Ethan Frome

Rating:
Summary: One of my absolute favorite novels!
Review: I feel that this novel should be condidered one of the absolute best books of any age. It is a very sad story of how the local conventions of an area can smother a man's happiness. "Ethan Frome" is a slow moving story, but it is a very short book and does speed up at the end. The characters (particularly Ethan) are some of the most real that you will ever find in literature. Every serious reader should read this book, and the Modern Library certainly should have found a place for it on its list of the hundred greatest novels of the twentieth century.

Rating:
Summary: Slow Moving, but Worth the Time
Review: I picked this book out of the library just by chance. I started reading it, and, if I didn't pursue it, I would never have finised it. It was so boring in the beginning, and way through the middle, but at the end is where I couldn't put it down. It left a good feeling inside me when I finished it.

Rating:
Summary: Dull and pointless
Review: Stupid book. They call it a 'classic'. Classic, in that it is the slowest and most pointless book ever! A guy thinks he loves his cousin but he doesn't. So what. I only read it because I had to pass English class.

Rating:
Summary: Slow action, but intriguing
Review: I am a student at Lyman Hall High School in Connecticut. I read Ethan From as a project for English class. I loved this book, except it was a little slow to start. I thought Edith Wharton did a wonderful job of describing the love between Ethan and Mattie. I could feel the intensity of their problems and their emotions caused by Zeena. When I was reading the introduction, I had no idea that this was going to be a love story, because my teacher told me little about the plot. I almost didn't want to read the book, because I thought the entire book was going to be about Ethan transporting the narrator back and forth to work. I am glad I went on with the book. I really enjoyed it. I thought it was so tragic when Ethan and Mattie felt so desperate they tried to committ suicide. I am glad they lived, because it would have been so sad if they died. I thought it was so ironic that Zeena rose to the occassion of having to take care of Mattie and Ethan when they were injured, even though she was "sick." Throughout the entire book, I knew Zeena really wasn't that sick. She just was so wrapped up in herself, she thought she was sicker than she was. What do others think? All in all, I did enjoy this book, but I wouldn't recommend it to people who like action.

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Summary: Edith Frome masterfully depicted a tragic love affair
Review: I thought that the book was dull yet many important morals and ideals involving the basis of several problems of todays love affairs. It orchastrated the desicions Ethan faced as he watched his wife become more ill and began to notice her younger cousin. It is a classic piece of American literature and should be read by people of all ages. Mrs. Kerkow: This is for you.

Rating:
Summary: Could it get any worse?
Review: Many proclaim this novel to be powerful masterpiece about forbidden love, but it was not. Rather it was the lowest possible form of fiction about a man who thinks he is in love, but is not. His life is merely so depressing that he would jump anything that came along. I did not find any value or enjoyment out of this novel what-so-ever, and that is not just me being cruel, because I am trying to be as kind as i possibly can. So if you have time on your hands and you are looking for a good read, I suggest the local phone book would be a viable alternative to the novel Ethan Frome.

Rating:
Summary: A tragic love ruined by a controlling wife.
Review: The book, Ethan Frome, was good. Ethan Frome's mother was sick so Zenobia, aka Zeena, took care of her up to her death. His mom died in the winter and then he married Zeena. Their marriage wasn't based on love for each other which leads Ethan to falling in love with Mattie, Zeena's cousin, when she comes to help the Frome's because Zeena gets sick. Zeena's controlling ways slowly kills Ethan.

Rating:
Summary: Kind of boring, but still keeps you reading...!!??
Review: Kind of a Romeo and Juliet......I had to do an author paper on Edith Wharton, and luckily I chose to read Ethan Frome 1st--before any of her other books--or else I would'nt have read any more! It was boring, yet still fast enough to read in a few days. If you've read any other Wharton books, you're probably already scared away--don't be, this is her best.

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Summary: ETHAN FROME IS A TRAGIC LOVE STORY.
Review: ETHAN FROME IS A TRAGIC LOVE STORY INVOLVING THREE CHARACTERS. ETHAN, THE MAIN CHARACTER IS MARRIED TO HIS SICK WIFE, ZEENA. WHILE ZEENA IS SICK IN BED HE IS TRYING TO WIN ANOTHER LOVE. TWO OF THESE CHARACTERS, ETHAN AND MATTIE ARE TRYING TO PROVE THEIR LOVE FOR EACH OTHER. WHILE THEY ARE TRYING TO PROVE THEIR LOVE FOR EACH OTHER A FATAL ACCIDENT OCCURS AND RUINS EVERYTHING. IN THE END NO ONE IS HAPPY IN THE FROME HOUSEHOLD.

Rating:
Summary: Slumming It
Review: Though normally she portrays the filthy rich of New York City, Wharton here takes on a love affair between two abjectly poor people in a small rural New England community. It is a hopeless affair which must prove ultimately sterile given the society that produced it. What Wharton doesn't do is as interesting as what she does do. She isn't judgmental about the social structure, she avoids making the poverty so severe that it gets in the way of the story, and she doesn't confuse poverty with dullness and so make any of her main characters unable to be sufficiently articulate. Like Nevil Shute in "The Far Country," Wharton is gifted at making each sentence of dialog shine, each look, each touch, the weather, the cat. Everything is so genuine, it springs from the page. The result is (like Shute's) a romance novel you actually care about. It's great American art. One note: There are a lot of student reviews below mine. Just remember, if a kid resents having to read a book, that kid will give the book a bad review as a way of getting back at his/her teacher. So take the rating average above with a grain of salt.