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Summary: My last Oprah book
Review: I've read this author before, For Love, and found the writing weak. Same thing for this book. The murder was the only exciting event in the story, but nothing happened with it. The characters are weak and unlikeable, even the animals were mediocre. Maybe if I was in the same boat as the leading character, married and unhappy (but she doesn't know it yet) I would understand the book. Most of Oprah's books have turned out to be all hype and no substance.
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Summary: Raises moral questions you've never pondered
Review: This book is so packed with moral issues, it raises questions in the reader that are almost bothersome. The characters are wonderfully developed, forcing the reader to like them all, and hate them all.
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Summary: A gem!
Review: While I Was Gone is Miller's best work since The Good Mother. The biggest compliment that I can pay to this novel is that I did not guess where the plot was going. In fact, I wasn't focused on trying to guess where the plot was going because Miller's writing was so skillful that I was caught up in the story. The highest compliment that I can pay an author is getting so lost in a book that, in some ways, I forget that I'm reading one. That's what happened to me when I read this. I highly recommend it.
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Summary: While I Was Gone
Review: If you are a person who trusts the complexities of honesty - yet at times may question it's value - this is a book for you. A wonderful read - this book struck an intimate chord with the soulful mother, daughter, wife, friend, lover, spiritualist, and betrayer present in each of us. At times, I wanted to close the book and be alone with the haunted secrets we all must keep to ourselves. Our innermost fears of feeling rejected and shameful are pulled from the darkness and thrust into daylight. The author clearly describes the intense feelings associated with love, values, passion, career, and fantasy that plague each of us as we find our place in this world. The plot twisted and my heart lurched forward hesitant to discover what the next page might reveal about my inner secrets....
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Summary: Thought-provoking, but somehow lacking
Review: I've just completed reading this book, and I'm trying to process my feelings about it, which are pretty conflicted. There are parts of the story and the character development that really ring true, but in more segments than not it has an unreal, almost surrealistic quality. One thing I will say for sure: none of the characters in this novel falls into any clear category of saint or sinner;and after all that's true of most of us. I did like the fact that the author recognizes marriage as a kind of ebb and flow process rather than either "miserable" or "happily ever after." However, I have to agree with some of the other reviewers that Jo, who tells the story, seems somehow disconnected throughout the book from her life and the people in it...to a degree that bothered me and left her seeming somehow two-dimensional, not fully drawn by the author. But maybe that was Miller's intent, to demonstrate that many a person arrives at middle age still vaguely unsure of just how to experience life and be fully engaged with even close family members. Jo couldn't seem ever to enter into life at the present moment, because she was always taking her emotional pulse or waiting for some undefined "something" to come along and define her life for her. Daniel seemed more like a real person to me: He was kind, loving and tolerant, but also capable of anger, jealousy and resentment; and I found myself wondering, several times, just what it was about his wife that caused him to love her so deeply. Jo had reached middle age still basically dissatisfied and, I thought, extremely narcissistic. Most of us, if we're honest with ourselves, have in our worst moments toyed with fantasies of situations which would appall us in real life. But WHY did Jo always have to unload onto her husband? Seems to me she was forever asking for absolution at the expense of someone else's feelings....much like Eli, actually. I really didn't like this woman very much, now that I think about it. But while I wouldn't give the book a rave review or highly recommend it, it has certainly left me with some things to puzzle over.
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Summary: While I was Gone brings past to present
Review: Sue Millers story, done in excellent first person, brings a young girls past into a grown womans present. often when a person finds themselves unable to deal with their personal conflicts, they return to a time in their lives when day to day living was easy and carefree. Or so we THINK it was carefree. The main character may hide from her emotions of a mid life crisis but discovers her past has caught up to her present and she must deal with secrets and feelings that have been buried for many years. Excellent drama drawn out the entire book.
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Summary: Beautifully written
Review: This book revolves around a theme of forgiveness and has a little bit of surprises here and there... Very simple book, though... and some parts are rather mundane -- only problem with this book. The author paces the reader well, with very chronological arrangement of ideas, unlike some books... If you are in for thriller, this will not be your choice, but if you need some food for though, trust me -- this is it!
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Summary: Wish I was gone
Review: I have never read this author before, so when Oprah suggested it on her show, I thought I'd give it a read. While it was not the WORST book I have ever read, I can't say I liked it much. The story was scattered with a lot of extra information that it didn't need. I was especially disappointed in the fact that the supposed topic, when is infidelity infidelity?, was almost an afterthought. I kept waiting for the story to go into that, when Oops, a murder. Seems like this author couldn't really decide on a storyline, so she picks several, with no depth to any of them. I don't think I will be reading her other books.
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Summary: "Girls book" grown up
Review: I hesitate to call this a book for women as I tend to believe women have come a long way from the customs of the 1960s; however, for some reason, this book reminded me of the "books for girls" on the library shelves of the 1960s. They were books I, as a girl growing up in that era, tried to avoid because I found them dull, boring, and uninteresting when compared to "books for boys." This book seems to fall in the same category -- a lot of psychological and motivational review with no action. For those that enjoyed reading "books for girls," this book will be a good read; for those of us women with more "liberated" taste, this book is simply a grown up version of "books for girls."
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Summary: Made for TV Movie Screenplay
Review: Lifetime should option it, which is not to say that it was all bad. There are a lot of moving parts in this story, but the best writing is dedicated to the more mundane aspects of Jo's life and her feelings about them (i.e., the anxiety she felt about whether or not to have an affair despite her happy marraige). Best of all, Daniel's sermon about death and memory was perfect and worth the read if for it alone. It has been highlighted for inevitable future reference when I'm certain it will provide emotional comfort.
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