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Summary: I'm not interested in horses
Review: BUT, I love this book. I am fascinated with Smiley's humane attitude toward her characters (warm, concerned, sympathetic) and her crisp, penetrating writing style. She is one of our best living authors, I think. Readers do not come away with deep ethical/philosophical insights as with books like War and Peace or Crime and Punishment, but with insights and attitudes towards exciting characters that better help us understand and perhaps be amused at human nature. I suppose I like her balance between seriousness and human inher approach to characters. Just for the record, there is nor was there a Safeway in Arcadia when book takes place. Try Pavillon, (closest to tract) or Von's or Ralph's. Who do I write for correction?
Rating: 
Summary: Forget it
Review: This book is not for anyone who knows or cares about horses... or people or good writing. Multiple story lines are too superficially developed. Characters are not developed at all. How a publisher like Knopf can allow characters to mix Italian words with Spanish words when they are supposed to speaking Spanish is beyond me. So is the fact that this author won the Pulitzer Prize. The writing is just plain bad. Give me good old, down market Jilly Cooper for tangled story lines, full-blooded characters (equine and human) and just plain fun!
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Summary: I've read most of Smiley's books and this is my favorite
Review: I'm the last person to really critique literary works. So, as an enthusiastic yet uneducated (in the literary world) reader, I put forth my 2 cents. I know next to nothing about horses, so in the beginning I had to constantly check my information on such basics as what a gelding or a mare is. That said, I loved this book. Is there some compelling storyline? Not really. Is there a suspensful ending? No. Yet I read it like it was some cheesy Sidney Sheldon novel. Why? Jane Smiley has the incredible gift of thrusting the reader into her characters in a matter of sentences. Yes, I wanted to know more about every character within a few sentences. I don't know why...I'll leave that for the real critics. All I know is that I wanted to read every paragraph and every chapter right away. And no, not every character is wonderful. But, they all have some quality that I related to in some way. They are all so REAL. And, by the end of the novel, I actually found myself interseted and admiring horses. - something I never felt before. I read and repsected "A Thousand Acres" but I can't say I really liked it. But this novel, even more than "Moo" (which I liked as well) drew me in like few other books ever have. So, regardless of Smiley's ridiculous remarks about Twain, I like her!
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Summary: HORSE heaven?
Review: I was really dissapointed with this book, i've not read anything else by the author, I'm a horse lover and when I saw this book I thought 'wow, it looks like its about horses!'-it is called horse heaven and there's a pic of horse on the front.but I soon found that only a small portion of the book is about horses, the rest is more of a soap opera.I though it was awfull and I returned the book.Also, alot of the horse info is quite inacurate.
Rating: 
Summary: Never crossed the finish line
Review: This is a book that reads like War And Peace at the race track. There are a couple of hundred characters (including the horses) most of which one could care less about or even get to know. This is a textbook on horse management masquerading as a novel. I found the first 200 pages or so to be mildly interesting, even a little funny, and then the whole business comes to a halt. It gets mired in you-know-what. Every page introduces a new horse and more arcane horse jargon that you can live without. After awhile you don't know if the author is talking about a human or a horse and what's more you don't give a hoof.
Rating:
Summary: Great for Horse Lovers And Horse Huhhers? Alike
Review: I was very happy that my mom gave me this book to read. I am not a horse person, but now, I am intrigued to go hang out with horses soon! The book focuses on different lives that are connected through the racetrack. Not only are the lives of the people deeply connected and well written in the plot, but the horses all have thoughts and stories as well. I stayed up late into the night reading this book, I didn't want to put it down. Jane Smiley does a wonderful job making you realize the amazing stories of each individual person in the book. I really felt connected and really wanted to know what happened to each life as it played out in the book. And I have to say something about Eileen! That dog made me laugh so hard that I couldn't keep from snorting outloud. My boyfriend thought I was nuts, that while I was reading a huge novel, I was cracking up over the hi-jinks of a Jack Russell terrier. It really was hysterical! It kept the book going for me. I would highly recommend this book to anyone who has ever known the 13 year old who wants a horse, so maybe you can have a better understanding of their obsession. Excellent work!
Rating: 
Summary: Get the horse's perspective
Review: I don't particularly like horses, but I found this book entertaining. It's basically a story about several horses and people who experience some entertaining events on the road to greater self-knowledge. Some parts are lighthearted and funny, other parts are kind of melancholy. I really liked the horse characters, especially Justa Bob and Mr. T. On the other hand, many of the human characters were boring, selfish, and hard to identify with, the main exception being Rosaling Maybrick, whom I found interesting. The book is too long -- 200 pages could have easily been cut without losing anything. But if you have the time, it's worth reading to get the horse's perspective -- long live Justa Bob!
Rating: 
Summary: Smiley's Best!
Review: I've read all of Jane Smiley's books and this is my favorite. It's not as dark as Thousand Acres or Barn Blind but contains the same depth of characters and has a great storyline.
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Summary: Horse Lovers Will Be In Horse Heaven
Review: Horse Heaven is a great beach book. Well written, unpredictable, very imaginative, fun and extremely funny -- but its convoluted plot and millions of characters makes it hard to follow if you have to divide your reading up into too many sessions. Fortunately there is a character list in the front to help keep you on track. I do wonder if non-horsey readers will want to wade that deeply into 550+ pages of a very horsey world, however. Horse lovers will be in horse heaven.
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Summary: Still can't figure out if I liked it!
Review: Having been an excercise jockey and assistanttrainer/barnmanager for a stable full of racehorses of course I wasgoing to read this book. Now take into consideration that I am not only a very experienced horseperson (racing and hunter/jumper) but I have a degree in English Literature. With this in mind, realize that I did not read "Horse Heaven" to gain any profound knowledge of the horse world, nor did I expect to be enlightened by its metaphoric artistry. No big surprises there as far as the book goes. Smiley draws out for the reader a very accurate portrait of the racing world as a whole. She creates real-life characters of racing - the crooked trainer, the clueless owners, the ever hopeful horse crazy young girl, the slightly cooky but ever lovable animal communicator, the trainer trying to get a break, the up and coming jockey, and the ever hopeful bettor. The book touches on many of the harsh realities of track life - common injuries that easily threaten a horses career, having a horse claimed, shady veterinary dealings, bad luck, and bad decisions. For anyone who wants to get an idea of everything involved with the glamorous and not-so-glamorous horse racing scene, this book could easily serve as the beginnner's guide. In its entirety, "Horse Heaven" is much like an impressionist painting: From far away the big picture looks great. As an overall description of the racing world and so on Smiley paints a perfect picture, but the closer you look, the picture becomes more and more fragmented. While the characters were believable, they were lacking any depth. Smiley did not give them enough attention or time to allow the reader to understand them at all. Their actions and reactions make no sense because the reader does not know them well enough to understand why or how they came to such conclusions! Each character is only a study in brief that never fully allows the reader enough detail to gain any insight to that character's mind. Perhaps this is a result of Smiley taking on a bit too much at once. The most endearing and realisitic character in this novel is Justa Bob, that claimer who continually gets passed along until someone deems him useless and then neglects him. Something that gets totally lost in this book is the plot! Nothing ever happens! Smiley bounces from character set to character set in a manner that would lead you to assume these groups will intertwine, which they do to some extent in a six degrees of seperation kind of way. It could be said that since this is a realistic portayal of racing life, the story is realistic too in that day to day life appears uneventful. I would have liked a little more plot though, if only for sheer entertainment value. With all this said, I must admit that I did find it hard to put the book down. I started to like the people and horses and kept hoping something monumentous would happen, and little by little, small things did. END
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