Rating: 
Summary: Politics & love
Review: Kranz's remarkable novel is a hefty mix of comedy, politics, and the daily grind of love in all its forms. Flip's psychic boyfriend Warren doesn't fully support his fledgling acting career. Rosie, Flip's sister, is juggling what could be her first union strike with her so-called dating life. While Flip and Warren's relationship struggles, Warren's estranged sister sends her biracial daughter into Warren's life, causing him to adjust to life in totally new ways. Kranz changes viewpoints through the story, making it a mosaic of life in New York City, and this is one of the strongest aspects of the story. The most potent aspect of the story is Warren and Flip's love. It's incredibly tangible in its constant variations from positive to negative to inbetween. Like real life, their love is inconsistent with one saying something honestly to the other, and watching as it's misunderstood. And it's this honesty that resonates with the reader, drawing us further and further into the book until it's unquestionable that this book would be set aside. If you want to give yourself a fulfilling, joyful treat, grab this book and settle into a comfortable chair.
Rating: 
Summary: Love letter about politics, theater, and the way we live now
Review: Leaps of Faith comes right out of my own experience as a theater director, a rank-and- file union organizer, and a temp secretary. I wanted to write about love--but I didn't want to write a traditional love story. I wanted to write about politics and collective action--to show how sexy, uplifting, maddening, painful, and magical they could be. I wanted to write about people who don't usually get to take center stage--gay men in love, an African-American actress, a union organizer and her feisty group of clerical workers. And I wanted to write a story about the way we live now: watching TV, going shopping, going to the gym, trying to make the most of our jobs and our families and our all-too-overloaded private lives. Leaps of Faith is the result--a novel about how, if you're willing to take a leap of faith, you could end up in a terrifying--and wonderful--new place. Readers have told me that this is a book they can't put down, and one that they keep thinking about long after they've read it. They've also told me that they see themselves and the people they know on every page. And they've paid me the highest compliment of all--they've told me that they find themselves muttering--or even shouting!--advice to the characters. If you do read Leaps of Faith, I'd love to hear from you. E-mail your comments back to amazon and tell me what you think! This is a novel of many voices--I'd love to hear yours. Best wishes, Rachel Kranz
Rating:
Summary: Beach Reading for Socially Conscious Readers
Review: LEAPS OF FAITH is a very smart book, featuring a large cast of characters and three intertwined stories: a gay couple contemplating marriage, a problematic strike at a large university, and a difficult theatrical performance. It is a remarkable combination of the visionary and the down-to-earth. Kranz has faith that the improbable can happen, but her faith is not naive or sentimental. Ultimately, she is grounded by her love of people: she listens to them carefully, she takes their desires seriously, she understands their doubts and anxieties. Some aspects of the book are very funny, such as the psychic who can see into every life but his own. Others are movingly poignant: the out-of-work black actress who dreams of Dorothy Dandridge. There are tour-de-force moments, as when Kranz creates an entire cop show and has different fans describe it, each from his or her own gender or ethnic perspective. Above all, it is fun to read, beach reading for socially conscious people. You'll be a better person for having read it.
Rating:
Summary: An amazing book!
Review: Leaps of Faith is truly captivating. Its plot is rich and moving. Its characters are endearing and vividly alive, especially Warren and Flip. However too much emphasis is placed on the union and the strike. Also, the side stories of Tanya and the lesbian couple in Flip's theatre group seem irrelevant. But the relationship developments between Warren and Flip, between the couple and their respective sister, between the couple and their little girl,Juliet, makes the book shines. The strength in Warren and Flip's relationship culminating to their "marriage" is rare, touching, deeply emotional and beautifully told. I hope Kranz will invest her talents in another novel soon.
Rating:
Summary: A Great Summer--or Winter--Read
Review: One of the most clever books I've ever read. It's funny, captivating, smart. You'll love the characters and want to take it with you everywhere. A real joy!
Rating:
Summary: A Great Summer--or Winter--Read
Review: One of the most clever books I've ever read. It's funny, captivating, smart. You'll love the characters and want to take it with you everywhere. A real joy!
Rating: 
Summary: Life in the Big Apple
Review: Set in the vibrant Chelsea and Hell's Kitchen neighborhoods of New York City, Leaps of Faith explores gay and lesbian relationships, struggling actors, racism and union activists. There's something for everyone in this novel, but the author invested so much of her own experiences, I wonder if she has anything left to contribute to subsequent novels. Warren is a professional psychic, raised in a wealthy family who only partially accepts his gay lifestyle. He is suddenly saddled with raising his sister's French bi-racial 8-year old daughter, Juliette, after his sister admits herself into an asylum in Paris. Although he is totally unprepared for this role, he adapts quickly to it and learns to love Juliette totally. The central theme of the novel is Warren's volatile relationship with Flip, 13 years younger, struggling actor, and the love of his life. After much angst and soul searching Warren and Flip decide to pledge their troth to each other, and many humorous scenes are built around their "wedding" planning. Flip's sister Rosie is also struggling to come to terms with her love relationship with a much younger man of a different ethnicity. She is also a determined union activist and struggles with some serious health problems. I found the chapters relating to the clerical workers strike at the university to be overdone and boring, and some skillful editing could have made this section of the book more concise and entertaining. The structure of the book, which was told in multiple voices, allowed you to have insight into the perspective of multiple characters, and was a useful device until the chapters relating to the strike. Moving rapidly from the voice of one character to another character, none of whom were adequately fleshed out, was confusing and tedious. But, all in all, the book was amusing, quick reading and gave some fascinating insights into New York, the gay life, the theater, and the behind the scenes union organizing. A little less detail in some areas could have shortened it somewhat and made the pace more brisk.
Rating:
Summary: leaps of faith
Review: The book gives us an amazing number of believable, intriguing characters. The author has an instinct for the telling detail. I became completely caught up in the story and often found myself muttering advice to the characters.
Rating:
Summary: leaps of faith
Review: The book gives us an amazing number of believable, intriguing characters. The author has an instinct for the telling detail. I became completely caught up in the story and often found myself muttering advice to the characters.
Rating:
Summary: Witty, deep, politically conscious -- and a great read!
Review: This is an extraordinary book. What's it about? Work, love, race, art, family, and the role of political imagination in our material and psychic survival. Kranz's characters are wonderfully rich -- hilarious, ambitious, self-depracating, and vulnerable. While some have unusual talents (the intense, sensual, interior world of Warren, a professional psychic, is stunning), they love, argue with, hurt and get hurt by, compete against, fail and support each other in scenes of daily life I found both familiar and illuminating. One of the smartest novels I've ever read, Leaps has an experimental narrative structure worthy of a Ph.D. thesis -- while also being delightfully readable.
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