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Summary: A great American late 20th Century novel
Review: Rick Moody has written a masterpiece; a brilliant overview of a dysfunctional surburban family during the early 1970's. He does as fine a job as Tom Wolfe did in "Bonfire of the Vanities" in recording a certain moment in American history. His reliance on 1970's trivia, criticized by other customers, is important as the means through which he sets the stage for his fictitious family and their actions during the course of the ice storm. I can't think of another writer who has so aptly captured the domestic horrors of surburbia. In my list of great American novels from the 1980's and 1990's, "The Ice Storm" shares top billing with Tom Wolfe's "Bonfire of the Vanities", Mark Helprin's "A Winter's Tale", E. L. Doctorow's "Ragtime" and William Gibson's "Neuromancer". Without a doubt, Rick Moody is one of the most unique, distinctive voices of my generation; I feel privileged having been a fellow classmate of his in a college writing seminar many years ago.
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Summary: One of the Best Novels of the 1990s
Review: Rick Moody is one of the few truly important young contemporary fiction writers. He's a natural who can describe even the most taudry and painful subjects with a moving lyricism. But he can tell a story too, and the Ice Storm's a compelling one about family and loss of faith. The film was brilliant--as Moody has readily admitted--but the book has a unique voice you won't hear in the movie. Highly, highly recommended, as are his other novels and short stories.
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Summary: Depiction of a cultural wasteland and it's tragedy
Review: Rick Moody's classic book on the 70s is rich with detail of the era. Set in New Canaan, CT, an affluent WASP town which some consider a suburb of NY, two dysfunctional families pay the ultimate price for their jaded life-styles. It's the children who suffer as their parents struggle with issues too myriad and complicated to detail in a short review. Suffice it to say that a neighborhood key party provides the chaotic climax to an evening on which an ice storm rages outside, while a metaphorical storm of ice rages within.
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Summary: Recently re-read it, and I'm not keeping it
Review: So, um, I recently moved. What does that mean? Well, it means I had to figure out what to keep and what to throw. (Ok, not THROW, but what to sell, give away, and lend out indefinitely... and throw). Guess where this book went? Into the FREE PLEASE TAKE ME pile at the mailroom at work, that's where.Look, Moody is gifted. He's just not as gifted as he thinks he is. It's a shame his only tools are Faulkneresque sentences and brooding overture. If he could plot a little, he be a durn genius. But with Moody, it ain't about the story. It ain't about the characters. As with all the guys in his little club, he's got The Disease. The disease of expositional overload. And the book suffers greatly for it. The movie is actually better than the book, for once. In the movie, each of the children actually feel like something other than cardboard cutouts --- it's as if Charles Schulz took his Peanuts gang and gave them the same free reign as with Chuck, Linus, etc. and installed an even more free 1970s style unsupervised environment that puts the whole gang in overdrive (from many forms of not-quite-harmless stimulation). In the movie, the adults are cardboard cutouts, as the novel clearly indicates them to be, and there is an optimism about the world that we can have that maybe it won't have to be like this for all generations. Yet in the book, the overarching theme is that we are never going to reclaim Peanuts-land gentility and carefreeness. I don't care if Moody is right or wrong (but he did not convince me), but upon re-reading the book did not make me feel like Moody had encompassed his subject any better than the first time I read it. The expositional blockage is still in the way.
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Summary: `Ice Storm' runs hot and cold
Review: The bookjacket's blurbs notwithstanding, ``The Ice Storm'' is not a great novel, and Rick Moody is not a great writer. But the book does have its moments and I found the story interesting most of the time. Unfortunately, the book suffers from thin character development and a superficial evocation of the Seventies. Wendy, Paul and their father are reasonably developed, but all the other characters are one-dimensional. As for capturing the '70s, it takes more than fleeting references to Nixon and certain rock albums. Too, all the space given to Marvel Comics struck me as self-indulgent. Still, I found myself wanting to find out how the story ended, and Mr. Moody, who's both intelligent and often funny, will no doubt improve as a writer. I plan to read more of his books, and I look forward to seeing what Hollywood did with (to?) ``The Ice Storm.'' Ernie Torres.
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Summary: the ugly side of 1970s American suburbia..
Review: The Ice Storm is a well-written, economical analysis of 1970s suburban life as told through the lives of two closely linked dysfunctional families during one sad winter evening. The story has many bitterly satiric elements, and it doesn't take itself too seriously. The author manages to pump in all the kitsch elements of the 1970s we all tried to forget: wife-swapping, awful tastes in furniture and clothing, drugs/booze, and the Vietnam war. A fun, fast read. For folks over forty it will be a trip down memory lane. For all others it will be an education. Bottom line: a good read. No one will confuse it with brilliant literature, but it is an accomplished effort. (..no, I have not seen the film. However the novel's simple structure makes me think it would transfer to film ratherly nicely.)
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Summary: one of the best modern novels
Review: The Ice Storm is one of the best books i have ever read. It works on a lot of different levels. The characters AREN'T fully developed, in the conventional sense, but that is delibrate. In fact, it's where a lot of the book's power comes from: no one i know is "fully developed" either. Is the book too cold? Look at the title. Moody writes about something clearly personal to him, but avoids becoming overly sentimental. The Ice Storm requires and rewards close reading.
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Summary: A CONTEMPORARY CLASSIC
Review: There is no other book that explains what's like growing up in the 70s better than THE ICE STORM. A very beautiful and delicate family drama. Yes, it's very cold but that's the point the author wants to emphasize. Most folks complain that the characters are not fully developed - its not a flaw at all. Its simply because the characters dont know themselves - they're confused and lost in a chilly world. Very distant also. We're not supposed to feel any warmth or comfortable.Moody wants us to feel distant with the characters - dont forget the progantist is the oldest son Paul whos totally lost and frozen. We see his family through his eyes.Reading the book is like visiting my childhood again. My parents spent too much time partying and tyring to keep up with the sexual revolution. It does have a devastating price - my father died of alcoholism last Christmas and I don't talk to my mom and sister anymore. For a very long time, my family forgot how to huddle even in the most difficult time. And th book rings very true for me and many other young folks. Moody is also a genius with words and his writing is very beautiful.
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Summary: A Huge Surprise
Review: This book has not left me since I read it well over a year ago. Moody's narrative style is comparable to John Cheever with a flair for American culture. This was incredible. Read it.
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Summary: Read this bk before, after, or instead of the movie!
Review: This is a complicated and textured story -- interwoven lives -- full of yearning, regret, aching sexuality, and thousands of details that resonate emotionally, rather than simply clutter one's head! The movie is thin ice compared to this novel, which is, frankly, quite beautiful -- and unforgettable.
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