Rating: 
Summary: Funny but hard to read
Review: ...who finished this book thinking that Korda was a pompus twit with more money than good manners. His condesending observations of his neighbors left me irritated time and time again, as well as the name dropping and implied superiority of himself vs. the "lowly" country folk.
If you discounted the snide comments, the first part of the book was pretty interesting. However, the last 4 chapters became rambling and could have been condensed into one chapter.
It was great reading the reviews from the Hewitts on this forum. It made me remember that there are ALWAYS two sides to every story, and that Mr. Korda took some literary license in his book.
Rating: 
Summary: And I thought I was the only one...
Review: ...who finished this book thinking that Korda was a pompus twit with more money than good manners. His condesending observations of his neighbors left me irritated time and time again, as well as the name dropping and implied superiority of himself vs. the "lowly" country folk.
If you discounted the snide comments, the first part of the book was pretty interesting. However, the last 4 chapters became rambling and could have been condensed into one chapter.
It was great reading the reviews from the Hewitts on this forum. It made me remember that there are ALWAYS two sides to every story, and that Mr. Korda took some literary license in his book.
Rating: 
Summary: Better than A Year in Provence
Review: A model of English prose. Korda¹s account of country life is interesting, witty and enthusiastic. He has a keen eye for the people, places and things in rural Duchess County, New York. The book will remind readers of A Year in Provence. Korda¹s imagery, diction and grammar are outstanding. This kind of writing requires both talent and hard work. I especially recommend this book to anyone who appreciates the nuances of well written prose. It would also make a good PBS mini-series.
Rating:
Summary: Charming, thoughtful and hilarious
Review: Anyone who has ever owned a home older than he or she is will appreciate Michael Korda's hilarious ode to country living and good neighbors. City-folk and horse-lovers who go searching for a little weekend place close to the their horses' suburban stables, Korda and his wife, Margaret, fall in love instead with a huge, 200+ year-old farm house/inn on the wrong side of the Taconic, soon discovering that country living in a real-life farming community is not the city dweller's pastoral idyll, but rather a 24/7 struggle with the elements and ancient plumbing. This is no tale of a spoiled rich guy building a fantasy retreat, but rather that of two city people (although Margaret Korda is a farmer's daughter, she's spent her adult life living in London & New York) learning to live in the country and, in the process, coming to understand and care for both the land and their neighbors. Korda describes, not merely his and his wife's adventures in stop-gap renovation, but also the local characters and customs that make Pleasant Valley a community and gradual, increasingly willing assimilation of the Kordas into that local culture. Local characters include the unforgettable Harold Roe, a jack-of-all-trades who shows up on the day that the Kordas move in and with whom they eventually develop a relationship of mutual affection and respect, and Mrs. Bacon, who lives, along with her husband and children, in the Korda's home and, with rigorous professionalism, cares for the horses. While you won't stop laughing as you read this book (I especially enjoyed the parts about the pig auction, the first outdoor horse jumping meet and the nutrition-conscious houseguests who, having arrived expecting a weekend of luxury and entertainment, are greeted instead by a blast of pesticides from a plane spraying a neighboring farmer's apple orchard), you will also come away appreciating why Pleasant Valley became the Kordas' "home" and what "home" really means -- points that Korda makes humorously and indirectly but with passion and sincerity nonetheless.
Rating: 
Summary: A good, light summer read!
Review: Having read some of the previous negative reviews, I am impelled to say that I thoroughly enjoyed this book. It doesn't pretend to be more than a classic big-city-boy-moves-to-the-country memoir, with lots of hilarious anecdotes. Korda's experiences are not meant to instruct us; he simply shares his intimate, entertaining tales. The fact that the joke's on Korda much of the time (the pig auction, the hardware store, etc.)is part of the book's charm.I must admit that I enjoyed some of the name dropping, especially when the VIPs in question looked ridiculous (remember the Goldmans and their stuffed lion?).
Rating:
Summary: Laughed Off the Bed
Review: I bought this book as one of several dealing with moving to the country and what you'll encounter there. It was informative in that regard, but also surprising. It is incredibly funny. I was reading it at night and found myself laughing so much I almost fell out of bed. It is simply hillarious. Whether you are laughing at Korda or his neighbors is hard to tell, but there is a certain sweetness and regard for others suffusing the story. As a guidebook it is best for those with LOTS of money. I think I'll go into book editing. Korda appears to have inexhaustible supplies of cash and a very wry, but complacent, attitude toward parting with it. This book covers a period of about 25 years and, of course, the early ones are most interesting. It also offers a glimpse into the personal lives of what appears to be a most interesting couple. Whether or not you've read anything else by Korda, you deserve to read this...especially if you need a quick spirit pick-up.
Rating:
Summary: Funny but hard to read
Review: I don't deny the author's sense of humor. In general it's a funny book. But his writing skills hardly qualify him for an editor in chief of a major publishing house. Why? Because he tends to write very long sentences, wandering off in the middle. Very often when I finish a sentence I already forget what he was talking about at the beginning of it. I suspect he is trying to show off that he is English. In fact I get a very strong impression that he is a snobbish person, not very personable or pleasant, not the type of person you will like unfortunately.
Rating:
Summary: Korda Could Take a Lesson or Two from Thoreau
Review: I found this book immensely entertaining. I am delighted that Mr. Korda found the people in the country as enigmatic as I am sure they found him over the years. Pigs as pets, a Porsche and a monstrosity of a building for the horses could only have had the locals in stitches down at Cady's Bar. Mr. Korba is to be commended for the way he adeptly sidesteps local gossip and remains focused on those who work for him, creating a tale of country cunning written by the very man signing the checks. That his humor fails in certain parts of the text is understandable given the differences between the people of the town and himself. His irritation seems to increase every time someone refers to his house as the "old Hewlett farm" or the "old Hubner place". This is common in small towns, but probably not familiar to Mr. Korda. One need only to ask directions from a local to find out they call roads by names on signs long ago taken down and designate turns by where so and so kept his cows a while back. In his irritation, the author confuses the story therefore; I will take the liberty of clarifying it. First, the house Mr. Korda bought was never part of the Hewlett farm. The Hewlett family now owns a much larger farm in Northwestern New York. There are no trailers. In Pleasant Valley the "old Hewlett" farmhouse is the house two doors down from the "old Hubner place", or if Mr. Korda insists the "Korda place". The book alternates between disdain for the people of the town and subsequently trying to impress them. The author fluctuates between fencing them out, and waiting for them enamored of him. They are a tough crowd. As a former local, born and raised in Pleasant Valley, but living closer to the city, I can agree without hesitation that it is no Walden pond. It is full of people. People who do not post their land, or drive Porsches without waving, or chat about themselves at length. Thoreau did not buy Walden pond; he left it, undisturbed. Loons, ants and all.
Rating:
Summary: it will take more than a tuna melt to make Korda "country".
Review: I have to agree with the other reviews that this book falls a little short of the target. I disagree, however, with criticism that Korda focuses his ridicule on the country folk. I thought he poked equal fun at his various big wig guests from the city. What struck me, and why I can't give the book a favorable review, is that I'm not sure that Korda is aware that he himself is ultimately one of the saddest characters - naive, gullible, short-sighted and arrogant. The only person in the book who seems to escape having fun made of them is Mr. Korda (even his wife comes across as a beautiful 'get-what-she-wants princess). A little self depreciation would have gone a long way.
Take, for example, this final line from chapter seven: "The trick is to become just plain folks somehow, however you manage it - and if it takes the occcasional tuna melt, so be it". Lines like that inevitably indicate that Korda believes he is extraordinary, but for the good of the people around him, willing to stoop to the level of everyone else. That's why so many people are turned off by the book. The central character in the novel needs some development.
Rating: 
Summary: Conspicuous consumption in the country
Review: I love books of the city-dweller-moves-to-country variety, provided they are interesting, practical, humorous, and well-written. This book fails all of these, although I kept reading to the end, largely to see if anything of interest was going to happen. Basically, the book may be summed up as follows: our fearless protagonist, an eminent editor and author, buys a farm in the country. He hires the entire neighborhood to work for him in various capacities, lavishly redecorates his house, builds a house for one of his employees, buys a Ferrari to become "one of the guys," supplies his wife with endless numbers of eventing horses and pieces of farm equipment, builds an indoor riding arena (or rather hires someone to build one for him), and, in case you hadn't gotten the message, leads a nice life. His efforts at humor tend to sound patronizing, particularly when they are at the expense of his neighbors, and his fund of wealth is truly staggering. (I thought that it was only in Regency romances or Pygmalion stories that the heroine would receive a choice between a diamond bracelet and an indoor riding arena, but I was wrong.) The person whom I would most like to be in this book is his wife, who leads a life of wealth and privilege that passes belief. In spite of the fact that Mr. Korda is an eminent editor, the book was loaded with grammatical mistakes, some of which were so consistent that they cannot be called typographical errors. One example, appearing throughout the book, is Mr. Korda's use of "that of," which is supposed to replace the possessive. But the possessive remains. For example (not a quotation, but an example of what I am talking about): "the horse was grayer than that of Mr. Korda's." This phrase should read: "the horse was grayer than that of Mr. Korda." I plan on passing my copy of this book on to someone else. Mr. Korda does not need any more royalties.
|
