Rating: 
Summary: An intriguing exhortation to discernment.
Review: In a society where approximately forty percent of marriages end in divorce, Breathing Lessons presents a couple, Maggie and Ira Moran, two totally opposite individuals, who have weathered the proverbial storms for twenty-eight years. The remarkable thing about the storms is that most of them are of Maggie's making, as she confesses, "It's all my fault, I set everything pell-mell in motion not once considering the consequences." Maggie's pell-mell walk through life keeps taking her on decisive detours into other people's lives and often makes the already rubbled paths even more impassable. At the end of the book when Maggie is forced to realize that her attempts to put life's problems in neat, little packages with decorative bows are futile, she despondently asks, "Oh, Ira...what are we two going to live for, all the rest of our lives?" Her question, archetypally significant, is answered by a powerful image as her husband plays his game of solitaire. "He had passed that early, superficial stage when any number of moves seemed possible and now his choices were narrower and he had to show real skill and judgment." So it is with Maggie; so it is with us
Rating: 
Summary: Portions were great; the rest was boring
Review: Plus the character Maggie made me so frustrated. What a dope
Rating:
Summary: amusing and sprinkled with quirks.
Review: I enjoyed this one, as I have always enjoyed Tyler's books. The amusing bit about the husband who whistles `appropriate' tunes during `appropriate' (?) moments had me in stitches! Mrs. Moran is sooo full of quirks that I wish I could shake some sense into her. If I could have done that, I would have given a better rating of the book! (just kidding)
Rating: 
Summary: "Breathing Lessons" illuminates the miracles in the mundane.
Review: In "Breathing Lessons," Anne Tyler lays before the reader a story detailing the life of an absolutely ordinary couple, complete with unremarkable conversations and unexceptional
activities. And yet, these are examined with an eye so keen
and so affectionate that we, through Tyler's prose, see them transformed. Her greatest gift may lie in her ability to
write about the everyday with such precision, honesty and tenderness that we see beneath the surface of her story, beneath the outer layers of a life to the beating heart within.
Rating:
Summary: Love Battles with Reality in Humorous Ways
Review: Most people love a lover. Also, most of us would like more love in our lives. If you read nonfiction books on the subject, they tell you to be more loving to others to receive more love in return. But most of us feel frustrated in that quest. What would it be like to pursue love in a more unrestricted way? That's the subject of Breathing Lessons.Now, this could be a pretty heavy subject so Ms. Tyler wisely chooses to leaven her lessons with humor. Her protagonist, Maggie Morgan, will remind many of other fictional characters beginning with the lovable red head, Lucy Ricardo, in I Love Lucy. Those who have Dreamed the Impossible Dream while watching Man of La Mancha (or while reading Don Quixote) will recognize elements of Don Quixote in her character. The humor plays the same role that the fools play in Shakespeare's tragedies, to lighten the atmosphere from profoundly sad situations. Maggie is a klutz who doesn't let her klutziness stop her. She's a one-woman pile driver intent on her purposes of spreading love and connection among all she meets. Her husband, Ira, plays the foil (the Desi Ricardo/Sancho Panza role) to help us know what the real situation is. Ira is almost all reason while Maggie is almost all love. You will find Ira to be interesting for examples of how reason needs to accommodate love. Breathing Lessons shows a typical day for Maggie and Ira in an atypical environment . . . while on an out-of-town trip on a Saturday for a memorial service for the husband of Maggie's old friend. That environment turns the day into a quest (like Don Quixote) and they meet many interesting characters on whom Maggie has an unforgettable impact. Many will look for a heroic ending featuring accomplishment. But did Don Quixote have such an ending? Ms. Tyler redefines heroism in terms of continuing to love and hope for the best . . . even when everything crumbles into dust. I think anyone will be inspired by the example of Maggie to do the right thing. As you probably know, this book won a Pulitzer Prize which it certainly deserved. Seldom has a book created such a new an ennobling expression of human potential in the context of our all-too-human tendency to err. Many will find Maggie's klutziness to be overdone . . . and possibly annoying. I, too, found it a little overdone, but enjoyed the book nevertheless. Ms. Tyler doesn't want us to miss the point that we should make the most of our talents . . . however modest or great they are. Nice job, Ms. Tyler!
Rating:
Summary: Sweet without crashing into sappiness
Review: I liked this simple tale of two middle aged partners in marriage. The whole story takes place during one day as the husband and wife spend most of the time in their car driving to and from a friend's funeral. Of course, there are detours on the way, but most of the "action" takes place while driving where the author elegantly combines current conversations with their individual reflections of the past - mainly of their sweet and awkward courtship.
The husband and wife seemed very real to me (however, I must confess that for some reason I started picturing them as Kitty and Red Foreman from That 70s Show...). Anyway, I found myself rooting for their "happiness" - sentimental, I know, but the story did not sink to the level of sappiness. Also, their difficult relationships with their widely different children was given a bittersweet sense of reality as well.
Not a profound book, but still a very enjoyable read. I will definitely keep on the lookout for more of Tyler's books in anticipation of another rainy Sunday afternoon.
Rating: 
Summary: needs plot lessons
Review: Each chapter was the same. Yes, there are some bursts of good writing, but without a good plot... it was wasted.
Rating:
Summary: Couldn't get through it.
Review: Try as I might, I simply couldn't get through this book. The characters are well defined, but that's because it seems to be all Ms. Tyler does. The dialogue between husband and wife on the way to the funeral was darkly comic and mildly amusing, but page after page later, I felt that it was too much of the same. For those reading this review, please keep in mind that my commentary only refers to the first part of the book, as I couldn't get past the redundancy any further than that. Considering this book won the 1988 Pulitzer, it must be worth delving further into the story; I hope you can make it.
Rating:
Summary: Tyler's the best!
Review: I think if you don't see Maggie (the protagonist) as the kind of heroine that you cheer for, the book is more enjoyable. Fiona, the daughter-in-law, to me, was the key character who seemed to speak for the reader. I would love to read a sequel to this, but I'll have to settle reading another Tyler book. No problem she's my favorite. Five stars for Tyler, easy four stars for this particular story.
Rating:
Summary: How Can a Life Be So Mismanaged? (3.5*s)
Review: "Breathing Lessons" perhaps should have been entitled "How to Continually Make Life a Wreck." Ira and Maggie Moran are on the road to attend the funeral service of her old best friend's husband. Through the adventures on that trip and remembrances of twenty-eight years of marriage, the reader is constantly startled at the rationalizations, miscommunications, bizarre behaviors, and disconnections from reality that the characters exhibit, especially Maggie.
In Tyler's novels, life is not a bowl of cherries; coping and readjustments are required. But Maggie seems incapable of coherently directing her life. She comes across as mostly inept in virtually all areas of living. There is little affection and support in her family. Her husband Ira is the reticent type. Her son is essentially a failure, and her daughter has practically disowned her. Maggie operates in a mode of always trying to patch up her mistakes and shortsightedness, as well as life's complications, with little success, if not actually making matters worse.
Maggie is a somewhat sympathetic character despite her wacky behavior, but she just seems a bit overdrawn at times. The happenstance nature of Maggie and Ira marrying is remindful of "Amateur Marriage," Tyler's most recent work. In both books, the marriages were handicapped from the start, but "Amateur" is a more persuasive examination of family incompatibilities.
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