Rating: 
Summary: Okay read w/interesting characters, but not her best.
Review: Ever since Colony I have read all of ARS books. While I enjoyed getting to know Molly Redwine & her family, I couldn't help but shake my head at her choices. The prospect of caring for herself frightens her so that she feels she must take care of something else. Swans, okay. But two crazy, manipulative women and a nasty, withdrawn, bitter man? Sorry Anne, you missed it this time. Therapy may not be the socially acceptable way for Southern women, but Molly may have benefitted more from 6 months of sessions with a compassionate caring therapist than this bunch of people. For ARS at her best try Colony, Kings Oak or even Heartbreak Hotel.
Rating: 
Summary: Two Thumbs Up for UP ISLAND
Review: Ms. Siddons has once again captured the true Southern spirit that transcends setting. Wherever her heroine travels, the Scarlett stength accompanies her. Molly in UP ISLAND spends most of the novel on Martha's Vineyard, but her persona displays the Atlanta sensitivity and reactions to both nature and people. Siddons has the ability to couple the story of a typical Southern woman's response to unfaithfulness and the empty nest syndrone with personal friendships, sexual passion, and parent/child relationships, blending all into a well-developed story line. Her varied characters in this novel offer reading appeal to a vast summer reading audience. Passages are often so poetic that they are worthy of reading aloud - or having printed on a t-shirt. This reader only wishes Ms. Siddons could create her characters more rapidly; I anxiously await the next novel.
Rating:
Summary: Another selfless female taking care of everyone else
Review: This was the first book I have read by Ms Siddons and it proved to be what I thought it would be: readable but unremarkable. I enjoyed the descriptions of "Eel woman" and could picture her and Tee in their bicylce shorts. Unfortunately I did not see much change in Molly. She just traded waiting on her immediate family in the south to waiting on a substitute family in the north. Can't she find anything else that would bring her fulfillment?
Rating: 
Summary: Is there a sequel coming?
Review: Sometimes life hands you many difficulties to handle at once. As if scripted from a soap opera, Molly Redwine must learn to deal with one disappointment after another. But the hardest thing to deal with is her new role in her family. In the end, she redefines her family. Will this be good enough for Molly? There are too many loose ends. She will surely face changes in her new family--can she deal with those disappointments?
Rating:
Summary: This one made me laugh out loud.
Review: I always enjoy reading ARS books. I liked Up Country because her descriptions of the characters made me laugh out loud on occasion. I also have a weak spot for cold New England Winters (even though I have never lived through one). I agree with some of the other reviews that it was slow at times but overall this was a great read laying poolside on vacation and would be an even better read laying in front of a roaring fire with a nice glass of wine on a cold winter day. Pat Conroy might have the market on "Beach Music" but ARS takes the cake for Beach Reading.
Rating:
Summary: A romance novel written just for my generation.
Review: I couldn't put this book down! I read it in 3 days - I loved it. It had a little of everything. Romance, death, deceit, class, roughing it ... and what an interesting cast of characters. I only need to convince my co-workers to read it so I have someone to talk to about it!
Rating:
Summary: If you are over 40, read this book!
Review: Probably only women over 40 can truly appreciate this wonderful book. I could certainly identify with Molly Redwine and her search for herself. I couldn't put this one down and I can't wait to read the rest of Siddons books. ARS, if you are reading this, please, please write a sequel - take us back to up island.
Rating:
Summary: If you've "lived," you'll love this one.
Review: You have to have some "living" under your belt before you can fully appreciate how Siddons has so expertly brought a variety of mid-life crisis (separation/divorce, empty nest, parental aging/death, grief, etc.) together in a solidly-bizarre group of characters.<P>Watch our main protagonist deal with her issues and chaos with dignity and honor... while her ex-to-be takes the low-road. If you've lived enough, your skin will positively ITCH with recognition and empathy. A great read.
Rating: 
Summary: It wasn't what I'd hoped for
Review: This is the first ARS book I've read, although I'd heard glowing reviews of her books for years. I was on the Vineyard last September for a few weeks, and had been speaking with two of my mom's good friends who heartily endorsed the book. When I got back to my office, I ordered the book through Amazon. Although I love the Island and all that it has to offer, I was disappointed with the pace of the book. I did enjoy the character development of Bella and Luz, but wasn't all that sympathetic toward Denny. And Molly, there are plenty of therapists on the Vineyard who can help you overcome your need to help needy people and not yourself. (By the way, last year the large male swan on Mill Pond did hiss and spit at me a lot, captured on film by my husband, but he didn't try to do me major harm.)
Rating:
Summary: ex southern belle becomes caretaker for bizarro bunch
Review: This author gives me more and more pleasure. the more she strays from her southern roots, the better she writes. In UP ISLAND, Molly Redwine is a middle aged, mother dominated Southern belle. (Mamma was purty, and Molly is purty too, but not as purty as Mamma was) However this belle gets dumped by her male menopause crazed husband. The other woman in this case is so wonderfully awful that readers must not miss her. If this is all not bad enough, Molly's favorite child has left the nest. What to do? Move up north to Martha's Vinyard and become a caretaker for a family far more Gothic than her own. Who says Southerners have a lock on weird, people should meet my family. Between crises, berserk swans (yes I said swans) and romance, UP ISLAND is a quick delightful beach read.
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