Rating: 
Summary: Once you finish, you want to start it all over again.
Review: Toni Morrison, being possibly the best writer of this generation, pulls you into the story. Although not quite as complex as some of her other books (like Beloved or Paradise), you can't help but be drawn to the characters and their plights. Her words are beautiful, so well-chosen in each sentence. Once I finished, I just wanted to go back to the beginning and catch all the incredible things I may have missed the first time around. The best author ever.
Rating: 
Summary: But is it love?
Review: Morrison gives us in about 100 pages nothing less than the twentieth century, as it was lived by the "colored folk" of a seaside community. A community dominated, infatuated, enriched, shocked, ruined, and finally haunted by Bill Cosey, the bigger-than-life owner of the great local hotel. The beautifully characterized voices of five women (Cosey's granddaughter, child bride, cook, daughter-in-law, even his posthumous flirt) spin the fascinating and complex web of love, hatred, dependency, greed, and shame left in the great man's wake. A great short book, one of Morrison's best.
Rating:
Summary: Accesible and still challenging
Review: This is the third book by Toni Morrison that I have read "in its entirety". The Blueset Eye and Sula are the only others I have been able to read without giving up. "Love" is an accesible yet challenging work of art. Unlike other offerings by Toni, "Love" does not require a dictionary, encyclopedia, nor extreme patience to read and understand. "Love" is an easy read that quickly pulls you in and demands that you feel and understand the emotional totality of each charachters existence. In typical Morrison style, this novel challenges you to think beyond the pages of the book. The charachters are so clearly defined and their actions so vividly expressed that you are left contemplating them long after the last page is read.
Rating:
Summary: 4 1/2, a gem
Review: I read everything this literary master writes. My favorites have been "The Bluest Eye" and "Sula" but this is will definitely go in my top three. It is an accessible, complusively readable book. I lingered over descriptions. The power of Morrison's writing is such that she can say very much in very few words. The psychological complexity of the women in this novel is immeasurable. I really liked these characters, their feuds, their irrational love for Bill Cosey, who is a marvel of a character as well. I am so glad Morrison wrote this rich and vital work.
Rating:
Summary: "Love" is how you'll feel about this novel
Review: Morrison never ceases to surprise me. She is an American treasure. Her writing is lyrical, powerful, poetic, complex, and heart-wrenching. You will not be able to put this tale down once you start. One word of advice: Pay attention to every single detail, no matter how minute it might seem at the time. Even something like a look or a off-hand comment can later be of utmost importance. Enjoy!!!
Rating:
Summary: Who really loved whom? $64,000 question!
Review: Toni Morrison is a difficult author to read. However, there is no question that she is masterful at her trade. While enthusiastically digesting and appreciating her latest challenging novel, "Love", the reader knows she is in the presence of a "writer" in the most laudatory sense of the word! A colleague of mine, noting the title, remarked "That looks like a 'ladies' book". Not necessarily so! While it is a character study of a man seen through the eyes of those women whom he most influenced, it is also an exquisitely crafted story of manipulation, deceit, generosity, benevolence, hatred, resentment and revenge. Bill Cosey was not only a renaissance man, one who had the foresight to build a small empire, a highbrow resort for upper class Negroes, but he was also a man with a dark side......P>It will take the reader a while to establish who is related to whom, how they came to be pieces in the greater puzzle, and how the two most vengeful characters will resolve their relentless battle. Fists fly, a knife is drawn at Bill's funeral, a will written on a napkin is contested by one of the combatants, a quest for another will with a clearer mention of a beneficiary is plotted. And who is the sweet "Cosey Child"? The novel is built layer upon layer and bits of information are slowly parceled out by the author, providing the hungry reader with just enough facts to keep her in a perpetual fog, letting it rise just a bit to get another glimpse of emerging answers to the puzzle, then carefully guiding the bewildered reader into another a maze of information that suddenly culminates in a crisp and shocking picture of Bill Cosey! His rise and fall. In the background, the humming ghost is our guide and clarifier. Toni Morrison is not an easy author to read! She guides, teaches, teases, challenges her readers using humour, intrigue, metaphor, history and fallible human beings. Once, as a guest on a talk show, Professor Morrison mentioned that the sign of a good reader is one who has to read and re-read for understanding. I found myself re-re-re-re-re-re-reading certain passages and when I was done, I was back to re-re-re-re-re-re-ing. Masterful work!
Rating:
Summary: A Mighty Fine Project!
Review: Ms. Morrison once again graces us with ever-standing, ever-present talent. In Love, we journey through the great grapple of Bill Cosey. Though dead, the women in his life move through the novel like sticky residue. Christine and Heed are childhood best friends until Heed marries Bill. The consummation sends the two into a spiraling-like hatred. May, Christine's mother, also harbors grudge against her dead father and in turn rubs that ire onto her daughter. L is the character who knows "all." L's voice is quite luring, sort of omnipresent. Can we trust it? Then there is a younger generation: Junior and Romen. By the end of the novel, each of them learn quite a bit about the nuances of "love". I would have enjoyed seeing more of Romen, but there is certainly enough to know what type of man he will grow to become. Ms. Morrison's characters are never easy, cliche, or overdone. We understand them because they --are-- complicated. We love them for their experiences. As a smaller project, the plot could have been a tad more prominent even though Love unravels the characters brilliantly and places us in a setting that often times seem surreal, but like home. 4.5 stars!! Highly Recommended!!
Rating:
Summary: LOVE by Toni Morrison
Review: This evocative and lyrical book is easily her best novel since the classic BELOVED. Rich in language, it comes without the ideological baggage of JAZZ and PARADISE, but returns to the narrative force of earlier works such as SONG OF SOLOMON. Toni Morrison is at the height of her creative powers again. Enjoy!
Rating:
Summary: Love, or the pathologies of its perversions?
Review: A new novel from Toni Morrison, so of course I drop everything and plunge in. Enjoyable, yet at first the title seems unexpected given the content? LOVE is a phantom, whether in the unspecified full name of sometime narrator L, or the mysterious Celestial, or the rare descriptions of an actual Love (romantic: Bill/Julia; physical: Bill/Celestial; fraternal: Christine/Heed.)
Dare I compare character Bill Cosey (the object of all characters' attention and obsessions) with a real life Bill Cosby? I am tempted.
I have truly enjoyed the read, and in fact read it twice in a row! I did get much more out of the book on the second reading. Great work as always from Morrison, but for a neophyte I'd recommend starting with Song of Solomon or Sula, then Beloved.
Rating:
Summary: "Brava Ms. Morrison"
Review: "LOVE" by poetic writer Toni Morrison is such a beautifully written story. Very moving and heartfelt. I enjoyed the characters very much. The dialogue was absoultely captivating. And the plot had me glued to my cozy chair all evening. I eagerly await the next by this very gifted writer to be sure! BRAVA, Ms. Morrison on a job well done! (LOVE by mutli-talented writer Toni Morrison, gets my highest recommendation and my personal seal of approval!)
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