Rating: 
Summary: Lost in his own world
Review: This is a story of a man who creates his own world of loneliness and satisfaction. He feels happy if he does not have to go out or speak to strange and unknown people. His reactions are very passive and he is undecided about most of the things. Unfortunately, he does not realise and admit that his world could not give him all protection he would like to. He becomes more and more depressive and unable to live a real life. Even more, he gets lost in his own world! It seems that nobody can help him - mostly because he does not leave anybody in his vicinity. Only a woman, who is in many things very different - is young, talkative (too much, I think), full of energy, daring and also thoughtless - could maybe change him and even she must be almost aggressive. I like neither Macon nor Muriel. I think, the author a bit exaggerates in description of their characters. They both look quite unreal to me. But it is worth to read this book and if you take some things from Macon's and some from Muriel's character, you could get an interesting person. And some descriptions of Macon's thoughts are also well written.
Rating: 
Summary: good read bad ending
Review: An interesting book with amusing characters. The parts on the death of Macon's 12 year old son were touching and his analysis of what happened between himself and Sarah rang with truth. Watching his character unfold as his relationship with Muriel progresses was intersting and seemed true to character. Also the interaction between himself and his siblings was very funny. I enjoyed the book up until the end where the story just ended with out any of the thoughtfulness or explanation typical of the rest of the book. I put it down feeling slightly disapointed which was a shame since I enjoyed the first part of it.
Rating:
Summary: Nice read, interesting characters, unsatisfying ending
Review: Up until the last few chapters I found the Accidental Tourist and enjoyable if somewhat fluffy read. The characters are all entertaining if not likable and the bits on his son's death are very touching. Watching Macon's character unbend very slowly in response to dog trainer is enjoyable and realistic. The last few chapters seem rushed in contrast to the rest of the book and his actions don't fit the character that's been built from the beginning of the book. It ends suddenly with no contemplation of action and no explanation. It's like either the writer ran out of ideas or she ran into deadline. It feels a bit like the book ran into a wall.
Rating:
Summary: This book is... pretty good
Review: Not the best book I've ever read but certainly an enjoyable read. The characters are truly beleivable, more so than most books I have ever read... It seems that you could run into Macon, Muriel, or Sarah any day at any store. Maybe it's that fact that didn't make this book 5 stars... The characters are REAL, but not interesting enough to make this book GREAT. Personally, I prefer John Irving's fascinating characters on the edge of reality. This book is an easy read, and worth it if you're not looking for something that will involve you deeply.
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Summary: Amusing at Times, but Empty as a Love Story
Review: Anne Tyler's most famous novel is an enjoyable read, with occasional episodes of deep sadness and quirky behavior that the reader will find amusing. However, ultimately the book attempts to succeed as an offbeat love story, and I personally found it to be one of the most unremarkable, unromantic love stories I have ever read.Macon Leary is a reluctant traveller who writes travel guides for other businessmen, like himself, who hate to leave home and who therefore wish to make their destinations appear as boring and risk-free as home. His quirky travel habits and advice are perhaps the novel's most original aspect. As the novel begins, Macon and his wife are struggling to deal with their grief over the loss of their 12 year old son Ethan, who was shot senselessly in a hold-up of a burger stand while at summer camp. Throughout the novel, Ethan's thoughts of his son are used to dig up powerful emotions of loss and despair even though Macon takes it all in stride. When Macon's wife leaves him in the novel's opening pages, he is left struggling by himself and organizing a ritual at home that is both original and pathetic. Rather than do laundry all the time, he washes his dirty clothes after each day by swishing them around on the floor of his shower. He makes popcorn so he needn't leave his bed in the morning, and sews together a patchwork of sheets so he can sleep in them one at a time, each shaped like a big envelope, and only wash them once. While in the midst of this off and unhealthy existence, Macon meets a dog trainer, Muriel, who aggressively drifts into his life despite Macon's best efforts to keep her out. Muriel has frizzy hair, wears inappropriate clothing and spiky heels, and has a son about Ethan's age who is allergic to seemingly everything. These two characters, who have virtually nothing in common, head toward an unconvincing romance that seems empty and unfulfilling. Overall Macon seems to drift from one relationship to the other, sometimes making decisions (or allowing them to be made for him) seemingly without any thought, despite the substantial consequences of his actions on himself and others. His wife reappears, and he goes home like a wayward pet, ultimately to be faced with a choice at the end that I won't give away. If the reader is like me, by the end of the novel you don't care with whom Macon decides to share his dreary existence, you just want him to make a decision for once in his life. Overall I thought the novel had a promising beginning, with Macon's eccentricities supplying much of the book's original humor, but by the end those habits of his were buried and we are left with an accidental love story that falls flat in this reader's opinion.
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Summary: Unbelievable Ending
Review: I tend to prefer novels that tell a plausible story. Stories where the characters act in acceptable ways for their personality types. No matter how much we'd like to believe it's possible, people do not change once they reach an adult maturity level even when they're faced with a life altering event or decision. In Anne Tyler's "The Accidental Tourist" the main character, Macon Leary, does just that. He makes a drastic change in his life after he is well into middle age. His decision just didn't seem plausible in light of his personality and situation in life. Macon's son Ethan has been killed during a robbery at a fast food restaurant while away at camp. The death of their son pulls apart Macon and his wife Sarah. The book opens with Sarah asking Macon for a divorce. Not knowing anything about their marriage at the outset we have to accept this as a reasonable request as Macon doesn't put up much of a fight. And that's the crux of the problem I ultimately had with this novel. Macon isn't much of a fighter at all. Life has been okay for him but his early years have effectively beaten him into submission. He is a man of routine and I was never able to picture him having enough nerve to do what he does at the end of the novel. The other main character of The Accidental Tourist is a 20-something dog trainer by the name of Muriel Pritchett. She has been tasked with the responsibility of training Macon's dog, Edward. After Macon moves in with his three siblings at their grandparent's old home Edward begins to get more out of control than normal. His siblings propose giving Edward away but Macon can't because he was Ethan's pet. Immediately after Muriel is introduced we realize that she's on the lookout for a man, any man, to provide for her and her son Alexander. Muriel is a real go getter but can never make the kind of money she wants to be able to give Alexander a better life. She latches on to Macon as her ticket to the middle class. I did like this novel's approach to the main characters, especially Muriel. She is presented as a lonely single mother looking for a provider and not for someone to love. She never really drifted from that the whole story. Even when she showed up on the plane to Paris I never got the sense it was because she loved Macon but it was because she felt he was her best chance out of poverty. I would like to have seen a little more of Sarah in this story. It seems cruel what happens to her. Of course bad things happen to good people all the time in real life. Sarah seems to be just another one of those good people. I believe her only real fault is her underestimation of Macon. She believes him to be an even meeker man than I do. In the end she pays for it but what seems an unfair price. To sum up, The Accidental Tourist was entertaining and interesting until the ending. But the ending is usually the most important part of any story. It's what most often leaves an impression upon you and I was completely unsatisfied with this ending.
Rating:
Summary: The Familiar
Review: Anne Tyler, also known for her novel Breathing Lessons, has done a marvelous job in accomplishing a task that so few writers are able to do. She has some how written a book that I had to and did finish in one complete sitting. She went on to accomplish this by creating characters that I could relate to, characters that I knew because they had been given real human characteristics. By doing so she has accomplished her purpose that no matter what tragedies one encounters through life, they can always be overcome. The Accidental Tourist, a story about Macon Leary, depicts the hardships of life and how various people face them, or even run from them. Macon Leary is an odd sort of character. He is very methodical and seems to have his own unique ways of dealing with things. I mean, how many people do u know that wash their clothes in the shower WHILE taking a shower? I don't know of any. Although I didn't see much of a plot forming until a good ways into the book, Tyler's style of developing her characters was enough to keep me interested and proceed in reading. The story opens with Macon's wife, Sarah, wanting a divorce. They had been going through some tough times because their 12-year-old son had been murdered in a burger stop by a robber. Macon had his own ways of dealing with that tragedy and Sarah didn't seem to understand them. Part of the conflict was that she felt as if she were the only one that cared. Sarah quickly moves out and Macon proceeds in his curious ways with life. The ways he delt with tragedy reminded me of those movies where a death is experienced and the mourner becomes depressed and hardly able to function. I enjoyed Tyler's twist of fate when a misbehaving Edward, Macon's dog, brings him together with Muriel Prichitt, a dog trainer. Both are divorcees, and can immediately relate to each other. She somehow influences Macon and he falls in love with her wild ways. When given the chance to go back to Sarah, however, he chooses to stay with Muriel, despite his twenty years of marriage to Sarah. Tyler followed every sort of change that Macon went through while separated for Sarah. She backed up the fact that people rub off on other people the way he changed after meeting Muriel. His own quirky siblings, who have to debate the pros and cons of every situation before acting, even if it something as trivial as answering the phone, bring humor to the story. They comment on how weird Macon is becoming, but I felt as if he were coming away from weird and becoming normal. Tyler also illustrated his change in attitude. He began to enjoy his work and talking to people, which he had never enjoyed to do before. In fact, he always traveled with Miss, MacIntosh, an extremely long book that Macon never left behind in fear of having to carry on a conversation with his seatmate. In the end, Macon was talking to them and even holding a woman to get through the flight. Tyler had me feeling sorry for Macon and his quirky ways, like eating popcorn in bed for breakfast or sleeping in sewn up sheets. Although I was under the impression that the book was about Macon AND Sarah, I feel as if it had little to do with Sarah's changes at all. Tyler wrote from a point of view that was personal to Macon, as if she knew him personally and he told her the story with all of his own thoughts. In conclusion, The Accidental Tourist is a brilliantly written novel about how one fights to overcome and defeat a hardship or tragedy, and the changes he or she must go through in order to conquer it.
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Summary: A wonderful story about how we change as people!
Review: This story, i.e., The accidental tourist is not really about a guy whom writes travel guides: It is a story about how people change when they are encounter new ideas or people. I usually do not read this kind of books since consider them to be mindless. Tyler is the exception to the rule and she writes a witty and thought provoking story about change.
Rating: 
Summary: If horses had wings
Review: The Accidental Tourist by Anne Tyler is an exquisite, metrical, well-written story about Macon and Sarah Leary. A harrowing event from the past eventually destroys their marriage. Macon mired in his comfortable (some would say weird) routine is forced to start on a new journey. The Accidental Tourist will surprise and delight the reader.
Rating:
Summary: Sublime
Review: This is a poignant and amusing story of people dealing with sadness and loneliness. I know some people can't get into the characters, but for me the relationship Macon Leary has with his siblings is one of the best things about the book. The way they cared for each other and watched out for each other even when they were younger, was touching. There are tough times in everyone's life, some tougher than others. This book shows that it's easier to hang on when you don't close youself up to others and look for new avenues to move forward. This is an outstanding story.
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