Rating: 
Summary: Interesting Journey
Review: I enjoyed reading this book. I did not find it boring, nor did I find it to be a great masterpiece in literature. I found it to be interesting and I thought the characters were memorable. The main character is a hero of sorts trying to get home and along the way he meets up with many people who have been affected by the Civil War. The book often keeps you reading due to the suspense of a band of guards from the southern army looking for deserters. I liked this book. I would recommend it.
Rating: 
Summary: Cold Plotting or Heartwarming Characters?
Review: Frazier's world is full of lyrical writing, gritty characters--I'll never forget the large, black prostitute or the goat woman--and memorable landscape. True villians exist in his world, as do those with both foibles and human hearts. The plot can basically be encapsulated in a paragraph, but the nuances of these characters continue to be unveiled till the last page. Frazier transported me to the horror and despondency of the Civil War and filled his story with people I cared about. Ada's stubborn survival instincts linked with Ruby's are an ode to the women of the day. If you like characters that'll stick in your mind for months to come, this is the book for you. Only with time can you discover just how impacting this story truly is.
Rating:
Summary: A complex story of people caught up in a war
Review: There are an amazing diversity of viewpoints expressed in the reviews for this book. I would agree with a previous reviewer's comments about teachers assigning students to write their reviews directly to amazon.com. Reviews should be collected by the teacher, graded, and at least edited for grammar and spelling before being posted. This book is not intended to be light entertainment. It is a complex plot about people caught up in the U.S. Civil War. The main character in the book is a man who has done his bit, is in the hospital recovering from a wound, and decides to take unauthorized leave to go home instead of being shipped back into the front lines to fight someone else's war. The book describes the seamier side of a home front. There are home guards who find it easier to bully and terrorize their neighbors rather than risk their lives in actual service. There are people who are persecuted because they don't support the war. And there are people who are simply on the sidelines, sometimes getting knocked about when they are caught up by events. The main character in the story makes a difficult journey home, sometimes caught in the middle between the two sides, only to find himself in a final battle with the Home Guards rampaging through the area. It deals with harsh realities and is a tragedy for many of the players.
Rating: 
Summary: I'm on the same side of the fence as Renoir below
Review: I felt exactly the same disappointment that Renoir in her below review felt in reading this book. To be sure, there was some lyric writing, but most of it was buried under piles of boring plot line and sloppy writing. Maybe if you've never read a great piece of literature before you'd be confused into thinking that it's a modern day Odyssey, but my advice to all but the most hard core devotees of slow moving books is to pick up the Odyssey instead. About half way through this book, I realized that I didn't care whether the main character made it home or not. I love Southern writing (like Faulkner, for example), but there are many masters who do a much better job than Frazier.
Rating: 
Summary: *****An unending bore; a waste of trees*****
Review: I was required to read this novel for junior english and found it hard to pick up, easy to put down. For the first fifty pages Frazier kept my attention with his time-specific writing and characterizations. However, by the four-hundredth page, the terrificly slow journey had left me back in the hospital where the book began. Nothing seems to happen in this book. If history is your thing, try this book, but don't expect too much. Cold Mountain is nothing special. If you want a truly good book try _One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest_ or _As I Lay Dying_; leave Frazier for another lifetime.
Rating:
Summary: bland name but superb fiction
Review: The only let down concerning this book is its title, which gives the impression of a dreary land mass. In actuality, this book is so wonderfully laden with colorful people set in a rich and powerful story, it almost demands a deeper title.I was recently talking to a friend about novels. My pal loves a story about really tough guys with a whole lot of integrity and depth. This book gives you that and so much more! Lastly, I never expected to read bad reviews on this book. If and when you see them move along quickly. Anyone who disliked this book is in obvious need of growth.
Rating:
Summary: Cold Mountain
Review: The voice of this novel is absolutely beautiful. The rich descriptions of the characters, the land and the food are incredible. More than once my mouth actually watered when Frazier was describing meals. Obviously the Civil War was the most devestating and brutal of our conflicts in US history, and this book helped illustrate not only the barbarism of war, but how powerful love can be as a motivator.
Rating: 
Summary: A most memorable book
Review: The best Civil War story - best novel - I have read in two years, this book does not have an unimpressive chapter within it. One is drawn into the book from the start and, although certainly not a "adventure thriller", this book contains many entertaining moments and characters. It only falls short of perfection will the fate of Inman - I guess I'd have preferred a happier fate for the soldier. But then again this is a Southern tragedy and, in that regard, all the events detailed therein fall neatly into place.
Rating:
Summary: BORRRRRRR-ING!
Review: Talk about a labor of bore! This book was horrific. It is so bloody slow. I have no idea how it won so many awards because it is nothing more than a 356 page descriptive paragraph. If you're in jail, by all means, indulge yourself. If you have a life, don't waste it on this overhyped recycling fodder.
Rating:
Summary: Finally Finished
Review: The friend who loaned me the book said she found it hard to get into until after the 4th chapter. I'm the type to continue to the bitter end. I finished it, but it was slow-going. Was it meant to be that way, a long tedious journey home?
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