Rating: 
Summary: I don't read 750 page novels, but couldn't put this one down
Review: There is no doubt that Tom Wolfe is one of the greatest writers on the American scene. This book contains fabulous characters and satire that bites so hard it leaves scars. Many parts of the book are uproariously funny. This novel is a superb vehicle for Wolfe to display his geniuse as a social commentator. A true iconoclast with x-ray vision, style and wit. It was laughable to read those critics who sneered that this book is not "great literature" and that "it won't be studied in literature classes". As one who has suffered through trash like "Slaughterhouse Five" in English courses, I would welcome a serious study Tom Wolfe's magnificent style and form. I think Wolfe has a great deal to teach any student of letters and even of rhetoric. I give the book four out of five stars for two reasons. First, I found the avalanche of bad language in the book very offensive. I don't speak that way, nor does my family, nor do my friends. Granted, it is the duty of the artist to hold a mirror up to the world to capture its reflection. And Wolfe's mirror is squeaky clean wihen it comes to showing us regretable traits of the age, especially the widespread use of swearing and obscenities. Howver, I still don't like reading it and wonder if the bad language was really necessary. Second, the ending is disappointing. There is something unconvincing and unsatisfactory about Croker's final "conversion.". That being said, I confess that if this roller-coaster of a novel would have gone on at the same clip for another 750 pages, I would have joyfully ridden it right to the end.
Rating: 
Summary: Should have been titled "Sherman McCoy goes to Atlanta"
Review: I loved Bonfire and was disappointed. The book has several main flaws. First, Wolfe repeats many of the literary devices he used in Bonfire in this book - the one about a character lamenting about the shortfall of his income to his monthly budget fairly leaped off the page at me. Further, there was no one I really cared about -- only one character evoked any sympathy from me; I really did not care what hapened to anyone else. And the sole sympathetic protangonist was so mired in an epic and gratuitous tour of prison life and Ebonic language, I lost interest in what happened to him and skipped the pages until he connected with the other characters at the end of the book. Finally, the ending felt contrived, as if Wolfe did not quite know how to end it. Wait for the inevitable movie.
Rating: 
Summary: One of our most important writers
Review: It's a pity that Tom Wolfe has produced only one book in a decade. One of our best writers and a brilliant satirist, he skewers the tawdry madness that is our culture with breathtaking precision. Ten years have passed since the exuberant, boyish The Bonfire of the Vanities and the writing here is more settled, less incendiary-but his microscopic eye is faultless. This time the target is Atlanta. The plot has to do with a billionaire entrepreneur whose empire is crumbling; an Uncle Tom black lawyer hired to somehow make disappear the date rape of the daughter of one of the cities wealthiest and most influential citizens by the wildly admired black star of a college football team, a successful if truculent product of the ghetto; the black mayor of Atlanta (70% black) and his Machiavellian scheme to save the day; a poor but idealistic young man victimized by the system; and assorted truly scurrilous bankers. There are also delicious, incisive probes into the lives of discarded wives and trophy wives and the inflated pomposity of Atlanta society. There are no heroes in a Tom Wolfe novel, but his acuity in chronicling the human animal is rare and precious.
Rating:
Summary: PHENOMENAL!
Review: What a treasure this book turned out to be! I can't remember when I've been so captivated by a story. The characters were huge. Their naked portrayal was disillusioning in many ways, yet I was able to connect with every one of them. Many reviewers criticized the ending. I disagree with them; I think think the author had a point to make and wouldn't have wanted to end the book any other way. I found A Man in Full to be immensely enjoyable. I'd enjoy hearing some recommendations from other readers who loved this book!
Rating: 
Summary: Wolfe's latest is a major disappointment...
Review: A Man in Full is a major disappointment. Wolfe's attempt to capture the spirit of the '90's the way Bonfire captured the tenor of the '80's misses the mark completely. I never imagined that Wolfe could produce a book with so many cookie-cutter stereotyped characters, meandering plot-lines that end up in obvious places, and the most hackneyed and annoying use of accents (southern-redneck, african-american, asian, etc.). The central plot device that the book hinges on - Croker facing bankruptcy because his white-elephant office building sits empty - is absurd. Anyone who knows Atlanta or Cherokee county knows that supply and demand would fill that building up -albeit at rental rates that might still cost Croker his shirt, eventually. Any hack writer could have churned this out in 3 months. The only way this book succeeds is as a commercial product. Don't be put off by its thickness and its 742 pages. It's very light reading. Easily consumable fluff, like a Big Mac or a Slurpie. It's a book that Krantz or Sheldon or King or Clancy would be proud to call their own. Sadly, i'd come to expect more from Wolfe...
Rating:
Summary: Ironic, a little long, still a page-turner. Weak ending
Review: Wolfe certainly has his pulse on the late 1990s. I wonder if it will rekindle interest in Philosophy, or will his portrayal of Conrad seem a little too hard to believe? Disappointing closure. Reminded me of National Lampoon's "Learn to Write Good" -- "and suddenly, they were all run over by a truck."
Rating:
Summary: Almost Home
Review: It is hard to fault a superior writer and chronicler such as Tom Wolfe. Some chapters are brilliant (Chapter XII - The Breeding Barn is a piece of poetry). However, one gets lost in exposition and excessive vernacular along with accompanying explanation to the point of distraction. Moreover, the ending is a letdown (I actually had to reread the last chapter to be sure that something was not missing - and it wasn't...).This may not be Tom Wolfe at his best, but at his worst, he is better than almost anyone out there writing. Keep truckin',Tom....
Rating: 
Summary: A sprawling, unfocused entertainment
Review: A MAN IN FULL is the literary equivalent of a really big bag of cheese puffs: they're fun to eat, but when you're finished, you're still hungry. Though the book was diverting, any depth comes not from the characters, but from the wealth of details about Atlanta and its social scene. One wishes Wolfe would have spent fewer words showing off his research and more in delineating real characters. No matter what the character's point of view, Wolfe writes solely in his own distinctive -- and repetitive -- voice. Words and phrases are repeated over and over, inflating an already tubby tome. The only sections of the book with any real heart(and the only ones dealing with the more sober matters of life and death)are the prison sequences, which other writers, such as Wolfe's fellow entertainer Stephen King, have done better. Wolfe has amplified the faults of his far superior BONFIRE OF THE VANITIES, and neglected the previous book's strengths. The rush to finish the book becomes transparently obvious in the final chapter, where any emotional resonance we might have developed for the characters is tossed out the window along with whatever remains of the plot. In short, A MAN IN FULL is an overhyped, overinflated would-be epic with neither heart nor soul, despite the heavyhanded sermons on stoicism. These 740 pages contain admittedly tasty cheese puffs, but cheese puffs nonetheless. Or, as Wolfe might put it, "Cheese puffs! Cheese puffs! Cheese puffs! Cheese puffs!"
Rating:
Summary: A tour de force, from beginning to epilogue.
Review: This is a triumph. If it is translated to film, it could be a great 5-part tv maxi-series. What could be done to translate the inner dialogs that are so important, I have no idea. There would have to be lots of intelligent camera work, to say the least... I liked the ending. It reminds me of the ending Wolfe made for Bonfire when he serialized the story in RS, and which was drastically changed in book form. The epilogue, which Wolfe used in Bonfire as well as in his great short story about the ad man and the athlete making a commercial together, works marvelously for me. It is very interesting to note just which two characters are featured in the epilogue as well. I'll read it again very soon, I hope.
Rating:
Summary: In Search of a Plot
Review: Bonfire of the Vanities worked so well because it had a narrative drive that compelled you to read on. A great story and as a bonus, Wolfe's trenchant, satirical observations and descriptions. A Man In Full has the descriptions and observations but a compelling plot is completely missing. Are we actually supposed to care about Charlie Croker, a man who finds nothing quite as amusing as an AIDS joke? Are we supposed to believe that an intelligent, skilled, highly motivated man cannot find any work in the Bay Area during a boom economy? This is a book that asks us to believe that one learns to worship Zeus in prison and that Croker himself would end up becoming a Zeus evangelist. And how embarassing that Wolfe uses the gay community as some kind of metaphor for moral decay. What next? Demon Rum? I could only cringe as I read Wolfe's rap lyrics. Where was the editor when he turned those pages in? The ending felt like after writing 730 pages, Wolfe realized the book was only supposed to be 742 pages, so quick, time to wrap things up. What little plot that exists is ended with a two person chit chat recounting where everyone ended up, much like the closing credits of American Graffiti. Nobody writes descriptions better than Tom Wolfe, and for that it is worth reading. But skill in descriptive writing doesn't matter if we don't care about what is being described. A major disappointment.
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