Stones From the River

Rating:
Summary: Simple stunning
Review: I read this book years ago and I still use it in conversation as a perfect example story telling. The principle charector is an "other" in a time when being different meant death or subjugation. It is the witnesses view of the well spring of great evil and the indolent denial that allowed it to fester and flurish. Our witness was just so different that she stayed under the radar of the watchers. If you ever wondered just how could they let this happen in a civilized society, this story goes a long way toward enlightenment. It shows the true face of the destructive nature of denial.
The story is entirly absorbing and heartbreaking. It also speaks the truth of how the meek could just inherit the world.

Rating:
Summary: Amazed at the hostility in these reviews!
Review: I usually try to avoid Oprah's picks for literature. After I finished She's Come Undone, I unknowingly picked up Stones without realizing that it, too, had Oprah's stamp of approval. The first few chapters--the ones dealing with Trudi's mother--bored me and I started to wonder why everything Oprah picked had to do with mental illness of some kind. Once I became engaged in this book, I could not stop reading it. I am amazed when I read other reviews by people who say that this novel is trite or that it's difficult to care about the characters. Not many Americans could relate the experience of the Nazi regime from the inside. Hegi stunned me as she gave me a clearer insight into World War II Germany (which my high school history classes failed at miserably). This piece works on so many different levels. Trudi's disability, if that's the word for it, is an allegory to which almost every other element in the novel can be compared. Stones connects a "biography," a story of a community, and a compelling account of a horrific time in world history. You don't have to care about Trudi, but didn't anyone feel for Alexander or Frau Abramowitz? I'm giving it four stars; Hegi lost my last star for making the first few chapters way too difficult to get through. But this book is definitely rewarding once you get into it.

Rating:
Summary: 5-stars for what?!?!?!?
Review: If you are reading all these 5-star reviews, be aware that not everyone out there found this book "superb" or "spellbinding" or any such nonesense.

I bought this book because I saw nothing but stunning reviews for it here on Amazon, which goes to show you can't always trust reviews. I thought there must be something wrong with me when, upon finally forcing myself to finish the book after about a month of starting and stopping, my only real thought was - "How can someone write a book about WWII Germany and the Holocaust where you just don't CARE if every person in the book dies?" I mean, that's rough to do! But I just kept wishing allied bombs would wipe everyone in the book out of existance so the torture could be done already! So I must be crazy, right?

However, turns out I may be crazy, but I'm not alone. I've persoanlly met at least a dozenother people who felt the only thing this book was good for was (a) kindling, or (b)insensitivty-creation training, or (c) valium-replacement.

So just BE SURE you want to plunk down your money for this one - maybe just buy a used copy if you're determined to avoid being too annoyed.....

Rating:
Summary: Excitingly moving
Review: Reading Ursula Hegi's book, Stones from a River, for the first time was excitingly moving. The book is told by Trudi Montag, a dwarf girl, a zwerg in a little town of Burgdorf, Germany. Trudi is isolated from the other people in town because of her physical difference. Trudi tells her story of her life and brings you through her struggles and high points and you travel with her feeling her pain and her happiness. But, it is because of Trudi's difference that she matures and learns about other people. Trudi becomes wise, and sees that she knows other people better than she knows herself. Trudi up holds her self values, especially when at a time during World War II when you did not have a choice. Trudi held true to her values and was very strong willed in what she believed in. During this horrible time in history she shapes who she is by reacting to the war and the persecution of people who were different around her. Trudi telling about her life keeps you intrigued and always wanting to read more. The story was compelling and a good construal of history. I would recommend this book to anyone who loves an excellent story to read with history in it.
Shana McMahon, a student at Mercy High School

Rating:
Summary: Unusual and unforgettable
Review: Some may say that it's too long and that it's hard to familiarize oneself with the charcter with whom many people don't have a lot in common. But no matter how long it takes to finish this book, you won't regret it and won't soon forget it. The main character is a dwarf, Trudi. She is born towards the end of World War I and lives through the horrors of World War II. It is a very gut-wrenching portrayal of a small fictional town and people in it. The descriptions of people's behavior during the time of Hitler are very honest and close to the truth, as I see it. But that is not what makes this novel great. It is the character of Trudi. She is not perfect -- she gets jealous; she curses people; she betrays trusts. But she is so real, you can practically reach out and touch her. She is the strength and the foundation on which this novel rests. And no other heroine in recent memory has been so unique and so real. Read "Stones from the River". I guarante! e that you will treasure it for years to come.

Rating:
Summary: Meghan from CT
Review: Stones from the River by Usula Heigi focuses on the life of a dwarf in Germany during the Nazi occupation. The author uses Trudi's love of storytelling and small town gossip to weave a story not only of the main characters life, but of all those around her. The begining of the book was slow but as Trudi grew the stories began to pick up. The presence of the Nazi's brings a historical element to the novel. I would recommend this book-but you have to trudge through the slow begining to get to the heart of the story. You ultimately get to see Trudi and all those around her mature into acceptance and understanding.

Rating:
Summary: A flowing saga, with nuggets of beauty
Review: Stones from the River deals with a heroine who is everything a heroine is not. She is a small sized person, a 'dwarf' as it were, not remarkably pretty and not truly bestowed with the milk of human kindness in all spheres like the heroines of romantic stories. Yet for me, she and the book are like a passionate love affair with life, feelings, honesty, brutality, beauty and redemption.
The book traces Trudi's growth from birth, seeing her mother turn crazy, her tribulations and triumphs due to her short stature. Trudi curses, abuses, gossips, has her insecurities, trades off her secrets and yet somehow you cant help admiring the gumption of this pint sized heroine. How she and her father help their Jewish friends during the holocaust, her wanton curiosity in luring men on the basis of false information, her tumultous inner world, her forthrightedness.
There are other players in the saga of Trudis stories...the unknown benefactor who blesses her town with strange gifts, the children of Trudi's youth who live out their own tableus, the lady who dresses her son as a girl, Leo, Trudi's father - truly a character to rival Atticus in To Kill a Mocking Bird. I think women will identify with the emotions that Trudi confesses to..the loss of a man, the strength of appearance, the solidariy of friends, the gain of ones esteem. Truly...a wonderful flowing river with enough beauty, like the stones in the river.

Rating:
Summary: Pure Perfection
Review: The first time I read "Stones From the River" was with my book club. I believe it was the only book we all categorized equally with "To Kill a Mockingbird" and "The Grapes of Wrath"
Yes, it was that good.

The second time I read it was for the pure pleasure of Hegi's words. Her powerful voice is translated through Trudi Montog, the main character. A German girl whom happens to be a dwarf (Zwerg) A misfit. Who hangs from doorframes until her fingers are numb. "Grow, grow!" she prays to an ineffective God...why else would he create her short, stubby, ugly, and utterly despicable.
But she was given a gift. The wonderful gift of story-telling. This will save her as humour saves the character in "A Beautiful Life" or at least made life tolerable.

In the midst of Trudie's battles, Hitler is rising. Slowly, like a cancer spreading. Jews are being taken from their homes, disappearing, losing their German passports, given a yellow star to wear on their chests.
Nobody believes it is really happening.
"They are only working at those camps." they say.

INDIFFERENCE is worse than anything. Indifference makes monsters grow.

"Stones From the River" is about the human condition during war. How it can sometimes turn us into animals, Intolerant of our differences. Hating one another because of them.

Who understands better than Trudie about the ugliness of being different...."They will find anything. Anything to separate one from another. Widows. Jews. Swergs. Madness. Hitler will find something."

"Stones" is not an easy read. I wanted to scream at times...WHY did you all let this happen? WHY?" And at the same time...the story was so beautiful, I carry some of the sentences around like jewels to savor later.

In the end, Trudie accepts herself as she is...too much has already happened to feel sorry for herself now.

..."And what to end the story with. It had to do with what to enhance and what to relinquish. And what to embrace." ...STONES

Rating:
Summary: Solitude and Diversity in World War II
Review: This book is a book about diversity, and the solitude it brings on. Trudi Montag is a dwarf -a Zwerg- and this condition isolates her from other people, who are not able to see the likeness that lies under physical diversity. But it is from her diversity that she can observe and understand life of other people better than themselves... the same as you understand happiness better when you are missing it... and in this continuous understanding, through the hurting consciousness of her diversity, Trudi becomes a woman with deep feelings and a particular wisdom... someone you really would like to meet.
Diversity. The book is also about the World War II and the vicissitudes of the Jews under the Nazism. Somehow this book makes understandable something that is really not understandable. It shows how such a thing could happen: because of prejudgements of some, the fear of others, the indifference and the too weak opposition of people who didn't agree. Since I live in a little village, like Burgdorf, I could easily tell which one of the inhabitants would behave like Herr Blau, which one like Herr Immers or Frau Weiler or Leo Montag... Things have not changed as much as we think. Crualty diminished so much in this years, but indifference grew the same rate...

Rating:
Summary: Made me a fan!
Review: This book made me a fan of Ursula Heggi. What a great writer with a gift for human interest. Beginning in pre-Nazi Germany, this story ends after the war and focuses on the conception, chidlhood, adolescence, and adulthood of a female dwarf and the keeper of the pay library. She knows just about everyone in her small town, and all the drama, triumphs and tragedies in their lives are detailed along with her own. Wonderful book!