Rating: 
Summary: One of the Best of the Year!
Review: Without a doubt, one of the best books I've read this year. Funny and compelling. So well written, that it makes you realize who poorly written most books are. Well deserving of all of the kudos and hype.
Rating: 
Summary: Overwritten; better than Sonata
Review: This one was too long by a good 100 pages, frequently tedious, and would have been much better had Franzen not been so occupied with being "writerly" (a deadly boring quality in an author). In too many places, Franzen seems to forget that he's telling a story, as he's too busy exercising his vocabulary. Frankly, I don't care how many five-dollar words he knows, or how cleverly he can incorporate them into complex sentences. They don't impress. I know five-dollar words, too, and lots of clever folks can produce verbal structures fit to make one's head swim. Sadly, Franzen's verbal acrobatics serve his image of Serious Writer more than they serve his story. In fiction, story is all, story is what truly matters, and it suffers here at the hands of etymology. Let's hope he finds a stronger editor next time, who'll tell him to just bloody well get on with it. On the whole, a disappointing read but an excellent sleep-inducer.
Rating:
Summary: I really don't understand why people like this book so much?
Review: I did not care for it at all. It does not have chapters and it switches from character to character at the drop of a hat. It is hard to follow and very scattered. It had a goood storyline but it just need to be sectioned up better. I don't think it should be called Amazon's book of the year at all. I have read many other books this year that definetly top this one.
Rating:
Summary: A Memorable Novel
Review: Like other great novels, The Corrections has such depth that, having read the book through once, it is fun to reread portions of it again and again to absorb the details that were missed on the first reading.The book opens in the gerontocratic suburbs of St. Jude. The gerontic theme manifests itself in Alfred's stubbornness and the last two years of his life, riddled with dementia, Parkinson's disease, and incontinence. St. Jude, one of the twelve apostles and the patron for desperate cases, gives hope to Enid's never ending attempts to correct her life. The setting is today. The events are myriad and fast moving. A neighbor getting rich on an insider tip. An early event involving his daughter that traumatizes Alfred, impacts his actions, but remains dormant until the end. A bio-tech IPO with a lot of hype that rises on hopes and falls in reality. Three Jeeps chasing the younger son in an SUV, one of the "workhorses of the warlord class." Email correspondence. Internet scams. A ménage á trois. The elder son's anhedonia. It is hard to put the book down.
Rating: 
Summary: The Disaffections
Review: Despite the glut of publicity and laudatory reviews, The Corrections is a dull, unimaginative story that certainly seems like Oprah fare. The characters come across as manipulated and utterly predictable. This book will be completely forgotten within a short time despite a likely movie version. Why is it that such mediocre narrative is the only thing pushed by the publishers? Oh yeah, they're all part of big corporations now.
Rating: 
Summary: I stand corrected
Review: My timing with this book was off by a day. I ordered it from Amazon after reading several early, obscure reviews. The day it arrived, Oprah picked it for her book club. Being a dyed in the wool book snob who tries to act like she's not especially when her own 15 year old daughter is reading Danielle Steele, I was secretly dismayed. Now, my book club wouldn't want to read it. Now, I couldn't discuss it with my sister.
But, I stand corrected. It was exactly what I hoped it would be. Engrossing, funny, complex and scattered. I learned way too much about chef's, Parkinsons and Liberia. Some of the characters were familiar, some I'd love to sit next to on a plane and others I think about from time to time.
You can lose yourself in this book and find yourself too. I don't know why Franzten dissed Oprah, I don't think he had a clue about "hell hath no fury.."
One certainly doesn't need a special "literary" IQ to read and understand this book. While you might need some biceps to lug it around, it speaks to anyone who's ever been in a family with a cast of characters. That's just about anyone. Enjoy.
Rating:
Summary: The Corrections Is A Waste of Eyesight
Review: "The Corrections" is ostensibly about a family dealing with the father's Parkinson's Disease (PD) related dementia and the progression of the disease. Instead, the book is actually about a totally dysfunctional family and the grown kids' sexual perversions and activities. It's a dark, depressing book that only lightly touches on PD. I have nothing positive to say about this book except that I positively would not recommend that anyone waste their time reading it.
Rating:
Summary: Tough cookie.
Review: If you're looking for an easy read, this is not the book for you.
Franzen's book is a sprawling, messy, riveting,long dive into a family that is almost certain to bear some resemblance to your own. Books like this don't come along every day.
Rating:
Summary: best book that I have read in quite some time
Review: As a writer, I very seldom read fiction. Most of it is quite boring and lacks imagination. Franzen has taken what is a basically hackneyed story (dysfunctional family) and fairly sparce writing language and created an excellent novel. I highly recommend it to anyone.
Rating:
Summary: Had to put it down
Review: A dreary, complaining story filled with whining, self-obsessed caricatures. "Exhilarating" or "spellbinding" it is NOT. Save your money.
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