, as it tells us, a novel of 'unconscious pain' - of Michael, Hanna, his parents, and the unwitting victims of the Holocaust, those children of the survivors. To unlock the novel, we have first to understand its metaphoric nature. We are given a clue from the image of the house which invests Michael's dreams. Within the austere prose, we snatch glimpses of a far greater pain, like a house which gives us just a hint of the spaces within; or like having a quick look through a window into room upon room. Doors are seen leading to more doors, and in reading the novel, we must unlock them ourselves. 'The Reader' tells us more from what it leaves unsaid than what it says and demands of us an involvement that lesser books do not. Often it depends on just a word or two. But don't be disappointed by its deceptively casual references and allow its magic to work. In return it will enthrall you.
Rating:
Summary: This book got me through Jury Duty
Review: This book was very interesting. My grandma grew up in Germany during the war and this story took me to that time. I really enjoyed the story of the strange relationship that these two people shared. The ending took a strange twist but that just made it all the more real.
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