Running in the Family

Rating:
Summary: make up your own history...
Review: I believe that this book should rival the praise given to the"English Patient". It has the feel of a hybrid-poeticautobiography mixed with a new york times top 10 fiction novel. Ondaatje liberates traditional novel format by interspersing this story with various sorts of entries and photos, creating a diary-like mind-visual, using elements of his own life (he's mentioned somewhere that he took creative license with the facts...) and poetic counterpoint, this book allows one the freedom to enter one's own history freely and dramatize &/or beautify at will...a healthy practice to say the least.

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Summary: Lush and Beautifully Written
Review: I thought that this was a beautiful book but I wouldn't recommend it to everyone-if you're the type whose reading is limited to thrillers and soppy romance then I doubt this would do for you. But if you like imaginative, beautiful, flawless writing, like me, then you'd love this wonderful memoir everybit as much as I did. Ondaatje transports you into his world through his witty, tender and sensual writing...in places it reads like a poem. Running in the Family is sort of like a sketchbook...filled with humourous anecdotes, sensual poems and glimpses of beauty and history...and of course, his outrageous family. Even though I live in Sri Lanka and am familiar with most of the places and things he writes about I was still delightfully stunned by the way he adds new insight and meaning and beauty to these things. Also, I used to imagine that memoirs were dull and boring...but I totally regret my words now. This is hilarious (though in places exaggerated), beautiful and powerful stuff and I give it my highest recommendation.

Rating:
Summary: you *can* come home again!
Review: In Running in the Family (1982), Ondaatje turns the biographical microscope on himself and his personal family history. There are wonderful anecdotes about his parent's courtship (a story so amazing it would make for an excellent novel in itself) and Ondaatje's feelings on returning to Ceylon. I was pleasantly surprised to find that in addition to the personal anecdotes, many of the poems I love in "The Cinnamon Peeler" have their origins here. This book is a masterful blend of prose and poetry and a must read for the Ondaatje fan.

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Summary: A lost paradise
Review: In this magical book what Micheal captures is the essence of a bygone era. Sri Lanka (Ceylon) also had a generation like Scott Fitzgerald's jazz generation. His parents are from this generation and most of his books, I feel, are influenced by it. My parents were also from this generation and I caught the tail end of it. If any, non Sri Lankan, visits Sri Lanka, after reading this book they will be disapointed. Like the traveller in one of Borges stories, who finds pieces of an ancient map buried in the desert, you will find only bits and pieces of what he describes buried in the present society. Sri Lanka today is a true example of Satre's dictum "Hell is other people" and his recent book Anil's Ghost depicts it well. It truly is a paradise lost.

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Summary: Michael Ondaatje returns to his boyhood home in Sri Lanka.
Review: Michael Ondaatje returns to his childhood home in Sri Lanka to sort out truth from fiction about his eccentric family. The atmosphere is hot and steamy and so are some of the stories he learns about his relatives. The chapters about Lalla, Ondaatje's magical grandmother are his best, describing this "Auntie Mame"- like woman, liberated after the death of her husband. Yes, we know Ondaatje for his English Patient, but this memoir gives us insight into the author and his Sri Lankan roots. Readers will want to visit Ondaatje's Sri Lanka right away. The steamy descriptions of the jungle are luscious to contemplate..

Rating:
Summary: A multi-sensory experience in print
Review: Michael Ondaatje's "Running In The Family" is a fascinating look into the author's family and "growing-up" traditions. Despite the fact that I have not been to Sri Lanka, Ondaatje's masterful use of imagery and local color add substance to what he is writing about. Another thing is the subtle humor throughout the book. I particularly enjoyed the chapter "Lunch Conversation". It's quite insightful which is why it strikes a familiar chord in all who read it perhaps. A definite must-read for those who appreciate vivid and unusual use of words to convey the book's essence.

Rating:
Summary: A multi-sensory experience in print
Review: Michael Ondaatje's "Running In The Family" is a fascinating look into the author's family and "growing-up" traditions. Despite the fact that I have not been to Sri Lanka, Ondaatje's masterful use of imagery and local color add substance to what he is writing about. Another thing is the subtle humor throughout the book. I particularly enjoyed the chapter "Lunch Conversation". It's quite insightful which is why it strikes a familiar chord in all who read it perhaps. A definite must-read for those who appreciate vivid and unusual use of words to convey the book's essence.

Rating:
Summary: this book is very inspiring,
Review: michael ondaatje's book is one of the few books that i found really easy to read, but when i went back to it i realised there was alot more meaning hidden. it is not only a travel book, but a diary, and a very personel story of a man finding his roots. very touching. i recommend it.

Rating:
Summary: For Those Who did not love "Anil's Ghost"
Review: No author can make every book work. It's unfair to expect that. This is the first Ondaajate book I read, make that: devoured. I loved the non-linearity, the depth of love for his home country, the characters gathering and separating. I write this review because I believe strongly that Anil's Ghost is the companion piece to "Running in the Family" and less well-done, less artful. But this book more than makes up for the flaws in the later book. Perhaps the kleig lights of fame are too hot for a writer to work at his best. I say that because the author of this book is so gifted and has so much to evoke that I expect he will do so again, maybe not in his beloved, insane Sri Lanka, or maybe back there again. So, in closing, If you despaired of loving "Anil's Ghost" read this and you're efforts will be fully redeemed.

Rating:
Summary: Vivid imagery, poetic yet different from `English Patient'.
Review: Ondaatje goes back to visit his motherland and the episodes deal with aspects of his family history. The narration is very poetic, the imagery he evokes are at times are close to magic realism. The book is far away from the seriousness of `English Patient'. It is not a travel catalogue either. A lighthearted short lively novel with the flavour of wilderness