Quickening

Rating:
Summary: A Lousy Read
Review: "Quickening" intends to be a moving account of a young girl's journey of self discovery, but instead I found myself marveling at how unsympathetic the main character was. Mandy is a dull, unattractive, easily-influenced, self-pitying dishrag. She mopes, she wallows, she has sex with anyone with a pulse and then wonders why it doesn't work out. To keep her company, the author has conjured up a group of equally abnoxious characters, including an obese, hypochondriac mother to a "Praise Jay-sus" country preacher. They're all red-neck grotesques, and though fans of Ms. Brown will most likely claim that they're "taken from real life," I suspect that they've been plucked from repeated viewings of Jerry Springer and "What's Eating Gilbert Grape." The last chapter is by far the best, but by then it's much too late to redeem this condescending, stagnant, and frequently scatalogical read.

Rating:
Summary: Quickening=A Quick Read
Review: A very compelling tale of the pain of growing up with (very) imperfect parents. I was absorbed and could feel the main character's pain even as I wanted to warn her to avoid it. Well drawn characters and a wonderful "journey through time" as Miranda learns major life lessons.

Rating:
Summary: A Character To Care About!
Review: Amanda Boyle finds herself at somewhat of a crossroads in her life. She is leaving for college and beginning a time in her life where she will no longer be dependent on her dysfunctional parents. As she begins to realize that her life is really just beginning, she thinks, "Every part of my life contradicts every other." It is the contradictions that create her story.

Laura Catherine Brown has created a character we truly care about! Mandy is not sure where her future is headed, but there are things she does know. She knows she does not want to follow in the footsteps of her mother, always complaining and never feeling well, physically or otherwise. She knows she does not want to go through life without feeling valued and loved, and the quest for fulfilling those requirements are the driving force of almost all of the events in her life. She also slowly realizes that by capturing the world with her camera, the things she sees (through her eyes and in her photographs) actually matter! Mandy starts to see that we all have contributions we can make to the world, big or small.

We follow Mandy from her first days at college that include experimentation with sex and drugs. We reel with her from the unexpected death of her father, and feel her pleasure and pain as she experiences her first love and the thoughts of an unwanted pregnancy. We root for her as she begins her first job, and ultimately breathe a sigh of relief when we feel that she has reached a point in her life where she is ready to build her own life, using her own strengths and talents. It is a milestone we all strive for at some time in our lives, but some of us never really reach it, due to daily obstacles that sometimes get in the way of reaching our full potential.

I really enjoyed this book, because I felt like Mandy was someone that I cared enough about that I wanted to know what happened to her. I look forward to reading future works by Ms. Brown. This book also has great potential for discussion in book clubs looking for an interesting coming-of-age story.

Rating:
Summary: A Character To Care About!
Review: Amanda Boyle finds herself at somewhat of a crossroads in her life. She is leaving for college and beginning a time in her life where she will no longer be dependent on her dysfunctional parents. As she begins to realize that her life is really just beginning, she thinks, "Every part of my life contradicts every other." It is the contradictions that create her story.

Laura Catherine Brown has created a character we truly care about! Mandy is not sure where her future is headed, but there are things she does know. She knows she does not want to follow in the footsteps of her mother, always complaining and never feeling well, physically or otherwise. She knows she does not want to go through life without feeling valued and loved, and the quest for fulfilling those requirements are the driving force of almost all of the events in her life. She also slowly realizes that by capturing the world with her camera, the things she sees (through her eyes and in her photographs) actually matter! Mandy starts to see that we all have contributions we can make to the world, big or small.

We follow Mandy from her first days at college that include experimentation with sex and drugs. We reel with her from the unexpected death of her father, and feel her pleasure and pain as she experiences her first love and the thoughts of an unwanted pregnancy. We root for her as she begins her first job, and ultimately breathe a sigh of relief when we feel that she has reached a point in her life where she is ready to build her own life, using her own strengths and talents. It is a milestone we all strive for at some time in our lives, but some of us never really reach it, due to daily obstacles that sometimes get in the way of reaching our full potential.

I really enjoyed this book, because I felt like Mandy was someone that I cared enough about that I wanted to know what happened to her. I look forward to reading future works by Ms. Brown. This book also has great potential for discussion in book clubs looking for an interesting coming-of-age story.

Rating:
Summary: A Fine Coming of Age Novel
Review: Everyone who grew up within the last three decades can identify with Mandy's struggle to leave home and discover herself. Brown shows the tremendous pull of first love, the temptation to lose oneself in the arms of a man, and the fierce will required to separate and become whole. Brown has a funny, lyrical voice, full of compassion for her characters. I loved this book.

Rating:
Summary: Vivid Characters and descriptive locations
Review: From the opening dialogue sequence, I knew I had in my hands a book that would capture my attention and capture my attention it did. I found myself eagerly turning the pages. Mandy's journey from child to woman was both painful and believable. Every last character sprang vividly into my imagination as did the descriptive locations. I'm looking forward to Laura Catherine Brown's next book.

Rating:
Summary: A quick read
Review: I finished this book in a few days and have mixed feelings about it ~~ none about the writing ~~ that alone was superb and carried the book ~~ but the characters set my teeth on edge. I wanted so often to shake Mandy and say ~~ look here kid, this is not the end of the world!! Then why are you making those dumb mistakes?? I felt despair often throughout this book ~~ through her choices and choices that others made, Mandy travels through life confused and lost. Between a selfish, self-centered and abusive mother, a father who died of a heart attack, her boyfriend Booner ~~ Mandy struggles with trying to find herself in the process of a cruel, harsh and unrelenting world.

If an author can make me feel this strongly about a character and have me make excuses for someone when I normally don't, then she deserves a 4 star ~~ but I must say that I will not add this book to my personal library ~~ because it was too intense for me. I didn't like the characters and oftentimes, felt like I was watching Jerry Springer live. We all make our own choices and should live by them despite the hard knocks we all get in life. Yes, Mandy had it rough growing up ~~ having a white trash family doesn't help. But she should have taken the help offered to her by her college roommate instead of running away. There is a lot of shoulds interwoven throughout this book ~~ and that is how life is. I didn't feel sorry for Mandy ~~ if that was what the author intended. I got tired of her excuses and found myself wanting to shake her and say, snap out of it kid. Wake up and smell the coffee! I have drawn my own conclusions of what happened at the end ~~ but don't want to spoil it for any potential readers.

I do recommend this book for any readers who are open to reading new experiences. Brown does do a good job of drawing the reader into her story. And you will question what you read. And you will walk away from the book with new ideas. And that is one of the highest compliments a reader can pay to the author. Even if we didn't like the book, at least the book made us think. Just for that reason alone, I'd recommend this book.

Rating:
Summary: Couldn't put it down
Review: I found this book about a smart but damaged young woman very absorbing. I loved reading about her evolution from child to woman, from daughter to person. The coloration of the other characters in the book was marvelous: quirky, varied, amusing, sad. The story reminded me of the journey taken by the heroine in "She's Come Undone," by Wally Lamb, from child of a troubled family to triumphant survivor. I started this book and just kept on reading until the moving ending.

Rating:
Summary: Enveloping
Review: I haven't seen this novel on bookshelves, but it is extremely well done and deserves some readership. It touches lightly on the mother/daughter genre/cliche, but explores the relationship in such harrowing, disturbing and emotional ways that it doesn't seem like something that has been done before. Expect to want to read this in a day - don't expect to feel "uplifted" as Douglas Glover writes in a review on the back of the hardcover edition . . . I found myself rather depressed, but it made me think - about my own previous relationships, about the difficulty in grasping who people are, and who you are, when you are caught up in the first waves of love.

Rating:
Summary: What a terrific writer!
Review: I loved this book. I read it a few months ago and I stil miss Mandy! This poor girl had her share of troubles and sorrows, and through her struggling, the reader witnesses her growth and her inner triumphs! While she makes some poor choices, I myself (and I would suspect most readers) can certainly empathize with her and understand, to a great extent, her motivation behind those decisions......she wants so desperately to be loved unconditionally! Ms. Brown does a wonderful job of letting you into Mandy's world, and letting Mandy enter your heart. I loved my time with Mandy and can't wait for this author's next offering!