Amy and Isabelle

Rating:
Summary: Real life at it's best
Review: Amy and Isabelle is a novel about real life and real people. The writing is lush and descriptive. I could vividly picture the settings. It's a book full of atmosphere. A few other Amazon reviewers thought there were too many red herrings in the plot. I think those things are what made this novel REAL!! Real life is not always wrapped up in a neat tidy package. It's messy and sometimes things are not resolved. If you want resolution try Leave it to Beaver.

Rating:
Summary: Reminded me of Peyton Place
Review: Amy and Isabelle was an engaging read. I devoured the book in 2 sittings. I'm struck by the similarity to the 1950's novel Peyton Place. Amy and Isabelle are remarkably like Constance and Allison McKenzie, the mother and daughter in Peyton Place. Another similarity is the many characters in the (New England!) town(s) that are interspersed through both novels. But Strout isn't as melodramatic as Metalious, and her characters have more warmth and humanity. I wish her continued success as a novelist.

Rating:
Summary: Ugh
Review: Dull,disappointing and dreadful. I was quite surprised at the favorable jacket blurb from Alice Munro, one of my favorite authors, who does this sort of thing ever so much better. The author obviously sat down and wrote out a plot, then marched her cardboard characters through it -- it certainly does not develop naturally from their characters and conflicts between them. Also many red herrings and pointless diversions as other reviewers have noted. The author also has a tin ear for dialogue; some of the conversations between Amy and her best friend could have been better written by a seventh grader. Buy Alice Munro instead!

Rating:
Summary: Boring...
Review: My book group just read this book. Most of the members really enjoyed it, but I didn't. I agree with the reviewer who said the story line just never took off. I guess the focus of the book was meant to be the relationship between the mother and daughter, but I even found that a bit dull. I found the author very descriptive, but could have done a better job with character development.

Rating:
Summary: I'm not letting my 13 year-old daughter read this book.
Review: My daughter knew that I had awaited this book's publication and that I devoured it in one evening. The steamy setting of Shirley Falls and the vividly drawn characters charmed me but also alarmed me. Nearly all of the women in the story are hurt by the predatory and fickle men they desire. Their only consolation, it seems, is in female friendship and sympathy. It's a great book, I told my daughter, but you can read it later. Much later.

Rating:
Summary: almost, but not quite
Review: Frankly, I was disappointed in this book. It got good reviews and I felt like it was a good story idea, but the characters were all so unlikeable. Amy, the daughter and one of the protaganists has no depth to her character. All we seem to know about her is she has pretty hair and hates her mom. Her relationship with her "best friend" Stacy is pointless and entirely based on cigarettes and relentlessly talking about their parents as assholes. Very tiring. I know it's been awhile since I was in High School, but I know I had more meaningful relationships with my friends than this stereotypical picture of teenage angst. Isabelle, the mother, is equally unlikeable, but at least provokes sympathy because her life is so pitiful. Although I ultimately found this novel very readable, it was so irritating that I sort of wanted to throw it away when I finished. I would recommend this to friends, but only so we could discuss how annoying Amy and Isabelle were.

Rating:
Summary: I was very disappointed in this book.
Review: I found the characters shallow and one dimensionable. This tired plot has been written many times and the outcome was too predictable. I found the end totally improbable. From all the hye, I thought it would be a better read.

Rating:
Summary: HATED IT
Review: I was waiting for the story to begin. It never did. I was truly disgusted by the only in-depth description in this story; the disgusting affair between a minor and an authority figure.

Rating:
Summary: Thanks to amazon customers for their strong reactions.
Review: It's most gratifying for an editor to see that a book he has published--especially a first novel that he had great faith in--find a home in the hearts of real people outside the business of publishing. I and Random House are most grateful for the strong comments here--the demurrers as well as the encomiums, since no worthwhile book has ever pleased everyone, just as no dish is for everyone's palate. (Out of self-defense, I must say, in response to one reader's comment, A) thank you for the praise for my editing and my own writing but B)I did work--very hard--with Elizabeth Strout on the editing of "Amy and Isabelle.")amazon and its customers have helped to make this book the success it has become, and author and editor are grateful for the attention.

Rating:
Summary: Promising but disappointing.
Review: After seeing this book recommended by the Today Show, I have to say I was more than slightly disappointed. For a first novel it had a lot of promise, but I could tell the author was more of a short story writer. I had hoped for a more powerful conclusion. What happened to the teacher? He seemed to be the murderer of the young girl. I wanted to see the loose ends tied up. It let me down.