Rating: 
Summary: Hoping for another great Smiley Novel
Review: After reading "Horse Heaven" and loving every minute, I have been anxiously awaiting Ms. Smiley's newest novel. It never grabbed me, nothing terribly interesting or exciting happened, and the big con played on our likeable main character wasn't so very awful. It was basically blah and I was disappointed. If you really want to read this book, don't buy it! Get it from the library or borrow from a friend who has already spent their money on it! Sorry Jane, looking forward to the next one.
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Summary: The reason white collar crime isn't interesting
Review: Anyone who has read "Moo" or "A Thousand Acres" can attest to Jane Smiley's ability as a writer. Her plots are interesting, her characters enthralling and her writing as fluid as a warm country lake. "Good Faith" is a dog. An old, lazy dog. Not even Jane Smiley can turn the S&L scandal and a real estate deal into a lively, engrossing book. I never thought I'd skip pages in a Smiley book, but the last 60 pages of this book was so dull I wanted to gnaw off my limbs. The plot is hidden under a dusty quilt of minutiae and the characters are as insipid as those surrounding the Whitewater fiasco. If you haven't read Jane before -- don't read this one. Choose another because she has truly given us some of the best books ever written.
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Summary: real estate and sex, what a combination!
Review: Good Faith is the new novel by Pulitzer Prize winning author Jane Smiley (A Thousand Acres). Thus far, ever novel I have read by Jane Smiley (four) has been very good. Good Faith is no exception. Good Faith is set in the 1980's during an economic high point. Joe Stratford is a realtor. He is described on the book jacket as the type of guy that everyone likes. He is friendly and good at his job. Stratford spends a lot of time working on putting together a sale of one very big, expensive property. At the same time, he is working with Marcus Burns, an ex-IRS agent who is always searching for a way to get rich quick and not have to pay taxes. Stratford gets involved in a scheme that Burns cooks up about a huge land development deal. Good Faith is really about two things: real estate and sex. The real estate portion of the book has been mentioned. The sex has not. Stratford gets involved with an old friend, a married woman named Felicity. Even as his real estate career is heating up, so is his relationship with Felicity. She is a free spirit, though they are being very secretive about the relationship. Breaking up the routine of the real estate portions of the book, we are given some of the most well-written sex scenes that I've come across. They aren't lewd or overly graphic and while somewhat idealized they come across as very real. I'm not sure that any author of Smiley's caliber writes sex scenes this good. After reading Good Faith I am reminded why I enjoy reading Smiley's work. She is a very good writer (Moo is probably my favorite of her books). Good Faith may not be up to the standard of some of her other books, but it is well above the standard of most other authors. Good Faith is worth checking out. I found it very interesting all the way through (despite the fact that it is about real estate) and very well written.
Rating: 
Summary: Not Pulitzer prize material.
Review: Good Faith seems to have started out as a social novel, attempting to capture the spirit of America as it led to the savings and loan debacle of the 80's. Along the way it was hijacked by the character of Marcus Burns, visionary, manipulator, master of the new thinking. This could have been a good thing, and certainly Marcus is original, but I found him a bit over the top; also, you never see him from the inside, revealing as some of his conversations are. Smiley is very interested in family and siblings, Good Faith is no exception, and certainly there is a lot to like here. Another focus of the book are the love affairs of the narrator, Joe Stratford, and Smiley does a very good job with the "action". To my taste, however, Smiley seems to too content to make Joe's lovers interesting people rather than interesting, nuanced characters. While Smiley does not devote a lot of time to Joe's parents, religious fundamentalists who live what they believe, I found them surprisingly refreshing. Good Faith is not Pulitzer prize winning material.
Rating:
Summary: What a Waste!
Review: How is it that a really excellent writer like Jane Smiley who can create numerous interesting characters can write such an incredibly boring book? I read all 417 pages, hoping against hope that it would not turn out to be as I feared, "all wind up and no pitch." But indeed, that is exactly what it was. So many details... Oh, my God. Did I care on page 379 that Joe ate a ham sandwich and tomato soup for dinner? No. Some really good scenes. Way too much descriptive sex. Repetitious drives to the same old places. Don't bother.
Rating:
Summary: Another view
Review: I agree with a lot of the positive aspects of Good Faith, as pointed out in many of its reviews, so I won't go into that. I was very disappointed that Joe, without much thought, casually used cocaine when it was offerred and apparently sufferred little or no consequences or regret. Also little or no consequences or regret for his promiscuity. The story has few consequences of any of the wrongs exhibited other than foolishly lost money. I was also disappointed that the only apparent Christians are depicted as nut cases.
Rating:
Summary: A Travesty
Review: I am a big fan of Smiley's; LOVED A Thousand Acres, Age of Grief and others. But I could not get through this. It is such a disappointment when someone with Smiley's demonstrated talent writes something so meandering, and so infused with trite analysis of the greediness of the 1980's. And the gratuitous and repetitive sexual scenes were something new and unwelcome from Smiley. Smiley has written so much that is wonderful; I wouldn't recommend spending time on this one.
Rating:
Summary: Delightful, Interesting, Memorable
Review: I am a fan of Smiley's, although I enjoy some of her works more than others. This one was right up there with Thousand Acres for me. I felt the tension throughout the story and found her characters and their attitudes thoroughly evocative of the times. I read it months ago and the characters remain with me now.
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Summary: Has anyone noticed......????
Review: I am listening to this book on tape. The reader is the incomparable Richard Poe, whose voice is like hot fudge over Hagendaas ice cream. The writing is sublime, the reader is divine; what more could one ask for? Except....this book sounds like, reads like, A CLONE OF RICHARD FORD'S (another Pulitzer recipient) "INDEPENDENCE DAY" as read, yes, by Richard Poe (for Recorded Books, Inc.). Hello! I mean, it's as if Smiley read Ford's book and just decided to keep it going...real estate, sex, family stuff, and funny riffs on the "wisdom" of the real estate world and the amusing, sometimes irritating, sometimes adorable people who...people it. Maybe these two literary stars wrote their books in complete vacuums. Obviously, they must have. But "Faith" is like Ford's Book continued. Even descriptions of characters are very similar, as well as names. And believe me, I don't have a problem with that. What a blast, getting to listen to a slightly different take on my first favorite book. Ford's is more compassionate, humane, loving. His character Frank Bascomb is one of the dearest characters in all of literature, and as a writer I was hugely inspired by his writing. I think the world of Smiley, too, but this is an incredible coincidence. Did reading "Independence Day" make her rush to her computer, as I did? I know there was a temptation for me to write like Richard Ford...but I resisted it and thank goodness the book I was writing is my very own, for better or worse. Still, it got me going, as great lit often does. Anyway, I just thought I'd put it out there and see if anyone else had the same reaction to "Good Faith." I haven't finished the book, so I'll write a more thorough review when I'm finished, and perhaps my take on it will change somewhat. But darn, if this doesn't sound like ACT TWO of "Independence Day."
Rating:
Summary: ignore the doubters!
Review: I am surprised that many of the reviews for this book are so lukewarm. I adored it, as did my father, sister and brother-in-law, whose collective reading tastes range from Tacitus to Jilly Cooper and beyond. What's more it made me go back and re-read all Smiley's books in my possession and seek out the ones I hadn't already read (Moo, The Greenlanders). They are all terrific, and she certainly knocks other, more feted, American writers into a cocked hat. But whereas some of her other books contain elements which might alienate the sceptical reader (not me - I love 'em all!) - telepathic horses, campus farce, enigmatic Norsemen, coke-snorting wanabee rock stars - I honestly don't think she puts a foot wrong here. One of her most accessible novels, and I mean that in a good way. Read it, then read the rest.
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