Rating: 
Summary: "Magic is sometimes like love."
Review: Subtle, beautiful, poignant prose--if you're like me, you were starting to wonder if it could still be found in a book written in the 90s. Here it is. Never mind the plot, which has none of the knife-blade intensity we're so used to these days. And never mind the characters, which are unique and real, though not particularly complex or surprising. Read this book for the sentences, the paragraphs, the feelings and descriptions and quiet inner musings of the Magician's Assistant herself, the ultimate almost-X-gen expert in not-quite-tragic infatuation, Sabine Parsifal. This book is as much poem as novel. The voices echo eerily, as if you'd heard every line in the "real" world but you can't remember where. On the other hand, if subtlety and unending depression bore you, or positive portrayals of homosexual relationships freak you out, better skip this title and head for the bestseller list instead.
Rating:
Summary: An absolute delight.
Review: This book is a delight; beautifully written and thoroughly engaging. I was enchanted by the story and the people through whom the story was woven. After I finished reading it, I closed the book and then opened it back up to reread it.
Rating:
Summary: Sublte surprises in an interesting story
Review: The author has a keen sense of places (LA and the plains) and a feel for their people who live in them. The broad shape of the ending was easy to guess, but there were a lot of subtle twists and turns in getting there. I am recommending the book to my friends, at least the kind who would not care if there is a real Walmart in Alliance, Nebraska.
Rating: 
Summary: Terrific, keeps your interest without being a roller coaster
Review: I loved this book. It was somewhat surreal, only in that the story, although very possible, seemed to "step to the right" at little here and there. It did not follow some expected, cliche storyline that you could easily guess. It read a little like a mystery and a little like a romance. But be prepared for a stunning and somewhat surprising end! Now I'll read the Patron Saint, because I liked Patchett's style and involvement in womens internal drives and questions.
Rating: 
Summary: Ann Patchett Lacks Magic
Review: I wanted to like this novel, but I just couldn't. Like all of Patchett's other works, this one is boring and hard to read. After I bought the book and read it, I felt like I had been tricked by an evil magician. I felt like an unwilling participant at a magic show--the lady who gets sawed in half. The plot is jerky and lackluster; it's predictable and rather dull. The characters are slippery and distant. There is no energy, no rabbit out of the hat. It's a one woman show where the magic is missing. It deserves a zero but the marks don't go quite that low.
Rating:
Summary: Don't miss this book!
Review: Anne Patchett is a fine writer with a mastery of the language like few of her contemporaries. If you enjoy writers as diverse as Anne Tyler or Elizabeth McCracken, you will love this one, or any of Patchett's other titles.
Rating: 
Summary: There is no Walmart in Alliance Ne.
Review: There is no Walmart in Alliance NE. If an author is going to use a real setting for their story--she needs to make sure their facts are right. I couldn't accurately judge the story because of the factual errors.
Rating:
Summary: As good as contemporary fiction gets...
Review: Once again Ann Patchett takes the unlikliest of subjects and weaves a most compelling and involving tale. Grief, loss of a spouse, AIDS, Nebraska-in-winter. Why would anyone want to get into this ? Well, Patchett, as she amply demonstrated in her earlier book THE PATRON SAINT OF LIARS, is a master at creating people and dialogue that you feel like you KNOW. She skillfully sidesteps every cliche and takes you places you never imagined you would willingly go and on emotional journeys you never expected that your emotions might feel. The book is masterfully surprising with little "suspense" and she is a master of subtle writing. If you like Ann Tyler, Anita Shreve and Jane Smiley then this book is for you.
Rating:
Summary: Read something else
Review: This is another one of those books where everything and everyone is either black or white. LA and the three main characters are all flawless. Nebraska is a wasteland populated by ignorant brutes.
Come on Ann give us a little credit. Life isn't like that.
Rating: 
Summary: It could have been so much more...
Review: I LOVED "Bel Canto" and had high hopes for this book. As I began, I thought the characters were lovingly drawn and that the only reason the book felt a little flat was because we're seeing everything through Sabine's numb and grief stricken eyes.Yet as the book continues, that flat, superficial feeling never really goes away. We learn that the love of Sabine's life, Parsifal, could do no wrong even though he lied to Sabine about his past and did other horrible, though understandable things. We learn that Nebraska and snow are the definition of hell on earth and that Los Angeles and those who live there are perfect - their only flaws being insignificant ones. We learn that Sabine is one of the most clueless people on Earth, even after having travelled the world, having met hundreds of people, and after having lived 44 years in an international city like LA. I so started to doubt what I was experiencing through her that when she has her big emotional "breakthrough" - I didn't believe it. The ending is another of those "I guess I've written enough pages so I'll stop here" endings. Sigh. Patchett's writing is lyrical and so wonderful to read - I just feel that this book wasn't fleshed out enough. There just wasn't enough of a story or an ending to put it in the same league as "Bel Canto". I guess I'll just wait for her next book.
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