Rating: 
Summary: lushly written
Review: Lorian Hemingway's "A World Turned Over" is beautifully, lushly written. In a dreamer's evocative prose, she tells the story of the severe tornado that struck Jackson, Mississippi, in the spring of 1966, destroying the Candlestick Shopping Center. Hemingway, a girl of 10 at the time, had moved away shortly before the storm came. More than thirty years later, she returned to there to claim her own memories, and to record the recollections of people whose lives had been forever changed, some by the loss of a family member, some by witnessing sites that burned upon their souls. When they see the sky taking on that peculiar yellow tinge, when they hear the sirens, their bodies respond with pounding hearts, shallow breathing, goosebumps. They react not only to the sight and sounds, but to their own memories. Suffused with that sense of place which other southern writers also express so well, with the scents, sounds, sights of that region called "home", Hemingway's book will transport you to the Jackson she knew as a child, and to that March afternoon when the familiar world was turned upside down. This book deserves a wide readership! Highly recommended!
Rating:
Summary: Eloquent and touching
Review: The least discussed facet of grieving in our culture--that you don't get over it, that it doesn't go away, that you carry it to your grave, that those we have lost actually are still with us, is illuminated in this book with shining humanity, truth-drenched prose and rich description. Lorian Hemingway has dug way way way below the surface to pull out deep truths about people, tragedy, loss, renewal and survival and managed to avoid the triumphant ending other authors seem never to have been able to resist. A gripping read which will haunt you long after you've finished it.
Rating: 
Summary: More childhood memoir than disaster book
Review: This book seems out of place in the "disaster book" genre. The author seems more concerned with reliving her childhood. Not a very good read.
Rating:
Summary: More childhood memoir than disaster book
Review: This book seems out of place in the "disaster book" genre. The author seems more concerned with reliving her childhood. Not a very good read.
Rating: 
Summary: A Literary Disaster
Review: Warning: If you are looking for a good disaster story with a straightforward narrative account, then steer well clear of "A World Turned Over." The cardinal rule in such books is that the author should stand aside and allow the horrific events and the accounts of the survivors speak for themselves, maybe providing a little commentary along the way. Unfortunately, this tragic tale of a killer tornado is conveyed with so much overloaded flowery literary prose as to render it virtually unreadable. For example, here is a direct quote from page 70 describing the tornado: "Cruel and without conscience, calculated in its killing, the wolf at the door was deadlier than the red-haired boy could ever have known. The world rolled onto its side, the ground was pulled into the sky, the prayers for mercy given up were given back, and up into the dark column rose our sense of place and those who had made it so..." If passages like the above were lightly scattered throughout the book, it would be one thing. But they appear repeatedly on just about every page. Given that the victims of the tornado were, for the most part ordinary small town folk, the literary pretentions of the book seem even more inappropriate. Author Lorian Hemingway had a close personal connection to the disaster, having moved from Jackson, Mississippi, as a teenager only a few months before it happened. She knew most of the victims personally. Nevertheless, I can't imagine that anyone who does not have a personal connection to the disaster will be able to make it to the end of this book.
Rating:
Summary: I SWEAR I HEARD A "HEARTBEAT" AS I WAS READING
Review: what a great book!!
it can honestly fall under the heading of a nature, factual, small town/people and a suspenseful book. i loved the way this book bulit up from a small town story to the actual tornado part. you got to know some of the real life people and then the disaster hits. the accounts and lines used to describe the sounds of the tornado were great- "sounded like many frieght trains" and "like a heartbeat". i learned a lot from this book, but i also "saw" the story unfold in my head like an old black and white movie. (i think i saw it in black and white because of those great "wizard of oz"
refernces) the writing here and the words used were really what made this a great read. when i first glanced at this book i knew quickly it was something i would buy. what i didnt realize until i got home was the famous last name. at that point i seperated the two.
this hemingway stands on her own! i will go back and get her earlier works.
something though, makes me want to go take another peak at "old man and the sea".
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