Amy and Isabelle

Rating:
Summary: Slow going at times but good.
Review: Although I enjoyed the overall story, I found the author to be a bit too detailed in some of the settings. Just made for slow going at times. There were some issues which left me feeling unsettled. I felt that either the climax was understated or simply left hanging. If you enjoy this novel, you would probably enjoy the quirky writing of E. Annie Proulx in The Shipping News and Post Cards.

Rating:
Summary: A gift from a new author!
Review: Absolutely wonderful book. What fiction is all about. Strout explores the intimacies of this mother and daughter team. Amy and Isabelle love each other enough to hate each other. The author perfectly balances every emotion.

Rating:
Summary: On & Off
Review: This book was on & off. At some parts you just wanted the book to end and at others you could hardly put it down. It was an interesting story with lost of twists and turns but needless to say was definately a first book for the author.

Rating:
Summary: Great characters, good reading
Review: I enjoyed Strout's treatment of her characters in this book. Beyond the title characters, she made several other people come to life. I especially liked Fat Bev. Everyone could benefit by having Bev in his/her life-she is a nurturant, kind and wise soul. Tracy, Amy's best friend, served as a counter point to the consticted lifestyle Isabelle imposed on Amy and herself.

Rating:
Summary: Moving, realistic portrayal of mother-daughter relationship.
Review: What a wonderful book! Elizabeth Strout's descriptive prose is so vivid that I could practically smell the river by the mill. The characters are almost heartbreakingly real: a confused teen experiencing love for the first time, a resentful mother who feels life has passed her by-any mother or daughter will surely be touched by their interactions. Amy and Isabelle was as much of a page-turner for me as my favorite suspense thriller and it's sent me in search of Strout's short story work.

Rating:
Summary: Intricate, magnificent, lovely
Review: I want to know if readers think that the Professor killed Debby Kay. He had the "slight southern accent" that was revealed on the call where Amy found him after the discovery of the body. The obscene caller to Amy had the "southern" accent. What gives here? Was he the guy whose murder of Amy was interrupted by Isabelle's boss?

Rating:
Summary: Boring characters make for a boring read
Review: Sorry to contradict other readers but I found this book a chore to get through. The characters were one dimensional and when the secrets that ought to be transformational are revealed it turns out to be a non event. This book validates a reader's rule I've created that says you can't make a compelling book out of boring characters. You also can't show lives being lived out by repeating the same interactions 100 times. Maybe real life is like that but one purpose of fiction is to make real life more engaging. I did read the whole thing just to see if I could find what other's had seen in the book but it never got better. Sorry.

Rating:
Summary: Moving,painfully accurate in evoking choices and regrets.
Review: Such a genuine story, full of the complexities of a mother-daughter relationship built on need, guilt, loyalty and resentment. Strout keeps the story flowing so tightly that each sentence grips the reader closer and closer to the action, as though you are there, witness and participant both. Superb dialogue,and unforgettable characters.A breathtaking first novel.

Rating:
Summary: Anne Tyler, Anna Quindlen, Beth Gutcheon: You have company.
Review: I went to high school with Liz Strout, so imagine my surprise when I saw her picture in Newsweek magazine along with a review of Amy and Isabelle. When I read the book, it was through the lens of familiarity and recognition. And yet I believe that anyone who was ever fifteen, who has ever lived through the glorious awareness of self that comes with first love, who has ever experienced the painful realization that one's mother is not perfect, will experience the very same gasps of recognition and familiarity. Ms. Strout's images are searingly beautiful, poignant, sometimes funny, and always accurate. I have passed the book to other women in my book discussion group, and each one agrees that this book will endure as an example of the best that contemporary fiction can offer. Anne Tyler, Anna Quindlen, Beth Gutcheon, you have company!

Rating:
Summary: Outstanding first novel
Review: Her writing and storytelling often reminded me of Virginia Woolf. It is a complex novel in that we come to know the interior lives of two separate people...Amy and Isabelle. I marvelled at how the author kept both stories distinct and separate, as their lives were distinct and separate, and she showed us the places where they overlapped and touched one another. It left me speechless.