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Sula

Sula

List Price: $25.95
Your Price: $16.35
Product Info Reviews

<< 1 2 3 4 .. 8 >>

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: Beauty and Innocence in MorrisonĂ‚Â¿s Sula
Review: I really enjoyed this book, and was quite surprised to read something so intriguing for a college course. Toni Morrison has such a beautiful way of describing not only common-place occurrences, but horrible tragedies. The novel is honestly disturbing, but some readers may find it terrible amusing...which is perhaps what makes it such a disturbing piece of fiction. Every character in this novel has a unique story, and the reader is also made to feel that even from characters rarely discussed. The town setting, which the narrator admits is little more than a neighborhood, has a story of its own. The tale of "the Bottom" is actually sad more than anything else, but holds a haunting beauty. And the characters all seem to carry a certain innocence. Morrison allows everyone to retain a surprising child-like purity. This is most evident example of this is the "deweys" who despite growing older, remain "forty-eight inches tall", since they remained boys in mind. Sula is arguably the "hardest" or least emotional character throughout the story. However, the reader may gather by then end that she is simply practical, and perhaps the only character who always remains true. Death is a definite theme in this book, and the ways in which characters bite the dust are shocking and fantastical. Once again, however, it seems that Morrison uses death not as an end, but as a renewal or return to innocence. In death Morrison allows her characters enlightenment of sorts, that may also touch others who still live. All and all, Sula is a thought-provoking work with amazing imagery and a story that I think everyone who reads it could relate to.

Rating: 4 stars
Summary: The last Oprah pick is another good one.
Review: When I first heard this would be the last Oprah pick I knew I had to read it. I am not the biggest fan of Toni Morrison but I was happy to have said I read this book.

Sula and Nel are childhood friends who grow up in a small town in Ohio and have a lot of things in common with each other. But each girl is different in there own ways. Sula is the meaner or the two and the more vocal where as Nel is the more quiet and laided back type.

As the years go by each girl makes a life for themselves. Nel decides to stay where she lives. She marrys and raises a family. Sula on the other hand goes and travels the country and is what people would call a rebel.

When Sula comes back she comes back and stirs up a lot of problems with the people in the town and makes herself to look to be a bad person. Nel on the other hand continues to live her life after what Sula has done to her.

The friendship in this book was wonderful and I loved how Toni Morrison put it all together and made such a wonderful book.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: Sula
Review: Toni Morrison's second novel, "Sula", is a wonderful piece of artwork that spans many decades, revealing the growth of the African-American society and the sentiments felt by those who have observed it.

"Sula" is like a duel novel, where we are told the story of Nel Wright and Sula Peace. They are women separated by differing outlooks on life and then reunited when they feel middle age.

Nel is our flat character, the one who remains the same; she is the "sensible" one, where she stays in her hometown and does what every African-American woman is doing at the time, being subservient to the rest of society.

Sula, however, is our tragic figure, the one who goes out to receive an education, who betters herself and refuses to see the gates that whites and blacks have put up for her.

It is a moving and powerful story, where there are so many vivid moments that make you want to cringe, to vomit (e.g. Sula slicing her finger), but this only adds to the splendor and magic of this novel. Although this is definitely not an original idea, for Nella Larsen did it in her novel "Passing", Morrison is working with controversial subject matter, and it is amazing to see her succeed at it.

"Sula" is a mini-epic that is bound to move the reader at the power of friendship and the bonds that these women share, even through the trials and tribulations of mid-twentieth century life.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: ooooohhh suuuula
Review: This is a generalization, but for most people, the movie scenes that cause us to cover our eyes are the same ones that make us inclined to keep watching the film. These same kind of passages are found continuously throughout Toni Morrison's Sula. Sula holds the same intensity and drama of a romance novel yet is written with the shocking talent of a Nobel Prize winning piece of literature. It is grotesquely beautiful and painfully honest, exploring the individual and mutual identity of two young black women growing up in the Midwest.
Morrison traces the lives of Sula and Nel , who are inseparable through childhood, barely able to distinguish themselves from each other. Their friendship is indestructible, until they suddenly take drastically different paths-Nel a path of small town domesticity, while Sula takes off to a wild life of college and city experiences. When Sula returns, they struggle to keep a friendship together despite their changed ways and lifestyles, deciding what is important to them-what is unforgivable and what can be overlooked.
This book is amazing, and worth reading simply for the beautiful writing, although the storyline does add to the appeal. It makes you question your own values-ideas of what is right and what is wrong, who is good and who is bad. It becomes clear through reading this that it is a fine line between these things, and that sometimes friendship is more important than morals.

Rating: 4 stars
Summary: Sula
Review: Toni Morrison, winner of the 1993 Nobel Prize for literature, SULA, her second book (THE BLUEST EYES 1st book). Uses many words to describe the many adventures two women have growing up together in the town of Medallion, Ohio in the 1900's. From childhood to adulthood separated at a young age, they go through crime and death as children and as adult's lead separate lives. Sula is a woman who tries to fight for her beliefs and Nel has chosen a life of love and glory.
As Gisele Toueg said "lyrical and gripping, SULA is a n honest look at the power of friendship amid a backdrop of family love, race and human condition." Sula moves away to go to college while Nel stays in medallion, Ohio, marries and has a child. When Sula comes back from college the bond between her and Nel never broke, as we can see here.
"Suddenly Nel stopped. Her eye twitched and burned a little. 'Sula', she whispered, gazing at the top of trees. 'Sula?' leaves stirred; mud shifted; there was the smell of overripe green things..."
Shadrack another character in this book played a large but laid back role. "At the edge of the porch, gathering the wisps of courage that were fast leaving her, she turned once more to look at him, to ask him...had he...?
He was smiling, a great smile, heavy with lust and time to come. He nodded his head as though answering a question, and said, in a pleasant conversational tone, a tone of cooled butter, 'Always'" Shadrack was a man who started national suicide day, he was a war veteran who lived in a shack.
"...The only black man who could curse white people and get away with it, who drank from the mouth of the bottle, who shouted and shook in the streets." This was Shadrack.
Toni Morrison uses her words like lyrical prose. Her descriptions are amazing. Toni has to be among one of the best writers out there

Rating: 3 stars
Summary: Twisted
Review: You can always depend on Ms. Morrison for unusual twists and turns. This novel was interesting, moreso for its poetic style than for the plot. You almost dreaded to know what would happen next. The ending was abrupt so say the least. I felt that there could have been much more to the story. Sula with a child maybe? Something. All in all still a decent book.

Rating: 4 stars
Summary: Good book
Review: POSSIBLE SPOILERS

This is the fourth book I've read from Toni Morrison (previous ones I've read were Paradise, Beloved, Song of Solomon). It's a great book about a story of two friends, Nel and Sula who go their separate ways after Nel's wedding and reunite after 10 years. I liked the book but I was a little disgusted on how Morrison likes to write about character's bodily functions in gory detail, which I deducted one star from the 5 star rating...hence the 4 star rating. Still, it's a good book.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: What a wonderful book!!
Review: I belong to a book club. This was one of the books selected. I was a bit skeptical at first. I can say that this was my favorite book that I have read in the club. We have read over 30 books so far and I am so glad someone picked this one. This is a treasure.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: Sula
Review: Toni Morrison's second novel, "Sula", is a wonderful piece of artwork that spans many decades, revealing the growth of the African-American society and the sentiments felt by those who have observed it.

"Sula" is like a duel novel, where we are told the story of Nel Wright and Sula Peace. They are women separated by differing outlooks on life and then reunited when they feel middle age.

Nel is our flat character, the one who remains the same; she is the "sensible" one, where she stays in her hometown and does what every African-American woman is doing at the time, being subservient to the rest of society.

Sula, however, is our tragic figure, the one who goes out to receive an education, who betters herself and refuses to see the gates that whites and blacks have put up for her.

It is a moving and powerful story, where there are so many vivid moments that make you want to cringe, to vomit (e.g. Sula slicing her finger), but this only adds to the splendor and magic of this novel. Although this is definitely not an original idea, for Nella Larsen did it in her novel "Passing", Morrison is working with controversial subject matter, and it is amazing to see her succeed at it.

"Sula" is a mini-epic that is bound to move the reader at the power of friendship and the bonds that these women share, even through the trials and tribulations of mid-twentieth century life.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: Her Best
Review: This is Toni Morrison's best book, and I've read all of them. It's also the best book I've ever read about female friendship. Thanks Ms. Morrison for a book I've savored all my life.


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