Rating: 
Summary: What a lyrical book!
Review: I have to admit at first I thought this book was rather slow in taking off ~~ but I kept reading ~~ something about Fenno keeps bringing me back. Once I wasn't in a hurry to finish this book, I ended up enjoying the lyrical flow of the wording in this book ~~ soft and gentle, very descriptive and insightful of the characters in the book.The book starts out with Paul, Fenno's father, and his trip to Greece after his wife had died. Paul meets Fern, a lovely young American, and was rather intrigued by her hopefulness and dreams. The last part of the book is about Fenno and Fern ~~ how they met up on Long Island. In between pages, the story is riveted on Fenno and his chosen lifestyle in America and his reflections on his brothers and childhood in Scotland. There is a lot of skipping back to the past then back to the present in this book but Glass does a wonderful job of keeping you on track ~~ you don't feel like you've lost your balance in this book like you would in other books. In fact, it makes you long for a glass of good wine, and to settle back on the couch to enjoy a leisurely read. This book is not to be rushed ~~ you must savor the stories Glass is telling you. All the stories are connected even if you don't make the connection right away. Fenno becomes a man to admire ~~ very human in all his faults as he struggles to find meaning in his life. Fern becomes a woman of courage once she faces the truth about herself. It is just a neat novel. If you like to read about people, this book is it. Glass writes passionately of people and their lives ~~ as if she was an observer ~~ an intimate observer. It's not a make me feel good book ~~ but rather, life can be good, book. 3-6-03
Rating: 
Summary: Poor on Plot, Kudos on Character
Review: I recommend this book with reservation. The novel is divided into three sections that read more like novellas than chapters. I enjoyed the second section the most, which was written in the first person from the point of view of a gay character, Fenno, who leaves his home in Scotland to open a bookstore in New York. Fenno is the most realized character, and I found him the most interesting. It is Fenno's story and observations in the second section, written in the first person, that really explore the other characters in his family -- his two twin brothers and their wives, and his parents, and gives some form and story-line to this book. This second section brims with complex family issues and dynamics. In this section, the author also describes Fenno's relationships outside his family that make him the most vivid and compelling character in the book. We read about his affair and longing for the elusive Tony, and his friendship and missed opportunity with Mal, a classical music critic for The New York Times who is dying of AIDS. Each character in this section is well-drawn, and there is some semblance of plot. But a choice Fenno is forced to make is all too reminiscent of the movie, The Big Chill, and seems to rely on a borrowed plot. The first section is all too short, with undeveloped characters such as the mother, who is further but not fully explored in chapter two. This first section is written in the third person and revolves around Paul McLeod, Fenno's father who is recently widowed and travels to Greece. There is virtually no plot, and I didn't find any of the characters appealing, especially the self-absorbed mother. There is a hint that she has had an affair, but it's not spelled out, and the reader is left wondering. There is too much description about the dogs she breeds, which I didn't care a hoot about. In fact, this chapter is more about dog breeding than the characters. After reading this first section, I put the book down for weeks, and did not intend to pick it up again. I was glad that I did. Some of the questions and loose ends are resolved in the second part. Julia Glass's writing is extraordinary in parts: her observations of human nature and New York; the way she gets into the head of a gay man is astoundinly realistic; and the trenchant insights she imparts throughout the novel evoke and understanding about people, life, and choices made -- and not made. The third section, which takes place in the Hamptons, re-introduces Fern, a character who made a brief introduction in the first section. Fern's character in the first section was undeveloped and flat. She befriends Fenno's father in Greece in the first section, and then befriends Fenno in the third section set in the Hamptons, but both characters are absolutely in the dark that they share a bond with Fenno's father. So I wondered why the author brought back the character of Fern? What was the point? There are explanations -- the contrast and similarities between father and son, to further develop Fern,to create a cyclical story-- but they are not satisfying. It seemed contrived, and that the author was stretching for a way to end the book by bonding Fern with the father in the first chapter, and then the son in the last chapter. Yet there are other characters mentioned in the first section that we never read about again. THREE JUNES is worth reading if you are not anticipating a plot-driven novel, but one of character development and some truly fine morsels of writing -- including morsels of exceptional food descriptions that take place throughout the second section and whet one's appetite when the 3 brothers arrange and plan their father's funeral (one of the brothers is a chef). Overall, however, I felt at times as if I were reading the author's memoir or a journal, disguised in the voices and perspectives of the various characters. Although the three sections are subtlely linked, one chapter doesn't necessarily flow from the next, and there are loose ends at the end. But I ultimately found reading the novel a satisfying, rewarding and enriching experience. The story leaves you pondering about some of the characters,especially Fenno, who definitely had an emotional pull on this reader. And although I did not thoroughly enjoy the first and third parts, I empathized with Fern's pathos and guilt over her contradictory feelings for her husband in the third section, and thought the author described the Hamptons in all its frivolity, includiing the gay fraternity that frequents much of the Hamptons, quite realistically.
Rating:
Summary: A Walk Among People Whose Histories Whisper, Quietly
Review: THREE JUNES, for this reader, succeeds on many, many levels. Julia Glass has written a cohesively intricate tale that picks up characters from a Whitman's Sampler and manages to make them all intertwine, alter, grow, and learn. The story of a Scottish clan whose history and present tense span a decade has been well documented in the other reviews and in the editorial comments. Read all of that - after you've immersed yourself in this lovely book - and come to your own conclusions. There are many wonders in this gifted author's first novel. For one, how as a woman she can write so sensitively, so innately intelligently about the psyche of her gay male narrator is proof of a humbling talent. That is not a sexist observation: many male novelists have attempted to convey the fears of self acceptance, of living life as a gay male, of struggling with the need/repulsion of being in a meaningful relationship, of coping with the quiet knock of death that has accompanied the evolution of HIV, the will to be a whole human individual while fearing the shedding of the comforting skin of family history. These are the only a few of issues that Julia Glass addresses in this eminently readable novel. She has created unforgetable characters (the at once flagrant yet emotionally elusive Mal - a music critic whose true history is revealed to his closest friend only after he ends his life on an AIDS bed, the daunting Fenno whose life choices drive this maze of interconnected families and tangential friendships, the hilarious Dennis and his glowing French wife, two unforgetable parents in Paul and Maureen, the tender/vulnerable Lil whose connections to the clan into which she marries alters the story at every turn, the artist Tony who seduces everyone including the reader while he avoids living in the present by making photographic art of it all. Glass seems to be addressing the fact that each of us pays mental and verbal homage to the concept of love but spend our lives trying to grasp it like the elusive gold ring on the carrousel. This is a panoramic novel, delivering the sights and smells and air of Scotland, Greece and the New York as a wonderfully rendered backdrop to the human comedy of errors. In her words "Never talk yourself out of knowing you're in love...or into thinking that you are" and 'Mind what you love. For that matter, mind how you are loved.' This multifaceted story will linger in readers' minds long after the last page is turned.
Rating:
Summary: This won the National Book Award?
Review: I found Julia Glass's writing to be entirely unremarkable. The second section, with Fenno, is by far the most involving of the three, but what frustrated me as I read the book is that it doesn't really feel like a 'novel' to me -- it's three stories (maybe one novella) arbitrarily linked together by small devices (references to Marjorie, etc.), some editor's idea of how they could sell this as a novel rather than a collection of stories. I felt the effort to link these stories forced. Did anyone actually feel as if the Fenno/Tony relationship in part three had any real connection to the Fenno/Tony relationship in part two? Tony was like a different character altogether. And what was Dennis doing with any role in the third story? That too felt forced, as if he did not belong there (and I didn't find his characterization true for a second). It also felt to me as though the children, in the second part -- in Scotland after their father's death -- had no relationship to him at all -- the author had to keep reminding us, or herself, that this story was connected to the first, that they are here because the character in the first story, their father, has died. Do they even miss him? Do they relate to his death in any real way? It seems they have forgotten him. I nearly quit reading this book before the end but forced myself. An unsatisfying experience.
Rating: 
Summary: Elegant writing
Review: Three Junes is this year's National Book Award winner for good reason. Julia Glass has that rare gift for gracefully interweaving the lives of her characters and effortlessly bouncing back and forth between different places and periods in time. She also draws her characters full of life, emotion, and humanity. This novel is an excellent portrait of the modern family. Each member leads his own life in its own unique direction, and yet what they have in common ultimately proves stronger than their differences or the distance that separates them. Fenno is one of the most charming characters I've come across in modern literature recently. Funny and kind, insecure and self-deprecating, sensitive and compassionate, he is loveable for both his strengths and his flaws. This is excellent writing.
Rating: 
Summary: Over-rated
Review: I love reading, especially a first book. But this is one of the worst books I have ever, ever read. How did it ever get into print? Let alone win an Award! Amazing. No plot; lots of ends left hanging; sloppy grammar. Save your time and money.
Rating:
Summary: Outstanding!
Review: I loved this book. In fact, unlike my usual speedy style, I read it really slowly to savor every aspect. The characters, the different time periods - all were drawn so well. I found myself completely absorbed in the smells and tastes and sounds of each part of the book. I might even read it agin!
Rating:
Summary: What Happened to??
Review: I enjoyed this book, however I found some plot answers missing.
For instance, did Marjorie ever send any of Paul's letters to Fenno? I don't recall a further mention about this later...
(I, for one, found Marjorie to be quite an interesting women, but not enough information was written about her..)
Did Dennis, David, Veronique, and Lil ever find Paul's ashes in the attic?
Maureen had had an affair-but with whom? The owner of the estate nearby, or the "Handiman"?
Rating:
Summary: Not bad, but not particularly memorable either
Review: Three Junes tells the story of a Scottish family in the aftermath of the mother's death, but mostly it deals with the life of Fenno, the eldest of three brothers, who lives in New York and runs an eclectic bookstore in the Village. Fenno becomes the caretaker of a music critic dying of AIDS and the on-again-off-again lover of a photographer unwilling to allow himself to be pinned down. Like so many books these days that pick up prestigious awards, this book is well-written, the characters are finely drawn (particularly Fenno, who serves as the narrator for the second and, by far, biggest chunk of the novel), but I was left rather non-plussed. A year from now, I'll probably look back on this novel and will remember enjoying it, but won't be able to remember much beyond that. While I wasn't disappointed, per se, I wasn't overly impressed. Julia Glass is a decent writer, but there's nothing particularly memorable about her style or her narrative voice. At times, this novel reminded me of something Maeve Binchy might write. There have been several great novels published of late, I'm surprised this was chosen as the National Book Award winner. Again, there's nothing really wrong here. Three Junes is a pleasant diversion, but not much beyond that.
Rating: 
Summary: Disappointing
Review: I have a friend who liked this novel so when it won the National Book Award I thought it would be one I'd like to read. How it won the award is beyond me. I didn't even finish it because the third story with the young girl( I don't even remember her name) wasn't compelling. I didn't find the writing as good as many other reviewers did. And much that happened seemed improbable. With so many great novels being written I hope we can award the very best.
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