Rating: 
Summary: Slow and dull
Review: I personally found the book slow and dull. It could not keep me interested and that is unusual since I can normally read just about any book that is put before me. There isn't much more I can really say about this book.
Rating: 
Summary: The Heart is a Lonley Hunter
Review: This is a brilliant novel set in a Georgia milltown during the Great Depression.Four people,struggling with their own identities, confide in a deaf mute. Dr. Copeland is a black physician suffering from TB who is estranged from his own family by his passionate devotion to protecting the rights of his race; Jake Blount, an alcoholic and border-line psychotic, who is tormented by his radical ideas of the rights of the working class, Biff Brannon a restaurant owner who is trying to come to terms with his own feelings following the death of his wife; and Mick Kelly, a sensitive teenage girl and daughter of the family who own the boarding house where the mute lives, . The four feel a special kinship to the mute, Mr. Singer, because of the sensitivity that each one must sense in him. Singer listens to their stories and asks them questions yet he gives little advice. Singer himself is a depressed by the decline, both physically and mentally, and institutionalization of his constant companion, another deaf mute, whose fate ultimately has a profound affect on Singer and his four confidants. The book deals subtly with several different social issues-racial strife in the South, a teenage girl coming to terms with her emerging sexuality, labor unrest, and the effect of the Great Depression on the middle class.
Rating: 
Summary: Not the ending i expected
Review: I decieded to read this book and join in on the hype. This book is not what i had expected. The writing is great and the character detail is great, but i must have missed something. The book bored me and the end...man, it left me with no deeper look at life.
Rating: 
Summary: The Heart is a Lonely Hunter~
Review: One of the most amazing things about The Heart is a Lonely Hunter is that Carson McCullers was only 23 when she wrote this. The writing in this novel is incredible. I think the reader should be prepared for the fact that this story is melancholy and can be depressing at times, but at the same time is brilliant in its character depth and social understanding. I wish I would have read this novel in highschool as there is clearly a lot of symbolism and statement that would lead to great discussions. The center of this novel is John Singer a deaf-mute who is feeling abandoned after his life-long friend Antonapoulos is sent away to a distant hospital. The novel introduces us to 4 lives: a young girl named Mick who grows up in poverty; Dr. Copeland, an African-American doctor; Jake Blount a wandering alcoholic and Biff Brannon a cafe owner. We learn the loneliness and pain of each of these characters and watch as each one is drawn to the mute, John Singer. McCullers details her novel with many truths about the human spirit, as well as some political and social statements of her own. It is said that much of the novel is autobiographical as McCullers was raised in a small southern town, primarily by her African-American maid. I would suggest that the reading of this novel is coupled with a little research about McCullers and some background info on the novel for full appreciation. Upon completion I am glad that I read this and can appreciate it for all that it offers and is trying to say.
Rating:
Summary: Insight into the lonely heart
Review: The Heart Is a Lonely Hunter by Carson McCullers. Highly recommended. Only 23 when she wrote The Heart Is a Lonely Hunter, Carson McCullers captures the restless energy of adolescence and the loneliness and isolation of those who choose not to fit into their world-Mick Kelly, an artistic teenager whose titles and graffiti reveal a darker side to her personality; Jake Blount, an itinerant socialist; Benedict Mady Copeland, a consumptive black physician; and Biff Brannon, owner of the New York Café. Linking this disparate group of outsiders is the ironically named John Singer, a man who cannot talk (or sing). They are drawn to him, as lonely people are to someone they believe will listen and understand. They never step out of themselves to discover that Singer listens, but he doesn't understand, nor do they realise that he, too, is lonely and isolated-or why. Just as these four impose their concept of Singer upon him, he has his own idol-his companion of 10 years, Spiros Antonapoulos. While Singer's lonely friends project upon him the character of a wise, knowing, understanding man, Singer in turn imposes a similar personality on Antonapoulos. His life revolves around his rare visits to the asylum to which Antonapoulos is eventually taken. As the reader's awareness of Antonapoulos as a childish, greedy, and lazy man grows, so grows Singer's faith in him as gentle and wise. As a fellow mute, Antonapoulos is all Singer has, so he both idealises and idolises him-in the same way that Mick, Blount, Copeland, and, to a lesser extent, Brannon idealise and idolise Singer. Rarely do any of the four interact, except when Blount and Dr. Copeland engage in a circular argument about how best to help their peoples-victims of capitalism in Blount's case, blacks in Dr. Copeland's. These two groups have much in common, but just as Blount and Dr. Copeland remain in bitter conflict, so do their peoples-a conflict which is alluded to throughout and which culminates in a brawl at the carnival grounds where Jake works. Dr. Copeland and Jake never find common ground, nor do the poor white laborers and oppressed blacks they wish to enlighten. Dr. Copeland's self-sacrificing but hopeless dedication and Jake's self-destructive brutality could be seen as representing their time and place, the 1930s South. Sexual ambiguity pervades the novel. It is never clear whether Singer and Antonapoulos are lovers, although it seems like that that is what lies behind Singer's uncritical devotion. Even when Antonapoulos's selfish, greedy, irrational behaviour drives away a third mute, Singer is merely disappointed at the loss of a potential friend-as long as he has Antonapoulos, he is content. After Antonapoulos leaves, ". . . in the spring a change came over Singer . . . his body was very restless . . . unable to work off a new feeling of energy." This sexual energy is shared by Mick, who is always restless. This isolates her even more from the rest of her family: her father, a disabled carpenter trying half-heartedly to make a living; her mother, for whom Mick acts as a substitute parent for her younger brothers Bubber (George) and Ralph; her older brother Bill, once close to her and now distant; and her older sisters Hazel and Etta, who have been forced from adolescence into adulthood through work and their own conventional interest in celebrity. (One could speculate about the nature of the "diseased ovary" Etta develops.) Mick lives in an "inside room," where she finds peace in music and in her perceptions of her friendship with Singer. Later, after her sexual initiation, she finds herself slyly manipulated into taking a job by her apparently solicitous family; at this point, she notices that, while the "inside room" is still important, she has less time and energy for it. McCullers exposition of Mick's transition from inventive childhood to dulling adulthood is subtle and is one of the best aspects of the novel. Of the four, Brannon is the most enigmatic. After his wife dies, he redecorates in what seems a distinctly unmasculine way (in contrast to his heavy, black beard, the subject of many comments). Even more interesting, he begins to wear his late wife's perfume. While he observes, defends, and supports Jake, his sexual feelings are focused on Mick, to whom he seems distant and cold (in her naiveté, Mick attributes his attitude to the fact that she and Bubber shoplifted gum from the café). Not surprisingly, after Mick is sexually initiated, obtains a job, and begins to dress and behave more like a girl on the cusp of womanhood, Brannon loses interest and consequently warms up to her. She is now no more of a challenge to his impotence than his late wife was. McCullers weaves a dense cloth of themes. First, there is the inward and selfish nature of loneliness. No one ever truly reaches out; in fact, Mick's Jewish neighbor Harry, appalled by fascism and Hitler, and Brannon are the only characters who are interested in the greater world. The conditions of the working poor and the black experience are eloquently portrayed without much narrative or focus on details. By the end, everything and nothing has changed. Mick is determined to escape fate through music, unlikely as it seems; a weakened Dr. Copeland becomes unable to carry on his "strong, true purpose." Blount leaves town to find someone who will finally accept the basket of ideas that haunts his nightmares; Brannon, "suspended between bitter irony and faith," faces the dawn exactly as he has for years. McCullers' portrayal of these disparate characters are true to life and reveal a remarkable insight into people, no matter their age, gender, race, or background-an insight that is lacking in her self-absorbed characters. The heart is a lonely hunter, so it will find what it wishes to-love-in the most unlikely of places. It would take many re-readings to mine the richness here. Diane L. Schirf, 31 May 2004.
Rating:
Summary: Life Situations Come Alive
Review: The Heart Is A Lonely Hunter is a great book! Most people can surely relate to many of the characters in the story. Each person has pretty much the same issues as most of us in every day life. The story shows how it is for people of color in a town of racist white people, what it's like for the deaf to live in a world of silence, of a child's dream to have a passion for music. If you'd like to read a great story, this is your book!
Rating:
Summary: Old Classic
Review: This book was originally published in 1940 and has been considered a classic ever since. Unfortunately, as Mark Twain once said, "A classic is a book everybody praises but nobody reads." In this case, I am glad to see Oprah recommend it and thus restore its popularity. The characters are rough and sometimes ugly, but beneath all this the heroine manages to find beauty and happiness. Great story for young women readers.
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Summary: Wonderful and unusual story
Review: I've read all of Carson McCuller's novels, and this one is easily her best. I liked "The Member of the Wedding." "Reflections in a Golden Eye" was O.K. I didn't like "The Ballad of the Sad Cafe," and furthermore, I have no idea why critics love it as much as they do. "A Clock Without Hands" is completely forgettable and not worth your time. But this is McCullers' great work. It's truly a great, unique and universal story, a timeless story about isolation, one which makes you care about what happens to the characters, one in which the characters and the events depicted are true to life. These are people you could meet, three-dimensional characters you can like, love, admire, some of whom you might also want to avoid. It's a tragic story, and reading it one experiences real emotions, particularly feelings of alienation from the rest of humanity -- a feeling which all the major characters experience in one form or another. Enjoy it and don't ruin it for anyone by revealing the sudden surprise near the end.
Rating:
Summary: The Heart Is A Lonely Hunter
Review: Carson McCuller writes this book with her own heart in the writing. The book is written with a lot of feeling and puts a hold on you, you just can't put the book down. It is one of the best stories of the small southern town and the happenings that go on there. The story is told through four main characters, the main character being a deaf mute that seems to have every one opening up to. This book is a must read- Larry Hobson- The Day Of The Rose
Rating:
Summary: Sixty-four Years Later
Review: I stumbled upon The Heart Is a Lonely Hunter a couple of years ago and purchased it for a dollar. I think it was on one or more of the "greatest 100" lists that folks publish on various boards, so I scooped it right up. I did enjoy the writing and the complexities of the story, even if it is occasionally bleak and sad. One aspect I loved is that it did hone in on a tiny microcosm within a single town, showing universality in a finite manner. The main "lonely" characters look to the deaf-mute John Singer as possessing incredible listening and audience skills, and they all literally go to him, turn to him, for obviously merely tacit advice, to pour out their hearts, while revealing their troubles and dreams. It is as if they project the answers they are searching for onto his dignified and quiet persona. Little do they know that he is as lonely and mixed up as they are, after losing his companion to insanity. Singer's stream of consciousness is noteworthy.
The book moves back and forth among each character's story, but it is linear and easily followed. The budding teenager Mick stole the show, and I found Doctor Copeland to be the most interesting character, yet the questions left surrounding the human condition involving racism, family, communism, alcoholism, aspirations, relationships, etc., run the gamut of human existence, and they are sensitively portrayed by an amazing (at the time) 23 year old writer.
This novel is a stellar example of a work standing the test of time. Roe Recommended. Roe
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