Rating: 
Summary: Worst Book Ever
Review: This is the worst book I have ever read in my entire life. I read it as a freshman three years ago and still have not forgotten how awful it is. The only remotely interesting charachter is the opium-addicted woman and she dies at the beginning. I wanted to die every time I opened the book. Silas Marner is the most boring charachter ever created. Eppie has no personality once she has grown up and is an obnoxious child to read about. I have no idea why so many people love this book; it was on a list of the most boring books ever written- number 7. Don't waste your time with this story, and don't watch the movie because it is even worse.
Rating: 
Summary: I read it in a box-I read it with a fox-I read Silas Marner
Review: The plot of this book was very anbsorbing. At the end, I had to remember that I was just the reader and not in the book. I read sixty pages to read the conclusion. Also, George Eliot(pen name for Mary Anne Evans) has a way with words that is amazing. She uses specific words that give the reader an exact image. Though the sory was great, George Eliot needed to describe the characters greater detail. Other than Silas Marner and Eppie, the characters were left as vague beings with specific personalities, but no physical characteristics.:)
Rating: 
Summary: redemption versus rebirth
Review: I thought this book was fantastic. In the beginning, it was hard to read though. But the story itself was marvellous! It made me think of redemption (Godfrey Cass kept many secrets from people) and rebirth (Silas's new love in his life: Eppie). The story provides moral things and it made me think of the most precious things in my life (-> not money).
Rating:
Summary: Grade Nine Student
Review: I cannot more agree with the reviewers who say Silas Marner is slow moving at the beginning, and that it is slow moving for the first half of the story, however I find that Silas Marner is not actually a story, more a biography, or a discription of the times. The scenes are that era are very vivid; the characters are very true and clear. Silas's betrayal, his 'death' and his obsession with money are reflected in the monotony of the book, just when you begin to feel the story has completely lost track of any clear-cut line, something new happens. Then, Silas is reborn, he remembers who he has been and his family. The most wonderful thing about this book is its summing up, happy ending. Nothing is left hanging, this book definatly has a good ending, and a book with an ending such as this is clearly the work of a gifted author; such as George Eliot. Do not read this book in search of thrilling plot, and captivating characters, read it for it's planning, and mostly for it's joyful conclusion.
Rating: 
Summary: Interesting story
Review: The beginning of this book was slow and long. The writing style was somewhat difficult for a 9th grader, and the sentences tended to run on. Almost an entire chapter, in the beginning, was about a long, dull conversation almost irrelevant to the story itself. When Eppie enters Silas's life, however, the story becomes more interesting. She makes the characters more interesting, and the whole story more enjoyable. The large development of Silas in the beginning to the end is apparent and important. The few final twists at the end also make it a story worth reading. Therefore, this book was a good classic and should be read by those interested in historic England.
Rating:
Summary: simple, lovely
Review: For any true connoisseur of life's ironies, there can be few finer than the fact that the radical Mary Ann Evans (George Eliot) is chiefly remembered for this completely traditional and eminently conservative tale. We needn't rehearse the elements of the story in detail because virtually every English speaking youth on the planet reads it in school. Just to jog your memory, Silas Marner is a devoutly religious weaver who is unjustly accused of theft. He moves to Raveloe where he becomes fairly reclusive both because he wishes it so and because the villagers find him odd. He devotes himself to the accumulation of wealth, but is once again devastated, this time when he is the victim of theft. Ultimately he is redeemed by a young girl who wanders up to his door. He raises the child and they come to love one another as Father and Daughter. The lesson being that neither religious fanaticism nor the love of filthy lucre will suffice to save a man's soul, but the basic love between two humans will do the trick.It's a fairly simple and straightforward story about the capacity of love to heal spiritual wounds and make damaged beings whole, hence its power. Her other novels are in vogue right now, particularly the unreadable Middlemarch, but this is clearly Eliot's best and one of the most affecting novels of the 19th Century. GRADE: A
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Summary: In all due fairness....
Review: I may only pity the plight of American society, for time and time again I hear complaints lodged against the British literary canon (indeed, even the American canon) that the books written long ago simply hold no relevance and plod along with no point. There is no relevance to an outcast being condemned in Victorian society for being an outsider and different? But certainly this country has no racial problems, particularly as we are so incredibly lucid and politically correct. Look at how openly we welcome outsiders into our society. We are nothing like the people of Raveloe. Is this George Eliot's masterpiece? No. Yet what parent hasn't felt the dilemma Siras faces with his future with Eppie? Who hasn't had their faith deeply questioned by a deeply-felt wrong in the world? Who hasn't felt the guilt of being unable to speak the full truth to those loved the most? Oh, the plot isn't there. That may be the point, for can the life of a man who lives without the presense of love and only ambition call his existence a plot? I hardly find that irrelevant.
Rating: 
Summary: Why can't we read some CURRENT social commentary in school?
Review: I don't know about anyone else, but when I read a plot synopsis on the back of a book, I like for that story to kick in at some point. However, that's not how this book is written. The basic plot doesn't get set into motion until about 120 pages in...and the book is 183 pages. To put it bluntly, the first 120 pages are spent aimlessly pondering life's many riddles and offering sometimes interesting, yet mostly tiring social commentary (I really don't care how the people at the Red House and the Rainbow act similarly despite class differences. I just want to finish this reading assignment so I can actually enjoy my summer). A plodding, slow book for the first two-thirds, it picks up somewhat before somehow managing to wrap things up in 10 pages...making me wonder why the book is even this long in the first place.
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Summary: Very advanced reading.....
Review: I don't really care a whole lot for this book...mostly because in 9th grade advanced english at school, my first high school experience, I was forced to read Silas Marner. The language and literary context is very deep and very advanced...it's a struggle at first to read until you get used to the flow of the book. This is definitely a book that you cannot read/skim like you can in most others. You have to carefully read and think about every sentence in order to comprehend the plot. The book gets better about half-way through, where more conversation takes place and is easier to follow. The worst aspect of the book, in my opinion, is the sentences that run on and on and take up entire paragraphs and in turn, the paragraphs that run for pages. All in all, the book was OKAY, but I don't really recommend it for pleasure reading.
Rating:
Summary: consequences and superstition
Review: I use Silas Marner with many of the students I tutor because it so effectively portrays that there are consequences to wrong actions. In contrast, what is right stands out purely (Silas and the child). I also use Silas Marner to make students aware of their own predispositions toward people who are "different"...people they don't want to know. The superstition of the townspeople toward Silas Marner reveals the common human tendency to deny a stranger his own personal history by conjuring one for him. This is an excellent book, especially for pushing young people to THINK!
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