Rating: 
Summary: Borrow this book( if you must )do NOT buy it!!!
Review: I waited all summer to borrow a copy from my local library, and I'm glad I did. This book isn't worth the paper it is printed on!!!As a historian I am very interested in the plight of slave women. So, when I heard about this book I was looking forward to it. I must confess it is a good idea, if it had been done right. But this book was not written by a woman who knew what she was doing nor was able to take on such a challenge. Looking at the first couple of pages I found the print and margins were very large. I thought this was to take on the appearance of a diary. I was wrong. The publisher did this because the author didn't give a lot of detail and had nothing to say so they had to make the book look bigger then it actually was. The writing was poor and simple. I wonder if the author had connections because if an average person would have written this book it would NEVER had made it to print. The book did not flow and at times I felt as if I was reading a young child's attempt to write a book. No, I take that back, a young child could have written better. If you wish to read about slavery in the south read: Aint I a woman? This is a great book. Also Cecilia: a Slave girl, is a really interesting story of a true event that is very horrific and sad.(But its not about the south)
Rating:
Summary: How dare they insult gwtw
Review: How dare you insult such a wonderful classic novel. On behalf of Margaret Mitchell I say "Frankly my dear I DO give a damn." (...) Scarlet would be ashamed as would Rhett, Suellen, her father, mother, Mammy, Frank, Ashley, Melanie, and everyone else. You are degrading those characters and the story. First of Mrs. O'Hara wouldn't allow those types of servants to work at Tara, she is not low like that. (...) So don't buy this book a (...) immature parody, but buy "Gone With the Wind," the best book and movie ever made in the history of mankind. Thank you very much... all who dare buy this parody of such a beautiful, emotional, and couragous story of a young women growing up the in the South during the Civil War (...).
Rating: 
Summary: Like Watching a Soul Grow
Review: This is no more a parody than Wide Sargasso Sea is a parody of Jane Eyre. To advertise the book as a parody is to do it an injustice--people who want a laugh, or even people who want another romance novel--aren't going to understand the book. The diary format makes it seem as though you get glimpses into a person's conscious and unconscious mind, at intervals. The character grows a lot, even though she starts out knowing what Gone with the Wind is pleased to airbrush out. That is, the book begins in anger and ends in something larger. It's a small book, sometimes poetic. It was a new point of view for me into that world in transition between slavery and something else.
Rating:
Summary: Feminism a step ahead of Scarlett O'Hara
Review: This book is especially zingy for those of us who memorized GWTW when we were young teens, but got more and more uncomfortable with the racism in the novel as the years went by. But "The Wind Done Gone" isn't about racism, per se; it's about feminism. Just as Scarlett was ahead of her time, so Cynara takes us beyond the "token" feminism of working and flouting social mores to understanding one's self as a victim of and contributor to society's often crushing pressures to conform. Randall's writing is conversational, captivating, and often brilliant; her depiction of an introspective woman is relevant to any time or place (just like Lucy Snow in "Villette," by Charlotte Bronte). Scarlett's charm lies in her defiant refusal to think about her actions as they reflect or affect the society in which she lives; Cynara's provocativeness lies in her inability to do otherwise. "Cindy" is what Ms. O'Hara might have been if we'd known her at age 70. I love them both. Read this! It is not a cutting, disrespectful, sarcastic perspective on GWTW; it's a revisionist retelling in the spirit of "Wide Sargasso Sea."
Rating:
Summary: Don't Waste Your Money
Review: If I could give this a zero I would, since I have found no redeeming qualities. Granted, I am a GWTW fan, but the fact that Ms. Randall could exploit another person's thoughts, words and ideas is outrageous. Not at all insightful, with no depth. For anyone with any knowledge of the characters in Margaret Mitchell's epic, it is blasphemy to think that Mammy killed three of Gerald and Ellen's children, that Pork actually poisoned his previous owner, that Mammy drugged Ellen to make her sleep with Gerald... I could go on and on, but I don't want to. Instead of using this opportunity to truly show another view of life at Tara, Ms. Randall takes away the charm of these characters as they appear in GWTW. They lose the three-dimensionalism and reality that they were created with. You can read about the research Margaret Mitchell did to ensure the historical accuracy of her novel -- just what did Ms. Randall do, except poorly piece away at the monsterous chip on her shoulder? This is not a parody, this is not a piece of literature. This is an example of someone with no ideas of her own trying to mooch off of the fame of a classic. I was originally angry that the Mitchell family did not fight harder to prohibit the publishing of this "book," but I now realize that they had nothing to defend themselves from -- no one could possibly think that this is a threat.
Rating: 
Summary: The wind done gone out of her sails
Review: After reading this book, I was left wondering what the author was trying to do (in relation to the preceeding and far-surpassing work "Gone With the Wind"). Was she, I wondered, trying to bank off another writer's superior creativity and fame? Who knew - I certainly didn't. Then I heard her explain herself on National Public Radio, and I realized she's a revisionist. Apparently, Mrs. Randall has a problem with "Gone With the Wind" for its racist undertones, as well as the way it portrays blacks in menial fasion. Guess what, sports fans? That's largely the way things were in that time and place. And since when is it abominable for art to reflect real life and times? That old classic IS an old classic because it truly portrayed a time and period; it was also well-received because it was original. Because Mrs. Randall's book meets neither of these criteria - accurate portrayal and/or originality of thought - it will never be a classic. Not even close. And the cardboard, stock characters don't help matters, either. The wind done gone, all right, and it took any shred of literary integrity with it. Hope this helps. --Brandon
Rating:
Summary: The View from the Other Side.
Review: This book is a book that you either love or hate. There is no middle ground. For the most part its a book that many people will say "how dare Ms. Randall question the people who are part of the Tara legacy? People, this is a book about a slaves on a plantation. It just so happens that the plantation is part of a American literary history. To assume that the slaves did not have a story to tell is to assume ignorance. It's another perspective, that's all. The book may not have the literary prose of Ms. Mitchell, but as a black female, I get what was beneath Gone With The Wind.
Rating:
Summary: Alice must be kidding!
Review: Long a lover of Gone With The Wind, I was most anxious to read this "parody" of that most loved book. I quickly bought from Amazon.com, receiving the book very soon. First, I was astonished at the size, only 210 pages, with very wide margins, all this in a 6 X 8 1/2 inch book. (Heck, I can write longer letters than this....) But as I read I went from interest to sheer boredom, very quickly. The idea was wonderful, but Ms Randall missed the boat by making it so short. She should have developed the characters, and should have provided so much more to her readers. Much sturm and drang about Mammy, not enough about "Other", nor "R", too much about "Garlic"... Come on, Alice! You can do better than this! Sit down and rewrite the thing, only this time spend a bit of time! Summation: Much ado about nothin'!
Rating:
Summary: Don't Waste Your Time
Review: This book was barely readable. Thank goodness I got it from the public library. Trying to keep up with the characters from Gone With the Wind and matching them to the characters in The Wind Done Gone was difficult. I wish Ms. Randall had left well enough alone. Her account of the Slavery South left much to be desired. Maybe just in her mind a slave was cunning enough to "persuade" a white man or woman what to do. However, that is just not what our ancestors knew about. Had a slave been able to persuade or con his/her master, Black folks would be in a lot better place in society today. This parody is a farce.
Rating:
Summary: Boo!
Review: It is compeletly a piece of trash! This so-called "author" doesn't know how to write. A 3 year old could write this book!
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