Rating: 
Summary: Excellent book
Review: Anything that David Baldacci writes is well worth reading. I find it difficult to write a review without giving away good parts of the story, and at the same time without being vague. However, I feel that after reading such a good book the least I can do is try my best to inspire others to read this excellent book.If you are familiar with David Baldacci's work this book may surprise you. This is a story about human relationships and love, struggle and injustice. The story is filled with unexpected developments that keep intensifying the situation as you get deeper into the pages. The characters are well developed and as their troubles continue to escalate you start to care more and more about what happens to them, which makes the book hard to put down. Furthermore, the story is so intense that made me want to jump right into the imaginary world and help the characters through their struggle. Although the story does have a happy ending, it is by any means not a cheap Hollywood-style corny tearjerker ending. In fact I find it that it is the best ending for this story, as it would not work the other way around. The book is well worth your time. Highly recommended.
Rating:
Summary: Please continue
Review: The other reviews on this page have given the plot, synopsis and literary criticisms. I only want to say that I hope Mr. Baldacci continues in this genre. His epilogue is an inspiration to those who wonder what to do with the information they have gathered as genealogy buffs.
Rating: 
Summary: very disappointing
Review: I was expecting something on the lines of his absolute power. But it certainly dissappoints as there is no plot at all.
it is the story of a girl who moves from newyork to a downtown area, and how her life changes and how she adapts to it. a very diappointing book from a great writer
Rating: 
Summary: My first Baldacci book
Review: I hear I should have started with a different book. David Baldacci gave us memorable characters, an interesting setting, a couple side plots and an entertaining book, but I couldn't help comparing the story with some other pieces of literature. The story was predictable. Like many family courtroom dramas, the end was twisted, but came out like you thought it would. Just when you think nothing more could happen to this family, the barn burns down. I know barn burning was a reality, but again? Overall, I was entertained, but found the saga of the Cardinal family a bit predictable.
Rating: 
Summary: Heartwarming Story
Review: This story is a change of pace for David Baldacci. It's the story of twelve year old Lou and seven year old Oz who go to live with their great-grandmother in the rural mountains of Virginia after their father is killed in a car accident and their mother is left in a catatonic state. This story has many themes including family, compassion, sacrifice, love and loss. This book was chosen by the high school my daughter attends for all rising sophmores, juniors and seniors to read over the summer. I think they picked an excellent book for these students to read and since we live in Virginia, I think it was an appropriate choice.
Rating:
Summary: Why most authors don't switch genres.
Review: David Baldacci is a wonderful conspiracy, governmental and thriller novelist, and I would recommend he sticks with these previous successful genres. In his book, Wish You Well, Baldacci writes of two young children, Lou and OZ, who must go live with their paternal Great-Grandmother, after surviving a horrible car crash in which their mother becomes catatonic and their father becomes lost to them. The story line becomes ironically laid out during the course of the book, and unfolds very similar a conspiracy novel, with just as many descriptions and adjectives, taking a page and a half to describe the consistency of a windy, gravel road. The story is one of the coming of age for two children and the hardships that they face, such as loss of a friend, realization that not everyone is treated as equally as they are and the growth and realization of their love towards their family; however with the vast descriptions the story is painstakingly long and difficult to read.
Raised in New York, David Baldacci writes of a coal mining town, in the Appalachian Mountains of Virginia, a town, that he had never visited himself previously of wanting to write the book. Wish You Well is based on his mother's upbringing and not of Baldacci's remembrances or childhood of the area of which he writes. Baldacci has done a great service to the town of Haysi, bringing recognition back to its name with, Wish You Well being selected for the 2002 All America Reads book, and for which he now is an honorary citizen of Dickenson County. However, he has made me come to realize why most authors only write in one genre.
Rating:
Summary: Warm Inspiring Story
Review: Baldacci generally succeded in his break out of his legal thriller genre to give all of us a sweet tale of Louisa Mae Cardinal and Oz in their transition from New York City to a small backwoods house with their grandmother. This is a nice sweet book, and is worth your time to read. The only reason I didn't give it the full 5 stars was I felt that the ending was a bit too coincidental.
Rating:
Summary: sweet...very sweet
Review: Wish You Well is the result of an author's desire to share his Virginia upbringing with the rest of the world. The result is a very nice story, if a little too predictable and so sweet your teeth hurt.
Lou, a 12 year old girl with a serious case of "eldest child syndrome" is suffering emotionally from the loss of her father and catatonic state of her mother. She attempts at all times to protect her 7 year old brother Oz, which might be stretching that sibling love a bit far. They are sent to live with Great Grandmother Louisa following the terrible car crash that took the life of their father and left their mother in a twilight state.
The change in lifestyle is huge: from New York City to the Appalachian mountains in a small cabin with no electricity or running water. Lou and Oz adapt quite readily, with the help of Diamond, the orphaned neighbor boy. Eugene, the devoted black hired hand, and Cotton the kindly lawyer are there to help Lou a nd Oz make the transition. There are plenty of ugly mean people around also, especially Billy Davis and his mean father who live nearby.
The story itself is predictable, and the characters live up to our expectations. The strength of this book lies in the scene descriptions, which is the reason Baldacci wrote the book in the first place. No doubt he has many fine memories of the Virginia mountains and the kind of life he led growing up there with women similar to Louisa. He wanted to share the beauty and simplicity of this lifestyle with his readers, while reminding us that there is strengh in moral virtue: be kind to each other, take care of the earth, pray. He is successful in sharing his growing up years with us, and the scenes he describes might almost make me want to take a visit there someday.
The story itself was nice, but maybe a little too nice. However, I will give this book to my daughter (who is 10) today, for her first real novel. I have no doubt she will enjoy it immensely.
I recommend this book to anyone who needs an escape from reality, and anyone who enjoys reading books that don't include graphic violence and sex. A pleasant read.
Rating:
Summary: TAKE ME HOME...COUNTRY HOME...
Review: Having read a number of David Baldacci's books, most of which are well written, engrossing thrillers, this one is quite different. It is not a thriller but, rather, a beautifully written, human drama, most of which takes place in the mountains of Virginia. In this unabridged, audiobook edition, the richness of the drama and the beauty of the writing is brought to life by the wonderful narration of Norma Lana, who manages to convey the down home sense of feeling that is palpable in the book. This is a coming of age story. It is the story of the Cardinal family, as seen throught the young eyes of twelve year old Louisa Mae Cardinal, known as Lou, a precocious twelve year old, whose father is a highly acclaimed writer of note with great literary distinction but little commercial success. She lives with her beloved father, her mother, and her younger brother, Oz, in New York City. The year is 1940. The family is on the brink of moving to California, when tragedy strikes, and the lives of Lou, Oz, and their mother are forever changed. Lou, Oz, and their now catatonic mother go to live with their paternal great-grandmother, Louisa, for whom Lou is named. This no nonsense, strong willed, loving matriarch lives high up in the the Appalachian mountains of Virginia, where Lou's father grew up, and that is where Lou and Oz will now grow up. They are strangers in a strange land, big city children now living on a farm without electricity, running water, or central heat. It is there that Lou comes of age and, together with her brother, Oz, has many new experiences. They are experiences that provide rights of passage and life lessons in friendship, loyalty, loss, and redemption. She gets a large dose of the good, the bad, and the ugly in life. While there, big business threatens their way of life and pits the townsfolk against each other in a struggle for survival. It is a struggle that sees Louisa take a stance that will, ultimately, be the death of her, leaving the children to cope with their mother, who is physically sound, but locked in her own mind since the tragedy that changed their lives forever. The interests of big business and those of the Cardinal family clash in a Virginia courtroom in a riveting drama that is not easily forgotten. With the help of a family friend, a humble and kindly, country lawyer, things are, eventually, put to rights. This well written book has richly drawn characters and a sensitive and descriptive narrative that transports the reader to another time and place. It is so evocative of the hardscrabble, mountain existence, so as to make the readers feel as if they, themselves, were experiencing it. It is a sentimental journey that is calculated to tug at one's heartstrings. It is a journey, however, well worth taking. With this book, the author has set himself apart from the pack and proclaimed himself a true literary talent.
Rating:
Summary: Moved all my fellings, everybuddy should read it!!
Review: Baldacci tells a story that must have happened many times in many nations, a moving tale that puts one to think, on what is really important in life. As the novel goes by, all kind of the best feelings surface on the reader. This is a must read novel, it should be translated to other languages.
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