Rating: 
Summary: Outstanding, page turner
Review: I couldn't put it down--you won't be able to either. Enjoy!
Rating: 
Summary: Wow.
Review: This book is an amazing journey through the life of the main character, Delores. This book tackles serious issues such as rape, divorce, body image problems, and more. I think the most important message one could gather from this novel is the affect of childhood events on an adult. We see in this book that Delores' troubled childhood leads her to an even more troubled adulthood.
Rating: 
Summary: worthwhile reading
Review: I'm not surprised by the polarity of reader responses to this book, given the horrific nature of many of the events that are crammed into its 460 plus pages. And I can see the validity in many of its detractors complaints....the three main sections the story is divided into don't always feel congruent, making it hard to get a handle on the main character or become involved, in an emotional sense, to the outcome of her journey. At times it feels, as another reviewer skillfully phrased it, "so 90's", half-baked pop pyschology packaged as deep literture. The characters catapult, sometimes awkwardly and unconvincingly, through almost every socail issue imaginable, and the strained PC undertones (or, more accurately, "overtones") can be a bit much. Additionally, the also afore mentioned Forest Gump like narrative style, where the novel veers into a mere overview of the pop culture and significant political events and social movements of the second half of American life in the twentieth century, at times feels gimmicky. Like many other readers, I felt there were staggering flaws in the authors sense of symbolism...what did all those whale methaphors mean exactly? What was going on with Dolores in her pool "reparenting" sessions? Was the author mocking that style of therapy, or applauding it? I know it was supposed to be something deep and moving, but I didn't quite "get it".However, all these frustrations voiced, there are strong elements of this novel that can't be denied. The writing style is engrossing, one can manuever through this material easily and rapidly. At times, there is geniune suspense over what will happen to Dolores, at other times the foreshadowing is so over the top the author clobbers you over the head with it. Unlike many of the readers, I did find there to be genuine humor, albiet dark and sarcastic, to balance out the tragedies. In fact, I felt the rough edged humor of the main character was a perfectly believable result of her experinces, as well as an understandable defense mechanism. No, this womans life is not always cheery, a number of unpleasant, even repulsive, events occur for her. She is, at times, snarly, unlikable, weak, and stupid. But does a lead character have to 100% angelic to make a novel good? Perfect people with perfect lives...sounds pretty dull to me, and not like the life experince of most people I know. Dolores is at times completely immersed in and blinded by her own sense of self pity, but she utimately makes a life for herself complete with love, compassion, and a sense of peace with all the adversity that she encounters, both at the hands of others and by her own misguided actions. There is growth, moving and believable, that occurs in this book, with some dead on insight along the way. Much like it's heronine, its an at times frustrating, unbalanced, but ultimately lovable complilation that battles a dark worldview but emerges triumpant.
Rating:
Summary: WOOHOO for Wally Lamb!!
Review: This book was an awesome read!! I did have to force myself to read it at times. Although the ending rocked!! Dolores Price is such a strong woman; she went through so much. I could visualize every moment in that book. Wally Lamb does a superb job of creating a picture of Dolores for the readers. This book is long, but good. (I'll have to take a break and read Lamb's other books before I tackle this one again!!) I had to read this for an english independent novel assignment, and I am so glad I did!!
Awesome for mothers, daughters, sisters etc
Rating:
Summary: Maudlin
Review: I want to find Wally Lamb and demand that he give me back the 10 hours of my life I've lost forever, foolishly hoping that the next page would bring some respite from this woman's victimization. It's not that I don't believe that this many horrible things could happen to one person; it's that I find it impossible to care when the protagonist spends so much of her time beating the readed over the head with JUST HOW MUCH she's suffering and JUST HOW MEAN almost everyone is to her. The first third of the book is pretty engrossing, because you think you're meeting a little girl who's had a rocky childhood (who hasn't?) and is going to learn to meet life's challenges head on. Instead, you begin to see the tragedies coming her way like a train miles and miles before she actually gets hit. I wanted to reach into the book and throttle her, thus ending both our miseries. And ...the whales?!...COME ON!
Rating: 
Summary: Hard to get through this one, too much whining
Review: I found this book very difficult to get through. The main character -- who has obvious mental instability -- has a life that gets worse page by page. Then, not only does she whine about it, continuously I might add, she does increasingly stupid things so that her life only ends up even more pathetic. Finally, when I got to the point where I thought.... "Okay, she's hit rock bottom, she can't do anything else stupid," she starts getting too conceited to treat decently the ONE person in the whole book who reaches out to love her and wants a life with her. Amazing. I had been recommended this book by a few friends, and was very, very disappointed. I kept thinking this woman should have been put in a mental institution -- which happens -- but never let out.
Rating:
Summary: An amazing journey
Review: Not very often does a book pull me in to the point where I can't put it down for anything. I have read on my lunch breaks, 15 minute breaks and even snuck peeks at it while I was at work. Delores is a wonderfully written character and an inspiration to anyone who has ever battled a weight problem, rape, the loss of a parent or loved one, or fallen in love for all the wrong reasons. I found myself relating with her as I read. Which to me is the sign of a good book. When you feel like you know the character personally it means the author has created a work of art. I have passed my copy on to people who I think need it. However, I always make sure to get it back because it has a special place on my bookshelf.
Rating:
Summary: A brilliant opening gambit, undone by wincing melodrama.
Review: The opening section of Wally Lamb's charts the childhood of one Dolores Price, a slowly fattening girl whose father leaves the family for a young mistress and whose mother takes the divorce in a way that lands her in the mental hopsital. Delores moves in with her grandmother, and later the mother returns, and the intricacies and interactions between three women are as funny and insightful as can be written. Delores is rebellious and unwise, while her mother is weak and jittery, and the grandmother is an old-style, wear-nothing-on-your-sleeve woman so driven so inward she's of no use when it comes to good, honest advice. Lamb is brilliant in drawing these flawed women, all of whom are incapable of expressing the desires in their heart for anyone to hear. The mother and daughter are in fact capable of wild happiness, but weak in front of men because of it. This is a story you can settle into. Then one traumatic event occurs, and it is planned for. Lamb prepares us for it, and deals honestly with the aftermath. The second traumatic event is out of left field. And from there, the book begins to slightly derail, becoming more and more simply a tour of personalities, more than a capturing of life. By the time we've reached Dolores' husband Dante in the second half of the book, we're just about ready to get off the ride. By then it's pretty clear that Lamb is using Dolores in a popular, recent technique started with Forrest Gump: as a vessel, of sorts, to tour the past generations with. There's the moon landing, free love, AIDS, Nixon, the stilted academic movement of the 1970s, the newfound use of rebirthing as a mental therapy -- Dolores is a kind of witness to these things. She loses her mooring as a full-bodied person and becomes more of a stock protagonist. It's too bad. The section you'll essentially want to skip is the period Dolores spends in the mental hosptial (Lamb summarizes his way through it, because he knows it's not very exciting) and, specifically, these rebirthing session she spends with a doctor he calls himself his new mother. Yeah, it's funny, but it goes on too long, and as a reader I didn't really bargain to have to go through it, only to see Dolores emerge on the back end just as screwed up as she already was. We know that because she hooks up with Dante, a ludicrous English teacher who deserves, we can see quite quickly, every bad piece of luck he can get. Lamb draws Dante as one of those horribly unforgiveable preening jerks, braggish and petulant at the same time, and faux intelligent to boot. He gets his comeuppance in a very pleasing scene for the reader, but his character is a drag. It's hard to say what happened to Lamb in this book, why the book suddenly flies off into "burden of the week" category. I mean, is it necessary to have one woman: 1. Have her parents divorce.
2. Have her mother die.
3. Be raped.
4. Have sex with a woman
5. Spend time in a mental hospital
6. Hook up with a creepy husband who then has an affair with a student.
7. Have an abortion. I mean, a few, maybe. But all of them? It's just too much. The only thing missing is a tornado or something.
Rating:
Summary: I could not put this book down!
Review: I read everywhere, during my lunch break, my 15 minute breaks, at the gym I could not put it down. Dolores reminds me of women I have known before, stubborn in their unhappiness, and content just being miserable. I fell in love with Mr. Pucci. The characters are real and come to life within every page.
I recommend this novel to all young women.
Rating:
Summary: Undone, Unraveled, Untied, are you ready to enter in?
Review: Suspense, death, real life situations, threats of suicide, and insane asylums make She Comes Undone a top rated book. Wally Lamb does a wonderful job portraying Dolores character. I did not pay attention to who the author was until I was flipping through the book and caught a glimpse of a man's picture, I was astonished to say the lest that the author was a man. This book travels through Dolores life from around age eight to age twenty-five, showing how much one person really does change through the course of their life and also how much of the person we were when we were eight will still be with us when we reach the ripe old age of ninety-ninety.
Our first encounter with Dolores is with her mother, watching two delivery men bring in their very first black and white television, courtesy of her father's "boss" or how others may say it, mistress. (Who knew the foreshadowing taking place with the television by the author, since television becomes such a huge part of her life later?) Dolores seems like fairly normal little girl but the reader can tell that her life must not be as it seems because trouble must be lurking around the next corner. We enjoy of few pages of normal life in the Price family but soon the bomb falls, Dolores mother loses her full term unborn baby tragically and everything stable in their lives comes undone. Soon Dolores picturesque portrait of life in the good neighbor hood, with expensive cars, backyard pools, and childhood best friends goes up in flames with the news of her parents divorce. She turns almost immediately to hating her beloved Father for leaving her all alone with a mother on the verge of a nervous breakdown. After it is decided her mother cannot take care of her anymore and needs to be put in a place to help her focus on the will to keep living, Dolores is sent to live with her grandmother in Rhode Island. Her Grandmother is like a rose, inside she is truly beautiful but she is also covered with many painful thorns, which can wound anyone who gets to close. Time goes on and Dolores's mother comes back to live with them, ready to live but still very fragile. Dolores is now in the teenage years and just about to fall into a downward spiral. She become very close friends with the man from the apartment above her and then her trust is broken in a man once again, when he rapes her out of the blue one day. From that point on she becomes a very inside person, she does not talk to kids at school, she barely glances at her grandmother, and only shares a few words with her mother from time to time. Dolores's only companions become television and her beloved sweet candy and soda. As she nears graduation her mother pushes her towards attending college and Dolores fights her with every once of energy she can muster and it seems that Dolores will win but something horrible happens and she feels as though she must attend college even if she does become a failure, she must try. She goes to college and tries to play a person she is not and only traumatizes herself even more. She meets many different people and is introduced to her first love in a very unique way. Although, people are mean, and they almost push her off the deep end but thankfully she is saved just before and placed in an asylum where she spends seven years getting a new handle on life. When she re-enters the world, she is a different person, still naïve and scared but now she has the will to survive and thrive. She still makes mistakes but in the Dolores Price makes it out on the top.
Wally Lamb did a wonderful job with this story, almost every page makes you try to read even faster to find out what is going to happen next. Every aspect of Dolores personality was there, there was nothing left to explain or question, it is as if the reader is able to enter into her and while reading the book actually becomes Dolores. He deserves as much credit for this book as he can get. If you are looking for a book and are ready for a truly eye opening experience, try She Comes Undone, you will not be disappointed.
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