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Drowning Ruth

Drowning Ruth

List Price: $29.95
Your Price: $19.77
Product Info Reviews

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Rating: 4 stars
Summary: nearly 5 stars
Review: The only thing keeping this from a 5-star rating is the ending--it doesn't quite meet expections. The rest of the novel is so well-developed that the end seems a little weak. I will definately check out her future novels.

Rating: 4 stars
Summary: Another Great 1 From Oprah!
Review: I hate reading, but found myself drawn to this one. I love the way it plays out and wow what a surprise!

Rating: 2 stars
Summary: Very disappointed!
Review: I have read 5 Oprah recommended books and have loved them all except for this one. I guess my expectations were too high, on the back of the book it's catorgorized as a "psychological thriller", well I was not thrilled.

I will say the story was told very uniquely, by the different characters, but from the beginning, you don't really know HOW it happens, but when you find out, it's not a suprise.

All in all, I was disappointed. But it won't stop me from reading other Oprah books!

Rating: 4 stars
Summary: Intriguing
Review: I found this to be an extremely enjoyable book. Throughout the first few chapters, which took me a few weeks to get through because I only read a little at a time, I was afraid it would drag a bit, but when Amanda's big secret came to the surface the plot began to pick up considerably and I finished it in two days.
Honestly though, I wouldn't classify this as a psychological "thriller". Psychological, yes, dramatic, yes, suspenseful, certainly, but I never was terrified or on the edge of my seat, which is something I would expect from a book classified as a thriller.
Nevertheless, Amanda's obviously deep-rooted issues create tension and give the novel definite suspense. It's not hard to figure out how events played out on the fateful night, though the truth is slightly different than what I expected, but really, I think this is more a story of familial relationships between people with entirely different personalities. I found that the most intriguing part of the novel was seeing how Mathilda's death affected each of her family members in their own way and how they dealt with it. Amanda obviously felt a lot of guilt at not being able to save her sister. Carl alternately felt sadness and deep depression at the loss of his wife and heated anger when he began to doubt Amanda's story and questioned Mathilda's integrity. Ruth, who it seemed for most of her early life was told by Amanda how she should feel and think, finally had to learn to deal with her own feelings about her mother, her aunt, and herself.
I think in a lot of ways too it was a coming of age novel, as we watch Ruth grow up and try to break free of her aunt's grip and then finally figures out where her place is. Although, Ruth is not the only one who has to grow up. Throughout the novel, Amanda is very immature, and it takes her a long time to finally come to terms with her sister's death and truly become an adult.
Altogether, I definitely recommend it. The novel has many elements in it and I think fans of any genre will enjoy it. It's not a difficult read either, and anyone will be able to get through it withough difficulty.

Rating: 4 stars
Summary: wonderful story!!
Review: Apparently (according to these reviews) you either like this book or you don't. I liked it. I highly recommend it. Great story.

Rating: 4 stars
Summary: Good story and more...
Review: I read many customers' reviews before writing this review and was particularly interested in the deeply emotional responses provoked by "Drowning Ruth". The reader is put through a succession of changing emotions, particularly about Amanda. I began the book certain that Amanda was psychotic, but finished the story feeling that the reader must allow that her mental health was shaped as much by the times as by nature.

Had Amanda lived today, she might have been a very different person from the one in the book. She might not have been so naive, would have had more control over her future, and would have had more choices in her life. Helpful medication would have been available to her and she would not have had to spend months in a "sanitorium". I went through many feelings about Amanda. During most of the book, I was curious about her motivations; she appeared to me to be a seriously disturbed person. But as the book came to a close, a sense of desperation grew around her, a desperation which had it's own logic. She was loosing hold on her secrets. The last few pages are remarkable. I can understand why some readers felt disappointed. We expect one thing but get another, which is less in keeping with the image we had maintianed about Amanda throughout the book. This ending is unexpected; it is dramatic, but reveals logic and redemtion. The reader is jolted.

Amanda showed some strengths, setting her sights beyond her parents' farm and becoming a nurse. She cared for mangled, dispirited American soldiers returning from the font lines of France in WW I. She was a good nurse, volunteering to care for the most difficult patients. Under these circumstances, she eventually broke down. Piecing people back together and watching young men die can break event the strongest (remember Hawkeye in the last episode of M*A*S*H?).

There are implications toward the beginning of the book that Amanda's mother was ill. Amanda had to deal with her mother's instability which is vaguely portrayed possibly as migrane headaches, Meniere's Syndrome or auditory hallucinations. Her response to what must have been a constant fear of losing her mother, was a wish to "own" her. This is important to bear in mind re: Amanda's relationship with both Mathilda and Ruth. In one scene, Amanda's father proves to be a strict but thoughtful man. In his short stint in the book, he proves quite human. Eventually when both parents die, Amanda blames herself. The seeds of a severe, but misplaced guilt are planted.

No, there is no "happy ending" here. The dysfunction of this family continues. I particularly liked Ms. Schwarz's hints of strengths and dysfunctions running through this family like a long braid, looping over, around and through the generations. Families hand down their values and priorities to future generations. Thus, Ruth could no more disconnect from her aunt than Amanda could disconnect from her parents' farm. Through her passivity and ambivalent connectiion to Amanda, Ruth becomes part and parcel of her family.

Rating: 3 stars
Summary: Interesting story with not enough satisfaction.
Review: I was torn between giving this book an "okay" or "good" rating. The entire story line was pulling and interesting. I hung on to every word as if I was on the edge of a cliff. The author used so many character secrets to keep the reader interested. With each new secret, the story would take a firmer hold of my attention. The author really did a wonderful job of introducing and explaining each character, so it didn't seem as if the people were background nobodies. On the other hand, the author keeps the climax within reach almost the entire length of the book. You, the reader, know what is going on, but you want everything to be in the open. It's understandable to keep the book moving, but the secrets are withheld for far too long. And it's even more disappointing to find that most of the secrets aren't even revealed to the people that they are supposed to be revealed to. Also, the author ends the story on a satisfying note, so that I had almost forgotten about some of the main characters that weren't concluded. For instance, Ruth's father was left out of the story for a large part of the conclusion and all of the climax. It was a compelling read, though. Everyone should be able to find a bit of themselves in at least one of the characters.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: Thought it was going to be a bore...
Review: ...but it was a page turner instead! I liked the way the author was able to intertwine present day with the past. Normally I don't like flashbacks, but the story flowed so well that I read the book in two days. Highly recommend.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: A riveting page turner!
Review: After Amanda finds herself in a shameful predicament, she moves back home to live with her sister, Mattie on their deceased parents estate. They devise a plan to fix the situation, but on a cold November night, everything goes wrong. Mattie dies suddenly and Amanda, the only person who knows what REALLY happened, keeps the secret to herself until many years later, when she's forced to divulge her dark truth.

Christina Schwarz portrays a vivid plot, tightly intertwining the characters in a gripping storyline. In the end, when it all comes full-circle, you'll marvel at her mastery.

Rating: 4 stars
Summary: Christina Schwarz's first novel; "drowning" or sailing high
Review: Christina Schwarz's first novel was definitely a big hit. Times said ,"Her novel shows her compassion and understanding of the American landscape and the people who live on it." Drowning Ruth is a great novel that tells of the ties that bind sisters together and the forces that tear them apart, of the dangers of keeping secrets and of the dangerous consequences that can happen when the secrets are exposed.

In winter, 1919, Amanda Starkey spends her days nursing soldiers who were wounded in the Great War. Amanda finds herself becoming suddenly overwhelmed, so she decides to leave Milwaukee and go back to her family's farm on Nagawaukee Lake. She tries to make herself feel better with her younger sister, Mathilda, and three-year-old niece, Ruth. But very soon, Amanda realizes being at her home town isn't helping her out at all. She still has all of her troubles back there with her as well. One terrible night almost a year later, Amanda is shocked by news when her sister mysteriously disappears and is later found drowned beneath the ice that covers the lake. When Mathilda's husband comes home from the war, wounded and with troubles of his own, he sees that Amanda has taken charge of Ruth and the farm, taking care of everything with all she has left in her. Throughout the book, Amanda tells the story of her family very carefully and secretly hides from herself, and the audience, the secrets of her past and of that night.

Ruth, haunted by her own memory of that terrible night, grows up under the pressure and possessiveness of her aunt and gradually becomes more aware the things that happened in her childhood. Is it possible to ever deal with the trauma that she experienced? Will she ever be able to put it behind her and go on? Will she ever know the real truth? She tells her own story as she knows it but the truth comes out eventually.

Drowning Ruth was very touching. I found myself really focusing on the character's feelings. Everything that was happening to them in their lives seemed so real. The things that happened in the novel, were things that actually happen in today's everyday life, making Drowning Ruth very believable. This was the first Schwarz novel that I read, but this novel has convinced me to read more by her. I could hardly put this book down.

Christina Schwarz's used very vivid characters in this novel. You could see right through them and know what they were thinking before the novel even continued. The character's lives and the way they dealt with things were very different because of their difference in ages. That made the novel more interesting to compare the character's and how each faced things differently.

Schwarz has a very large vocabulary, although, her sentence structure made the words easy to figure out. This definitely isn't one of those novels where you need to sit by a Thesaurus to read it! Most of her words were full of emotion and compassion. Surprisingly, I understood everything she was trying to say through her character's.

This was Christina Schwarz's very first novel and she did an exceptional job! If you're looking for a novel that is impossible to put down and one that really gets your brain thinking and wondering, I recommend you read Drowning Ruth. Who knows? Maybe it will even bring about some emotions that you never thought were there. Regardless, Drowning Ruth earns 4 stars.


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