Rating: 
Summary: Flashes of brilliance dimmed by excess
Review: This book took me a long time to finish. I had a love/hate relationship with it. There are flashes of brilliance which hit me hard in the heart, but the flaws and wordiness tend to diminish those.Things I liked about this book were the depiction of Michael Sr. and Corinne. I hated both of them. Their characters were well written by Oates. His obsession with fitting in at the country club, then his repudiation of his old friends when he gets acceptance, only to fall lower than his Wolf's Head Lake crowd. Corinne's initial attempts to save him from his alcoholism, ultimately failing, as he follows his own demonic drummer. Corrine accepts that her husband is, in fact, really just her oldest child, and makes the fatal choice to protect him. I admired Oates' depiction of this chilling choice. The cruelty of Marianne's schoolmates and the other people in town after the alleged rape were well defined; how former friends avoided the mighty Mulvaneys. The wolf-packing together of the perpetrator's friends, willing to lie to save their buddy infuriated, but also seemed true. Oates' description of Muffin creeping away to die were heart-wrenching, particularly since this was the sole support Marianne had for years. Her unwillingness to let go of the only source of love in her life for her hard exile years, was poignant. However, there were a lot of things about this book I did not like. The ending was ridiculous. After spending so much time on the one event which tore the family apart, we are expected to believe everyone was making nice-nice at a reunion. We have a bunch of new characters thrust upon us, and no explanation thrown in at the end. The mother prevails at the end, grown to an attractive and successful woman. No redemption there. Marianne, too good to be true, forgiving everyone, not holding a grudge for being more poorly treated by her parents than she ever was at the hands of the teenage boy. Running to apologize to her selfish father in the hospital as they whistle for her like a dog. What an unsatisfying resolution! There were just too many loose ends. I am not sorry that I read this book because of Oates' flashes of insight, bordering on brilliance, but it is hugely flawed. It did, however, make me feel all kinds of emotion, and did make me think. For that, it was worth reading.
Rating: 
Summary: Ouch, such a painful read!
Review: ...
This was just like a made for TV movie, complete with bad actors, an unlikely scenario and severe depression (with a half-baked after-thought "happy ending" that came much too late for relief). Boring, overly descriptive, long, and most of all DEPRESSING!!!! Joyce Carol Oates, never again! I'm glad I didn't take your English class at Princeton.
Rating: 
Summary: A BOOK THAT YOU CAN APPRECIATE IF YOU HAVE STRUGGLED
Review: I HAPPEN TO HAVE FOUND THIS BOOK VERY INTERESTING, TOUCHING, HAPPY, AND DEPRESSING, ALL AT ONCE. I TRULY LOVED IT, AND FELT VERY CONNECTED TO THE CHARACTERS. OATS USES SUCH GREAT DESCRIPTION THAT I CONSTANTLY WOULD RELATE THE CHARACTERS TO MY EVERY DAY LIFE, AND I LOVED IT. I RECCOMEND THIS BOOK TO ANYBODY WHO HAS GONE THROUGH FAMILY STRUGGLES, BECAUSE IT IS A GREAT BOOK, AND VERY EASY TO CONNECT TO.
Rating:
Summary: Another Oprah Book Club selection that was JUST okay
Review: I did read reviews of this book before buying it and thought I would like it even though some reviewers gave it 3 stars. This has happened before and I sometimes love those books. This time was different. I, unfortunately, have to agree with other reviewers that only gave it 3 stars. One of the biggest problems with this book is that sometimes you forgot that the youngest son, Judd, is narrating this book. It almost seems to go back and forth between characters. This can be kind of confusing, especially because they don't really do alot with Judd's character. He doesn't have a very big role as he is quite a bit younger than the rest of the family. Another thing that was disappointing was never really feeling connected to any of the characters. For a moment or two, you do feel a bit connected to Patrick, the "smart" one. For another moment, you really want to try to like or even dislike the mother. But you never quite are brought there. And as for Marianne, the only sister, I just thought this character was just too underdeveloped and not very interesting to read about. The main plot revolves around what has happened to her, but you really are left empty. I guess I just didn't feel too much for these characters. And definitely couldn't relate to the circumstance that supposedly tore them all apart. The father just seems to turn into a different person and never quite finds himself. I don't want to give anything away, so I'll stop there. The end is okay, but kind of reads like the rest of the book. Not very interesting.<
Rating: 
Summary: A Family Overstressed
Review: Did you ever wonder how your family would cope with a personal disaster, like the death of a child or a serious disability of a parent? Or did you ever wonder what was actually happening within your neighbor's house, to the family that lived across the street, a family that seemed to the world to be doing just peachy? In "We Were The Mulvaneys" these issues and others are explored in the setting of a "normal" American family in small town upstate New York. We meet a blue-collar father eager to make the leap to country club respectability, a boisterous mother running a cameo antiques business and basking in the reflected light of her children's accomplishments. The children include the recently graduated high school football star, the intellectual science student and the popular and outgoing cheerleader. In material science you stress a metal in a measured fashion until it breaks; it is only in the breaking that you learn its strength and mallability. Joyce Carol Oates chooses the daughter's rape as the stressing event and the fourth son, a verbal boy in junior high, as the narrator. The plot unfolds slowly, sometimes too slowly, with interspersing "family stories" to absorb some of the shock of the events. The anecdotes give color, humor and realistic detail to the book, but render it harder to follow. We watch each character's respond to the event. The father's brawls with the high school rapist boy and his father, never gaining the satisfaction that he defended his daughter but instead being overwelmed by the feeling that the townspeople are withdrawing from and mocking him. The mother is at first clueless to her daughter's anguish and ultimately sends her away, blaming this poor victim for her father's delusions. The oldest brother leaves home to join the Msrines, the middle brother fixates on bringing justice to the family by punishing the rapist and the youngest brother is there to passively record all of this. These people, in their so-called family, are so self-centered that they can't communicate their feelings and are powerless to comfort the girl. There are several levels of tragedy in this book, as these people play out their characters, some growing to adapt to the events, others being destroyed, or worse yet not changing at all to them. One reeal tragedy is that the raped girl must wonder why her parents have withdrawn their love from her. There is an optimistic ending, but I was left wondering if the next generation of Mulvaneys will do any better when they are stressed by their life's catastrophies.
Rating: 
Summary: Not my cup of tea
Review: I think this was one of those books that you either loved or hated, and I definitely did not love it. I just found the family so despicable in their handling of such a delicate situation, and although I'm sure this kind of thing happens far more often than we'd like to believe, that doesn't make it any easier to take. In my opinion, it started off well, and then just dragged incessantly once I got halfway through it. So it wasn't just the subject matter - if the writing had been different, I would have found it much more palatable. I'm sorry I bought it.
Rating:
Summary: [Spoilers] Reading this is like being dragged through sludge
Review: ....then suddenly hosed off and set out in the sun. This is a profoundly depressing story with an unbelievably happy ending. Lots of unexplained changes of character in the characters. Why did such an apparently ideal father and all-around nice guy suddenly banish his beloved daughter from his home and life? Why did such a caring mother let him do it? How did a highly focused, introverted, antisocial boy-genuis become a therapist and loving family man? It seems like there might be several missing chapters in this story. I will give the author credit for developing a wonderful sense of place. I felt like I knew that farm, and the selling and leaving of it was believable enough. Every time I read one of JCO's novels, I promise myself never to do it again. And I've done it again!
Rating:
Summary: Boooooring
Review: I have discovered that I am usually disappointed by the books recommended by Oprah. This book is no exception. It was so boring I could not finish reading it. It just went on and on with the only highlight being the "tragic event" that happened.
The story reminded me of the type of material that you see on a made for TV movie...
Rating:
Summary: The Mulvaneys ended too soon!
Review: This incredible book appears to be grossly misunderstood by many of the negative reviewers...if anything, it falls short by seeming to finish too quickly and with not enough detail! How did Patrick's heart change so quickly, bringing him back home? How did he meet his girlfriend? How did the traumatized Marianne manage to marry and have children without much therapy? How does Corrine suddenly pull herself together and find happiness and financial success? How can they all go on making the same huge mistake - not communicating? The best review I read stated that, while it took hundreds of pages to get to the complete distruction of this sad family, the author gave us a quick twenty pages of "happily ever after" wrap-up. There is so much more to be explained and described, which is the only negative about this marvelous book. It is shocking that so many readers did not "get" the book. It is even more appalling that so many readers judge a book by how it compares to their often limited experiences and understanding of life. They don't like what the parents did so it is a "disgusting" book!
The Mulvaney family experience is tragic, shocking and heart-breakingly real!
Don't read this book if you "get bored" easily, only appreciate lots of quick and simple dialogue, and don't appreciate great description and details.
The story of the Mulvaney family will be painful to read, but that pain is why Oates is one of our great authors!
Rating:
Summary: A long days journey into a family's problems
Review: While the actions of the father in this novel may seem bizarre by today's standards, the time in which the story takes place was one in which very different attitudes prevailed. Generally, I appreciate vivid and detailed description in literature, but in this case, I do feel Oates takes it to an extreme for many readers. On the other hand, it is up to the reader to decide whether or not to read every single word or to pass by the descriptive pages that are not immediately essential to the understanding of the story and the motivations of the characters. The value of this book is totally in the eyes of the reader and his or her ability to identify with the characters on any level. My response to this novel was mixed. I found much of it too predictable. The author gave some things away that could have been foreshadowed more subtly.
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