Rating: 
Summary: Practiced eye and careful pen
Review: The Egg and I, which sold more than two million copies in the 1940s, amused this unlikely reader, a teacher who grew up in suburban New Jersey and who has lived most of his life in the South. The author's reminiscences about her life as an 18-year-old newly-wed on a chicken ranch in the Olympic Mountain region of Washington State are not profound. But MacDonald had a practiced eye for detail and could make every word of an essay count. Perhaps what makes The Egg and I so successful is that MacDonald can convey the essence of her experience without lapsing into either bitterness or sentimentality. As for the portraits of Indians whom she met: few would argue that she was malevolent or wrong-headed, just that such things are politically incorrect and shouldn't be said today. More sobering is her smoking, the mark of a liberated woman in the 1920s, a sophisticated affectation that almost certainly contributed to her early death in 1958.
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Summary: The Egg and I.... What a stitch!
Review: I have read and re-read Betty's book, "Egg and I", and I only wish that it had a wider audience! Betty's writing style is sensitive, descriptive, warm and hilarious. I can almost feel the hovering of the mountains, hear the "yeep" of the baby chicks and I drool when she describes the seafood and method of cooking it that she and Bob enjoyed. Betty may not be Shakespeare, but she has certainly captured life in the earlier day of the Pacific Northwest. I asked my sons (aged 17 and 18) to read it and they have remarked on how much fun Betty's book is! If there is a tougher audience than teen-aged boys I'd like to meet it! In the meantime, if you're looking for a great, yet easy, read pick up "Egg and I".... believe me, you won't be disappointed.
Rating: 
Summary: A Good Old Friend
Review: I will always have fond memories of this book, which I grew up with. When my family moved from the city to a hut by the sea, this book was one of the things we took with us, and it was an old edition, hardbound and covered in green cloth. I loved the descriptions of American country life, but because I was young, the gender and race issues went right over my head. I haven't read this book in recent years, but I'm sure that I will see it differently now that I've gone to university and had a liberal-arts education. In any case, my memories of this book will always be good.
Rating: 
Summary: The only one of Betty's books that I found boring
Review: I have long been an ardent fan of Betty's hilarious (and very positive) books, with Anybody Can do Anything and Onions in the Stew amongst my all-time favourites. Yet I found this book, with the exception of the very beginning when she treats of her family history a bit, to be tedious and boring. Perhaps it was because the situation - living in the wilderness, isolated, in conditions out of the 18th century - was so dreadful that I shuddered inwardly at the very idea. Actually, the premise of the book was quite original for its time. I have enough books popular during the 1950s to see that, at a time when a number of "good sports" were writing of adapting to wilderness conditions (some far worse than Betty's - which has no elements of children dying or life threatening illnesses), Betty had the ingenuity to show the other side of the picture. However, reading her later, far more polished works, makes one see how very raw her talent was at this point. Various characters, such as the Kettles, seem far more fictional and caricatured than those who appear in her later work. Perhaps another reason that I dislike the Egg and I, while loving Betty's other books, is that there is a very unhappy undertone. All of Betty's books treat of some sad situations (one cannot do much worse than having tuberculosis!), but the overall feeling is very positive, and Betty's knack for finding humour seems part of a generally happy and accepting attitude. There is something very tragic about a "city girl" of only 18 so obviously marrying the wrong man, and one doubts that she would have gone through with it had she had the slightest notion of the living conditions ahead.
Rating:
Summary: A book I want to share with everyone.
Review: One of the best books I have ever had the pleasure to read. This anything but dramatic look back on the first twenty or so years of her life does carry a message - don't take yourself too seriously. I have read this book countless times, entertained my children reading chapters aloud and one year shared her description of a Christmas tree in a greeting card or two. I especially love the way she gives human personality traits to the inanimate "characters" in her story, like the stove, the mountains and that barely standing house she tried to make into a home. The human characters are memorable and entertaining, almost like reading a letter from a distant relative. As humorous as her recollections are, her descriptions of the sublime and serene can be poetic. Just an enjoyable read all the way around.
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Summary: Never fails to make me laugh...
Review: One of my all-time favorite books, I probably reread it once per year. Some of those reviewing the novel blast Betty for her comments on Native Americans and caution that this book is inappropriate for children. Why would anyone WANT to read this book to children? The book is clearly intended for adults and despite her observations on Native Americans is one of the funniest books I have ever read.
Rating:
Summary: The Most Genuinely Funny Book I've Ever Read!
Review: I first read THE EGG AND I in high school. I checked it out, and sat down in the library to read it. . . and I was afraid I'd get kicked out of the library for laughing so hard. None of this humor is put on or contrived . . . it flows out of her thoughts and is genuine.
Rating:
Summary: Light humor but some unenlightened views
Review: Betty MacDonald's humor lights up "The Egg and I"---she's a plucky (pardon the bad pun),lively young woman who puts in some wilderness time in western Washington in the late 1920s. Leaving her supportive, warmly loving family in Seattle, she's a new bride who takes on chicken farming with her older husband. He loves it. She understandably does not.
Although there is much in this book to make you smile, there is also a pervading sense of melancholy, and the increasing awareness that Betty has entered into a marriage that is a mistake. She is lonely and miserable much of the time, and her husband seems completely unresponsive to her feelings. She expresses some of the prejudices of her time; not only her views about the native coastal people, but also her attitudes about hygiene and child rearing. She gives her infant daughter a careful daily bath but both she and her husband smoke incessantly. They are unaware of the negative health consequences of smoking, and of some other behaviors considered "sophisticated" at the time. Although her works suffer by being dated by attitudes of a previous era, Betty is a wonderful companion, reader-friendly and funny.
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Summary: Funny, Funny, Funny
Review: I have loved Betty MacDonald since I was digging for her out-of-prints in old bookstores. Her writing style is easy to read, conversational - and her humor is fantastic. It's hard to believe her books were written 60 or so years ago - they are fresh and funny and familiar. She is not afraid to laugh at herself, and be very irreverent (politically incorrect, these days) about people and places in her life. She also gives a descriptive picture of the Pacific Northwest during her era, post-war, internment camps (though not in this book), housing markets, all very fascinating. A Great Read, as are all her books.
Rating:
Summary: When will the remake of Ma and Pa Kettle come out?
Review: My god, this is a great book! I got it as a joke and laughed all the way through. I think someone oughta do a new treatment of Ma and Pa Kettle, but like it is in the book. Sure, some of it ain't PC for now but she manages to touch on some pretty heavy subjects including, abortion, yes, abortion, honestly and intelligently. Then of course there's the Native Americans which other reviewers mentioned. It is a good book to talk to your mature kids about how things were then verses now.
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