Rating: 
Summary: Must Read!
Review: This is a beautifully written book that everyone can relate to. Nuala O'Faolain takes us into 50 year old Kathleen's life and her search for love, knowledge, and forgivness. By interweaving two different faiths in two different times, O'Faolain takes readers on a captivation journey and sometimes causes you to pause and take a look at your own life.
Rating:
Summary: Exquisitely Written
Review: "My Dream of You" is a totally honest book, so much so that it hurts to read it. There is not one word that is wasted, there is not one thought that is not so pure, so well described, and so TRUE, that it causes the reader to stop breathing for a moment. O'Faolain's great talent is the way she draws the reader in to worlds that should be alien, but somehow feel familiar, eg, Ireland during the Famine. This talent was evident in her memoirs, and is equally strong in this fictional narrative that I suspect is drawn straight out of her own life. Indeed, it matches her memoirs in many aspects, and it is hard to remember that this is only a story. O'Faolain skillfully weaves together two narratives in this book--one tragic love story from the time of the Famine, and one very modern tale of a woman trying to come to grips with aging and all that implies, from the terror of losing her sexuality to the fear, felt for the first time, of being alone. The plot is secondary to the inner thoughts of this incredibly strong and independent woman, Kathleen, as she faces her own inner weaknesses. This is a book well worth reading, and keeping. It is one that I read very slowly, in order to savor every word.
Rating: 
Summary: Solid writing
Review: To be honest, I meant to buy her memoir, which I think I would have liked more. The writing is very solid, and the story of Cait's life is interesting, unresolved and delivered in pieces to keep you going. My problem was just that this is not the type of book I read. While I loved identifying with the 50 year old woman who doesn't quite fit in and never has, I have a much harder time with the almost Harlequin sex scenes and the book she is writing about aristocrats and their servants about drove me nuts. Especially, when she was switching chapters between the narrator's story and the book she was writing. All that said, I still think I will pick up her memoir soon.
Rating: 
Summary: A 50-year-old views passion, hunger, the need for love.
Review: Kathleen de Burca, a single, middle-aged travel writer living alone for twenty years in the same basement flat in London, finds her whole life changing when her closest friend and confidante dies very suddenly. Her loneliness is overpowering, her desire to leave her job and try a new kind of writing is growing, and as she faces the age of fifty without a family or any lover, she remarks soulfully, "I have to get old...I have to watch the [irresistible passion] in me dying....This is the hardest thing; and no one warned me." Possessing the court transcript for an adultery trial from the 1850's, Kathleen decides to return to Ireland for the first time since she left home, thirty years before, to look for more information about the case and perhaps to write about it. She is puzzled by the irony that the apparently unrestrained passion of the "affair" took place during the depths of the Potato Famine, when hundreds of people on her husband's estate perished of hunger, their deaths made even more miserable by their forced evictions from their homes. She is also open to a passion of her own. Kathleen de Burca is an unusual protagonist for a love story by virtue of her age alone, and few women will be able to resist her attempts to find direction for her life, with or without a lover. Skillfully alternating Kathleen de Burca's search for meaning in her own life with her discoveries about Marianne Talbot, the famine, and emigration, O'Faolain creates a flawed and realistic main character trying to find connections within the mess of her life--the Irish roots she has abandoned, friends and lovers she has thoughtlessly hurt, and ill-considered choices she has made. Lush (sometimes too lush) descriptions of the Irish countryside alternate with dry court documents and testimonies, time alternates back and forth across the 150-year time frame, and hunger and passion are seen through the dual points of view of Kathleen de Burca and Marianne Talbot. This is a big, enjoyable story of love and passion as seen by both a young wife and a woman in her 50's, leading to new perspectives and new considerations of their roles in our lives.
Rating:
Summary: A good read for any woman 35-100
Review: My Dream of You was not only an entertaining story, it provided a poignant insight into historic Ireland and the dilemmas and dreams (yes, there are some left!) faced by middle-aged women. I found the story at once depressing and inspiring, reminding me that even though I'm "getting up there" my life is by no means over yet and if I am going to get anything out of the rest of it I have to "do the active thing." The only drawback I found was that I had to be able to read with little distraction as Kathleen jumps from decade to decade and back again at every turn. Cudos to Nuala O'Faolain. Well done.
Rating: 
Summary: Disappointing
Review: I couldn't wait to read this book because I enjoyed Nuala's autobiographal effort so much. I actually found the novel disappointing and almost embarrassing at times. The central character Kathleen is a bit of a dag, whiny, self obsessed, humourless. The other characters just don't come alive somehow. The plot is predictable and plodding. The sex scenes are cringe making. I guess it really lost me when Kathleen's middle aged lover leaves his false teeth on the bed. More detail than I needed, Nuala.
Rating:
Summary: Lovely but a Little too Long
Review: I adored the postcript to "Are you Somebody" and took "My Dream of You" out of the local library as soon as it was published. I really enjoyed this book, never found it boring, even relished a certain messiness about the writing, a careless joy is what I'd call it. My only critique is that it went on a little too long and didn't flesh out the historical story within the story fully enough. But highly recommended nonetheless.
Rating:
Summary: my dream of you
Review: Just like her first book, Are You Somebody?, this book is an easy read that is both comforting and entertaining. I love the way O'Faolain writes and how she keeps passion and love in the center of her books. It is a touching and personal book about a woman trying to figure out the mystery of love. A great book to keep by bedside.
Rating:
Summary: Depends on what you're looking for...
Review: I'm a big O'Faolain fan, but this book suffered by being way too long. I found the plot to drag, our heroine living a life a bit too surrealistic, and no all-absorbing element to suck the reader in and keep her/him reading. Being cheated on the Talbot story was perhaps O'Faolain's biggest crime! This was built up to be a pivotal part of the plot, but was never delivered. I was disappointed by this latest, but hope that others find it better than I did. Try Thomas Moran's _Water, Carry Me_ if you're looking for a great Irish romance with enough twist to keep you turning pages.
Rating:
Summary: A big satisfying read......
Review: I read the first chapter of this book online and then knew I had to read the entire book. O'Faolain has created a character that is real and complex. The type of person you'd enjoy to have as a friend. I enjoyed the intertwining of the story of Talbot scandal and Kathleen's own growth and discovery as she returned to Ireland. I believe readers of Maeve Binchy novels would also enjoy this book. Very satisfying.
|
