Rating: 
Summary: Disgusting and Repulsive!
Review: I was very repulsed by this book! I did not like the way that it glorified homosexuality and made it sound like it was alright! If I had not been forced to read it for a Literature class, I would have put it down somewhere around the 2nd chapter. The book started out with an interesting plot with exciting characters, but by the beginning of the 2nd chapter it began to go down hill. I would never recommend this book to anyone to read. It is a waste of time and is by no means a book that challenges the mind. It only pollutes the mind!
Rating: 
Summary: Rollins does justice to Baldwin
Review: I'm reviewing the audio version of this novel after having read the unabridged version. Like the reader from Detroit, I was puzzled by some aspects of the audio abridgement (notably the conclusion), but unlike that reader I didn't think it detracted seriously from the flavor of what remained. I had doubts about whether an introspective writer like Baldwin could be a candidate for an audio book, but Howard Rollins made the text come alive. We can only be sorry he didn't record more of Baldwin's books, for Rollins' voice reveals the depth of his understanding of Baldwin's characters and emotions. There's a reason a book is considered a classic, and Rollins makes clear why this book has endured. Perhaps some listeners will be motivated by this recording to seek out and read Baldwin's other novels; if so, treasures await them.
Rating:
Summary: Overrated . . . I'm disappointed
Review: I've heard nothing but great things about this book, but now that I've read it I can't imagine why. The prose is dull, the characters lifeless and interchangeable, the philosophies and dialogue juvenile. The novel as a whole is overwhelmingly racist and, now, dated. I fail to see how anyone who has read great literature, especially great African American literature, can respect this book.Don't waste your time. There are books out there that can change your life or the way you think. This is definitely not one of them.
Rating: 
Summary: passionate, gripping, muddled
Review: In my opinion the first third of the novel contains some of the best writing in contemporary American literature: urgent, and gripping. This is the story of Rufus, a Black jazz musician living in New York City. Once this tightly written character makes his exit, however, the novel loses its momentum. Baldwin does not create a gradual buildup of tension and emotion. Instead he leaps almost immediately into a bellowing peak and stays there all the way through the conclusion, an ungraceful pace that brings to mind a recording by Celine Dion or Michael Bolton. This is a novel that could easily have descended into kitschy melodrama, and it's a tribute to Baldwin's talent as a writer that he somehow weaves enough subtlety and complexity into the characters and events to maintain some sort of balance. Some themes are reoccurring: knowing and seeing vs. willful blindness, friendship vs. betrayal, art as a profession vs. art for its own sake, and the impassable chasm of the racial divide. Other themes are less clear, especially when it comes to love. All of the characters in Another Country burn bright, and they love in a way that is all-consuming. No one writes love and sex like James Baldwin, and these scenes make an impact. The contradiction comes in the casual disregard for fidelity that these same characters show. Is Baldwin making the point that love, when so passionately felt, is an overwhelming burden that chases the lovers into other arms? Is it that we as humans are afraid of happiness and that we seek to destroy situations in which we truly would be happy? Is it that love is a weak bond next to the relentless persecution of the outer world? Looking at the characters and their actions, none of these explanations seem to stick; the reader simply ends up feeling jerked around, in that the emotions and passions narrated in the thoughts of the characters are so very often directly contradicted by the same character's actions in the very next scene. The one theme that seems to clearly emerge is one of victimization. Baldwin paints a world in which no one is responsible for their own actions, and all of the characters see themselves headed towards their destruction. The characters feel helpless to steer their own fates, even to control their own violent and destructive actions (towards themselves and others). This isn't just a self-fulfilling prophecy - they don't destroy themselves simply because they believe themselves destined to fail; Baldwin actually seems to create a world in which no one can win. This conclusion struck me not only as bleak, but as a bit wrong-headed. Another Country has a five star opening and a three star follow-up. There are passages of brilliance throughout the book, but I finished this wishing that Rufus's story had been told as a novella or a short story, and that the exploits of the other characters in the last two thirds of the book were left to the imagination of the reader.
Rating:
Summary: Genuine, Heartfelt, and Enthralling
Review: It isn't often that, while reading a book, I stop and put it down, having been truly affected by what I have just read, so much so that I feel a desire to stop time, and live in just that chapter, that paragraph, that line that I have just read. While reading 'Another Country', I found myself doing this time and time again. The suicide death of one character leads all the rest to explore their own theories of what lead to the act, as well as their own feelings about that character, and even about themselves. A mixture of black and white, educated and non-educated, well-to-do and poor, talented and average, each of them is greatly affected by the death, and what follows. Some friends become lovers, some become enemies. An interracial relationship is formed, forcing each to examine the rage, biases, hatred, and prejudices against the other's race, and their own, that they never really knew existed inside of them. While largely about racial tensions, and an examination of how blacks and whites, men and women, view one another, the book also explores many other themes; the theory of an innate bisexuality that exists in all of us, and the desire to explore that as an extension of love that we feel for someone, regardless of their gender; the cause and effects of jealousy; the intensity of love, longing, and guilt; and the consequences of betrayal. James Baldwin manages to remove each character from all race and gender labeling, and bring them to their most elemental form: human. Flawed, feeling, passionate, caring humans. 'Another Country' is a book that I hope will stay with me for years to come. Each character, each setting, each conflict is painted so vividly that all are someone, somewhere, something that you have known. Emotionially gripping, honest, and sensual, this is a book I highly recommend.
Rating:
Summary: Captivating story
Review: James Baldwin has done it again! This is another one of his many literary masterpieces! In "Another Country" he weaves the lives of the characters into a rich and mesmerizing tapestry. Basically to summarize this book, a jazz musician commits suicide, leaving the people that loved him left to speculate as to what drove him to it, while ultimately forcing them to reflect upon their own lives and who they really are. This is a very powerful book that will leave you spellbound. But more importantly it makes one feel for these people, whether it is devotion, sympathy, pity or anger. The story is so gripping that it pulls the reader into the lives of the characters and gives us insight into drives them to behave as they do. Their stories are compelling and painful: the last days of Rufus' life, Ida's anger over his death, Vivaldo's battle to make Ida love him, Eric's memories growing up in Alabama and Cass and Richard's seemingly perfect but ultimately flawed marriage. The characters are so vivid they seem to just step right out from the pages: Vivaldo, Ida, Cass, Richard, Rufus and Eric seem so real it's as if they truly exist! This is a highly recommended work of literary art! Also recommended are James Baldwin's other novels, "Giovanni's Room", "Tell Me How Long the Train's Been Gone" and "Going to Meet The Man", which is a collection of short stories.
Rating:
Summary: Perhaps his best book & a great gift for the enlightened
Review: James Baldwin is in my opinion the greatest writer of the late twentieth century. Another Country proves it. The passion that is so richly concentrated in this book can only be described as powerful enough to change your view of the world. An excellent gift for enlightened friends.
Rating:
Summary: Still relevant today
Review: James Baldwin was a man who was able to capture the essence of so many aspects of life because he actually lived them. Homosexuality, racism, alchoholism, and being an American. Another Country is just as much a reality check for the United States today as it ever was. And reality is very hard for most people to deal with. I had my book club read it and no one could finish it because it was so disturbing to them, all for different reasons. I read it twice. I have never read a book, put it down and just said "YES!"
Rating:
Summary: Amazing
Review: James Baldwin's "Another Country" is a powerful book that attacks issues of race and love from an extremely different angle. I have never felt prejudiced against homosexuals, yet, I never quite realized all sorts of things that this book tackles. It broadened my perspective and it allowed me to step in the oppressed's state of mind and brought fascinating questions forward. I suggest this book for people with an open mind towards what love really is, but I fear it would revolt close-minded bigots.
Rating:
Summary: A Deep and Emotional Experience
Review: Like many of the other reviewers of this book, when I began to read this book I truly believed my mind to be as open as it could be. 400 pages later, I was on my way to a whole new spectrum of thought and perception about racial and sexual identity. This book made me cry 10 or 15 times and I became so attached to all of the characters that I found myself scouring the internet when I finished in the vain hope that Baldwin had written another book that picked up the stories of their lives at some point in the future. Unfortunately, it seems as though he did not, but that's life...a snapshot of time that means whatever it means to anyone who happens to observe it in action or in history. This book really taught me something about love, hate, struggle, and really gave me my first opportunity to view the world from the eyes of a gay African American man. No book could ever capture that experience fully, but this one at least gave me an idea of what it might be like, and I found myself as drawn into the allure of exploring a completely different lifestyle as much as the characters inside were.
I absolutely loved this book and it definitely had a positive impact on my life. I'm sure that sounds cliche, but it really did teach me more than a thing or two about human beings and gave a great snapshot of the '50s, much like On The Road by Jack Kerouac, but from a very different perspective.
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