Rating: 
Summary: Beautiful
Review: This book is incredible. I could not put it down, and could not stop thinking about it for days after I finished it. I wished I had a whole pile of books that would be similar and as fulfilling. This story is about true love, passion, and it opens up questions of morality, trust and honesty. Anita Shreve portrays this time period so well, and builds the characters amazingly. She creates compelling people who you truly get to know and will be sad to see go. I highly recommend this book.
Rating:
Summary: What a treat!
Review: I enjoy audio books as I travel to and from work. Sometimes I wonder what I am missing by listening rather than reading. But Melissa Hughes talent added to Anita Shreve's fascinating story. Shreve's writing style contains deep thoughts and nuances that can quickly be passed over if one is a fast reader. Hughes' reading was expertly paced and every thought and nuance was easily caught by the listener. I appreciated Hughes' talent for distinguishing the voices of the characters. Not only did she do this by pitch and tone, but through various regional accents of the upper and lower classes, as well as the accents of native French speakers speaking English. Shreve did not disappoint. I savored every moment of the story as it unfolded. Her characters were very real and sympathetic. The ending was unpredictable and yet very satisfying. I highly recommend this book and audio experience.
Rating:
Summary: Best ever, read!
Review: Fortune's Rocks will become a classic. Nothing comes close to Shreve's style and descriptive writing which embellishes every page of this extraordinary novel. Food for thought is offered on many levels. Having read several of her books, I am still amazed by each twist and turn of Fortune's Rocks riveting saga and unforgettable characters. A must read!
Rating: 
Summary: An exquisite novel of love and yearning
Review: This novel about the affair between a much older man and a 15-year-old girl is controversial in its premise, but completely compelling under Shreve's assured guidance. The oceanside setting of turn-of-the-20th-century New Hampshire is also a seductive environment recalling an era of deep-set traditions being pulled into the subversiveness of the new century.*** As the story opens, our young heroine, Olympia, makes the precarious passage to girlhood to womanhood: "For in the space of time it has taken to walk from the sea-wall to the sea, perhaps a distance of a hundred yards, she has passed from being a girl, with a child's pent-up and nearly frenzied need to sweep away the rooms and cobwebs of her winter, to being a woman." *** Olympia exudes a wiser, stronger sense of self than most of us are blessed with even as adults. Her evolving emotions and experiences are breathtaking. Shreve makes it absolutely clear that Olympia is not romantically preyed upon. Her affair with John Haskell, the much older, very married family man, is the convergence of two souls who would've lived accomplished and not-unhappy lives had they not met. But because they do, they recognize a chance for transcendence. It's an incredible discovery of love -- one that will jeopardize their futures and the futures of their families. *** The first half of the book is the most captivating, but Shreve quite admirably sees her characters through to the end. Edith Wharton is a clear influence and with marvelous results.
Rating:
Summary: A passion story of growing up and finding your own voice...
Review: Olympia, the main character, begins a passionate, forbidden romance with a much older man. I don't always like these May/November romances, but I found this one compelling -- perhaps because it's told from the point of view of Olympia who is struggling to grow up in repressed, Victorian times. She may be young and inexperienced, but she certainly isn't seduced -- in fact, at times, she seems like the stronger of the two. Olympia is able to grow into her true self only by breaking the rules and stepping outside the bounds of "proper" society. She has a conscience, too. This book deals with not only their romance, but touches on questions of conscience, such as women's rights, abortion, poverty and other social issues. I didn't see the ending as a cop out to the happy endings that we love so well, but as the natural outcome of Olympia's spirit and determination. GREAT STORY! I also loved it that the author used the same setting as she did for The Pilot's Wife. It was fun to read about how that area was at the turn of the century.
Rating: 
Summary: How times have changed...or have they?
Review: An older married man has a passionate affair with the teenage daughter of his good friend. With a few changes here and there, it could come straight from today's headlines. But this story is set in an earlier time, when women had few options other than marriage and children, and scandal meant social ostracism, and not a lucrative book contract. Though unsympathetic as a homewrecker, our sympathies are ultimately with Olympia and her struggles to rise above the scandal. How sad when your only option as a single woman was to be a teacher, governess, nanny,or missionary - whether suited for it or not. The author also uses the other "happily" married women characters, especially Olympia's "invalid" mother, as examples of the compromises women made almost a century ago. The author is also wonderful at describing a first love - and obsession with the beloved. No matter how much we may disagree with Olympia's pursuit of a married and much older man, we can identify with her feelings of love and lust. I also found the "subplot" of the class and cultural differences and discord between the Franco-Americans' struggle to keep their culture, and the Anglo-Americans' financial and cultural superiority quite interesting.
Rating:
Summary: Love all wrong
Review: This is a great novel of the wrong kind of love. What is even better is that it is set in the Victorian Age, when pretty much every thing is wrong. The area this novel takes place is not too far from where I grew up and was very realistic in terms of setting. I felt for Olivia the whole way. The one complaint is the ending, which I found a bit unbelievable in this era.
Rating: 
Summary: Fortunes Rocks
Review: I bought Fortunes Rocks because I found The Pilot's Wife riveting. As much as I liked the previous book, however, I found this one to be disappointing. Normally I enjoy visiting bygone eras in fiction, but I found the premise of the novel implausible and the story itself, boring. The end was insultingly tidy -- (don't read further without "spoiling" the end). The family is healed and reunited at their beloved summer home; and the boy, his working class parents (thankfully dead and dying), is back among the fold just in time to avoid a life sentence in a factory and to benefit from the manners, couth and education his biological parents can offer.
Rating:
Summary: A Good Beach read
Review: Found the story a little preposterous, but managed to finish it. I think it highly unlikely that a girl from a good family could have carried on an affair like this without being discovered, but stranger things have probably happened. Shreve can't seem to make her characters come alive for me for some reason--"The Pilot's Wife" was the same--both stories had great potential but were a little flat.
Rating:
Summary: My good fortune is reading Fortunes Rocks
Review: This is a wonderful book which despite its length, is a very quick read and a page turner. Sherve takes us back in time to a girl who is on the cusp of womanhood and brings us into a forbidden relationship and its effects on those around her. It is a story of growth, love, relationships, maturity, and obligation. One of the best books I have read in quite some time.
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