Rating: 
Summary: Weak attempt
Review: This novel started out well, but halfway through degenerated into cheap romance, cliched writing, and a plotline straight out of a soap opera. I found myself unable to care about any of the characters or what happened to them. Hoffman insisted on telling us, rather than showing, the important details, a device which greatly weakens any writing. Oprah struck out on this one.
Rating: 
Summary: This is a wonderful, and exciting book
Review: I have had a little taste of the same experience that March had in her life so I can understand what she was looking for in her life. I have past this book on to others. I guess you could say that although some people suffer abuse in their childhood and hated it they still continue to give abuse in thier adulthood. That is so sad because it doesn't give you much hope to think that people can learn from their misfortunes and make a difference in other peoples lives. It sure makes motherhood an improtant job!! thank you.
Rating: 
Summary: What are your prepared to do for love?
Review: An excellent read. . . although it started slow, I found myself gettin greally wraped up in the various "acts" of love described in the novel. Hollis and march's promise to love one another forever, their overwhelming attachment to one another. I remmbmber thinking. .."how special", feeling . .. "I wish I had such a love". I got so caught up in the "acts" of love, I totally wasn't expecting the acts of violence and abuse that were lurking in the wings. . . guess that's how it was for March as well. Alice Hoffman did a wonderful job of showcasing the fact that loves comes in many flavors, its emotionally and physically overpowering (as in the case with March and Hollis), its a day to day concious and sacrificial effort (Louise in relationship to Bill), its secretative and fulfilling (Judith and Bill), its new, fresh, exciting (Gwen and hank), its cautious, smart and careful (Susie and Ed). Its many things to different people. If you can't be with the one you love. . . perhaps it's better to love the one you're with.
Rating:
Summary: The best book I've read this year.
Review: I started this book with the idea that I would leisurely read it during the next couple of weeks, but I ended up finishing it in 2 days. I love the way Hoffman changes the interior POV's of the characters in one paragraph. There were enough surprises to keep me guessing and I thought I could predict the ending. Her treatment of the animals was particularly touching and I was hoping they wouldn't be mistreated which would have caused me a great deal of pain. The pacing was perfect: the introduction of the characters, the set-up of the story, the town, the central problem(s), I could feel the weather which was important to the story, I could sympathize with the "bad" characters even though I wanted them to pay for their deeds. Hoffman's writing contained just the right amount of descriptive narrative and the dialog was there when I needed it. After struggling through Toni Morrison's "Paradise", it was such a thrill to sit down and read a book for pure pleasure and I couldn't wait to find out what was going to happen to March.
Rating:
Summary: feeling of home
Review: Alice Hoffman did an excellent job, i felt as if i lived in the same town with them. I could relate this book to my life and i saw everyone of the characters in people i know. We see how hollis' life was scared forever when he was just a boy, and his greed and need to seek revenge was the death of him, to me this was a very valuable lesson(forgive and forget), actually we had a lesson to learn form everyone of the people in this book. ms.Hoffman, did not only have one story line going as most books do today, she had several and in some way or another everyone tied in together, just as they do in the real word or should I say "Here on Earth."
Rating: 
Summary: A disappointingly empty examination of the facets of love
Review: Hollis is Heathcliff for the 90's? What a tragic comparison. Hollis is a violent sexual preditor and a murderer. March, an otherwise accomplished and cherished wife and mother becomes a helpless victim under this charmless brute's spell. I kept waiting for March to wake up and defend Gwen, but she displayed only limp disregard. The end of the story fizzled out, concluding too neatly, in a unsatisfying, unlikely way that left too many questions unanswered. Not one of Ms. Hoffman's best. Also, while the writing style itself was evocative of the cold, frozen emotions of the past, Ms. Hoffman used too many similies and metaphors; left the story laden.
Rating:
Summary: "Here on Earth" is an intricate and compelling read!!!!
Review: Dont expect to visit Jenkinstown with March Murray and daughter Gwen, and return unscathed.
"Here on Earth" weaves webs of intrigue, drawing the reader deeper into it's plot word by word.
There are no one dimensonal characters; only complex, believable people that defy prejudgement.
Hate their decisions, loathe their behaivors, pity their situations, but understand each is fueled by life's causes and effects. Alice Hoffman gifts her readers with sensory descriptions of landscape and psyche.
Each page and each character explode with emotion and leaves the peruser shaking with empathy and sentiment.
Read this book.
Experience Jenkinstown.
Meet March, Hollis, Gwen, and Hank and the other cast that inhabits their worlds.
Come away gasping for breath.
Be haunted and changed by the journey long after you return "Here on Earth" to the shelf.
The trip awaits you!!!!!!
Rating:
Summary: I thought it was going to be a romantic love story.
Review: I was rather depressed after reading this story. I can't believe that Oprah recommended this book. I kept hoping that March would wake up and go back to her husband. I thoughtthe book might get better at the end but it didn't. I wish I had never read it.
Rating: 
Summary: Obsession & possession without intervention = tragedy.
Review: Ms. Hoffman missed her opportunity to really develop these characters into a great story,
what a shame, this had all the makings of a good book, then, it simply fell apart. Nevertheless, there is a "wake-up call" here, if it reaches its intended audience.
Rating:
Summary: Bad made for tv story line
Review: This is not a romantic story about passionate love. It's a story about stupidity, lust, and selfishness. It's disgraceful how most of the women in this novel are portrayed, giving up their lives, their selves, and their sense for a smile, a kiss, a touch, or just hard sex. I can't believe Oprah took her audiences down to this level after elevating them in Paradise.
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