Rating: 
Summary: How this book won an award, I will never figure out!
Review: I was patient, waiting, for something to happen in this book and nothing did. A story about a woman who got married, had kids, joined a garden club and died. Boring!!! Worst book I ever read! Other reviewers have said they can't get this book out their minds, I can't either, it was so bad. Now save your money!
Rating: 
Summary: an engrossing path through one woman's life
Review: Using fictional family trees Carol Shields fully develops characters so real and rich that, with the help of some old photos, her tale belies itself as a biography. Convincingly real, the characters are born, live and die with time pulling at one's heartstrings, causing laughter to erupt from oneself and keeping one's eyes glued to the page for each event that could happen in daily life, expected and unexpected. Shield writes with a flowing stream of consciousness that parallels the flow of daily life. The sentences and paragraphs connect in such a way as to the minutes and hours of each day. The Stone Diaries is an easy read, so fluid and unpretentious. Following the life of one woman Carol Shields is able to form the settings, the time and the histories around her character in a seamless fashion. A good book for a sunny day, a train ride to a special place or in a favorite chair by the fireplace. Not an extraordinary book, just a solid fictional story with good feeling and a constant flow of intertwined stories around the life of one, interesting woman.
Rating: 
Summary: Haunting
Review: Recommended to me by both my mother and my sister, I can't get this book out of my mind. Carol Shields pulled me into Daisy Goodwill's life immediately, forcing me to care for a woman I wasn't sure I liked until the very end. But more than that, Shields offers insight into every phase of womanhood and seems to have an incredible sense of what it means to be human. I will never forget this novel
Rating: 
Summary: The test of time
Review: There are times, when reading a book, I find myself thinking "this is just great!" And sometimes it IS great. Other times distance provides perspective. My book club keeps a list of the books we've read. I like to look back on the books a year later and ask "do you feel the same way?" I enjoyed this book as I read it, but I didn't think it was "great". I thought it very readable. I didn't think the technique always worked. I wasn't totally captivated by the character and her story. I wasn't burning to know what would happen in her life. It was pleasant. A nice summer read. Now I am looking back on the book to see if it has stood the test of time. And I find it an utterly forgettable book. Obviously my tastes are not in sync with that of the Pulitzer Committee
Rating:
Summary: The Stone Diaries
Review: I loved this book. It was beauitfully written and heartfelt. I would recommend this book to anyone who wants to read something worth reading
Rating:
Summary: A good story flawed by clumsy technique
Review: This is an engrossing story of the life of an ordinary woman from birth to death. The book succeeds very well on that level, but the author's over-ambitious use of many techniques is clumsy and flawed to the point that the flaws interfered with my full enjoyment of the story. The narrator of the book is the main character, but the viewpoint shifts between first and third person frequently, in the middle of sections, and without apparent rhyme or reason. When in the third person, the tense also changes between past and present apparently randomly. Some of the most important transitions in the lives of the main characters occur "off-stage" and therefore seem unmotivated. One character changes from a reticent small-town stonecutter to an outgoing succefful businessman and another recovers from a major depression with no explanation, leaving the reader wonder wonder how? and why? The narrator was present during both transitions and would know what happened. Some of Shields' techniques are more effective. For example, Daisy is called by various names during the course of her life, reflecting her various roles. This leaves the reader wondering "Who is Daisy?", which is just what the author intended. I enjoyed the book, but I wonder why it won so many prizes..
Rating:
Summary: Brilliant and Hilarious
Review: Who is Carol Shields and why is she not writing more?!! Although somewhat disjointed because of the book's diary structure, this book is an absolute masterpiece of storytelling, well-deserving of the Pulitzer. I could easily read this book 3 or 4 times and enjoy it each time
Rating:
Summary: A magnificent foray into four generations of a unique family
Review: Have you ever given much thought to your mother? Ever wondered who she really is, or who she was before she met your dad? The Stone Diaries is a magnificent foray into four generations of families spawned by the union of Mercy Stone--a quiet, heavy woman who, abandoned at birth, would not live to name her only child--and Cuyler Goodwill, a young quarry laborer who discovers in Mercy a love so profound that his life is touched forever.
Cuyler and Mercy's daughter, Daisy Goodwill, becomes the focus of author Carol Shield's intense probe into the relationships between mothers and daughters, husbands and wives, friends and relatives. Shields' seamless transitions between narrators--and between time, reality and the inexplicable musings of the mind--subtly give us permission to consider these relationships from our own perspective, and, in so doing, to bring this extended family to life.
In The Stone Diaries, Carol Shields has revealed a level of comfort with the written word that is all too rare in today's fiction. Her treatment of life's rewards as well as its injustices does not stop short of a full, honest examination of the truth. We aren't told of Cuyler's heart attack; instead, our limbs stiffen and freeze with his. We don't watch Daisy's husband love her; rather, we feel both the weight of his body and the depth of her unspoken despair.
I closed The Stone Diaries today with a sigh. I wondered what my mother must have been like before there was me. What does she still want out of life? Does she know what she means to me? Perhaps...
perhaps I ought to ask.
Rating:
Summary: A really good read.
Review: This is a fantastic book. For people who relate to the
verities of life, this is it. The travails of Daisy
Goodwill Flett and her family's generations is unfailingly
riveting. The opening scene is her birth, the closing
scene her death. The interspersing of letters between
characters is endearing. The very citation of chapter
titles indicates our intimacy with this woman. A really good read.
Rating:
Summary: Pulitzer Prize? I don't get it - Glad to be done with it
Review: Read the other reviews for descriptions of the book. I can't say I didn't enjoy it, but my overall feeling at the end was perplexed, sad, and relieved (that the book was over). I was perplexed over the photos and family tree (thanks to the other reviewers who confirmed all that was fiction). I was sad about the overall commentary on Daisy's life - why? As a Christian I am sad to think that this is how people feel about their lives. I don't see a point to life unless there's something more and Christianity is mentioned at various times (along with many other topics) with no depth and certainly not understanding. The only hope to life as I see it is through faith in Jesus and belief in what He said - that there is more to life than this life and what we do here has a point and purpose - Daisy's life has no point, other than to just carry on and keep going. I could go on and on, but I'll spare you. When I read a great book, I feel a real disappointment when it is over. When I finished this I was just RELIEVED it was over - I had had enough of the pointlessness and futility of life. I don't think I should have to have a reader's guide to understand a book - I've read a zillion books in my day and when I read a great book I've got all kind of thoughts on what was in it. I think I'll skip Pulitzer Prize books from now on.
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