Rating: 
Summary: Under developed characters
Review: The character development was poor and insufficient, almost like the author tried to disguise the identity of them. As far as what was there, it was accurate, from my experience with people suffering from a bi-polar disorder but I wouldn't look here for any great insights. Worth a read if you don't have anything else handy because it is a fast read, but I've read short stories that were better thought out.
Rating: 
Summary: Excellent book, couldn't put it down!
Review: The most significant strength in the book was the characters. Each character seemed so real and so full of emotion that I felt I was really seeing the story unfold from a first-person point of view. The way each chapter ends makes you want to read on and find out what events will surface next in the jumbled lives of the Barnes family. I strongly recommend this book to all readers!
Rating:
Summary: A Sight Better Left Unseen
Review: This book chronicles a few years in the childhood of a young girl named Hattie whose mother is a severe manic depressive. Unlike other children, Hattie and her brother, Freddy, operate more as caretakers than as children. They watch their mother and act according to her state of mind for that specific day. Pearl, the cook and maid, acts as surrogate mother, nurturing the siblings with care and love as they grow older, something their mother has never been able to do. Pearl also acts as guardian to the mother, keeping her from leaving the house in a frenzy when she is manic and from killing herself when she is depressed. Although this book was easily read in a day, it was disappointingly bland and somewhat anti-climactic. I can't place exactly what it was - it just didn't build up to a page-turning "what-will-possibly-happen-next" mindset and I grew bored and apathetic towards the end which is highly unusual for me. I would recommend it as a good, thought-provoking, informative book on manic depression but certainly not as entertaining fiction.
Rating:
Summary: A Sight Better Left Unseen
Review: This book chronicles a few years in the childhood of a young girl named Hattie whose mother is a severe manic depressive. Unlike other children, Hattie and her brother, Freddy, operate more as caretakers than as children. They watch their mother and act according to her state of mind for that specific day. Pearl, the cook and maid, acts as surrogate mother, nurturing the siblings with care and love as they grow older, something their mother has never been able to do. Pearl also acts as guardian to the mother, keeping her from leaving the house in a frenzy when she is manic and from killing herself when she is depressed. Although this book was easily read in a day, it was disappointingly bland and somewhat anti-climactic. I can't place exactly what it was - it just didn't build up to a page-turning "what-will-possibly-happen-next" mindset and I grew bored and apathetic towards the end which is highly unusual for me. I would recommend it as a good, thought-provoking, informative book on manic depression but certainly not as entertaining fiction.
Rating: 
Summary: A Good Story Idea
Review: This novel had a good story idea, but it is a bit drawn out. It could have been written on half as many pages and still told the same story. Even though I liked the story idea, I did not like the way everybody catered to and coddled Maggie - I didn't think she deserved it. It might give other "crazy" people the impression that they have the right to be babied. Tolerating someone is okay, but Maggie wasn't just tolerated - she was given everything she wanted and was treated like a queen and did not have to take responsibility for anything. In a way, the novel was sad because Hattie longed for a mother - I know that feeling, so I could relate to her. Except for the brand-new one, I have read all of Kaye Gibbons's books in the order in which they were written, and none of them measure of to 'A Virtuous Woman'. I don't think I'll ever read any more of Kaye Gibbons's books, because her writing style gets farther and farther away 'A Virtuous Woman', and it doesn't look like we'll have anymore books of that quality. Her latter books have been drawn out and a bit dry.
Rating:
Summary: From crazy mom to Stepford wife....which is worse
Review: Well I can't say that this was the best book I read. It was definately a fine book. Fine being Ok not good but not horrible. It was an easy read with nothing to miss seeing as Gibbons pushes everything down your throat. Not much thinking needed for this one. I would have liked to see more of what a child sees in a mother. Not what a commercial says one should be. If the book had gone into more depth and actualy painted the characters with lives outside of Hattie's I might have found it more interesting. For a mediocre read about woman who goes from insane woman with passions to a Stepford Wife whom Jesse Helms himself would be proud of, pick this book up. If it doesn't sound good your money is better put to laundry or a good CD.
Rating:
Summary: A story without passion
Review: What I really miss in this book is a sense of the narrator. The story revolves around the young girl Hattie, who tries to come to terms with her mother's mental illness. But instead of getting to know the young girl's emotional distress at having no mother-figure in her life, or the pain caused by being excluded from the small-town society because of her mother's illness, the central space in the novel is occupied by what seems a collage of independent and grotesque stories about the mother's crazy stunts. As a result Hattie never really comes to life, and the reader is left with an odd feeling that Gibbons really doesn't know her own narrator well enough.Originally, when Gibbons turned the novel in to her publisher it was twice the size it is now - half was edited away before being published - and in the end one cannot help but wonder if that other half is really what is missing from the book. It really is a shame because the story could have been very interesting if there hadn't been such a distance between narrator and reader.
Rating:
Summary: Subtle provocation of thought...
Review: What makes a book 5 stars...maybe a theme that captures an era or an event in time that could stand on its own. Kaye Gibbons comes close to weaving such a story. The characters are beautifully developed and never do they overreach. Instead we have a small story that speaks twenty volumes of the forces that shape children. Maybe more importantly we are left knowing eight characters and the thirsts that are at the core of their lives. Kaye Gibbons is truly gifted in drawing the reader into complexity with a simplicity that seemingly requires little writing effort. Don't be fooled. It's almost as if, at completion, you don't even know what hit you, only that you have been hit.
Rating: 
Summary: Sad and Funny
Review: While I could definately feel sadness for the husband and children of this woman who suffered so severely from bi-polar disorder/manic depression, there was a part of this book that made me laugh hysterically. Naturally, a child of an ill mother (whether mental or physical)is a topic which will generate sympathetic conversation. The subsequent loneliness and abandonment leaves a hole in children. At the same time, Kaye Gibbons portrayal of this woman made me laugh out loud. From her justifying hitting a woman with her car because she dared to wear a certain outfit, to her tirade over hearing the spoons click in the bowl, I began to wonder if I weren't a little imbalanced for finding it funny instead of sick. The reactions didn't seem so far fetched to me. That or perhaps I know a whole lot of undiganosed folks out there who I thought were 'normal'.
|
