Rating: 
Summary: Long but worth it!
Review: It took me awhile to finish this book. But as soon as I did I realized how much I actually enjoyed it. I found myself crying and laughing with Smokey through this book, I loved how "Downtown" takes you from Smokey's life as a naive young Irish Catholic girl moving away from home for the first time TO an amazing grown woman. If you can handle a 500 page book with a heroin who's searching for herself and a bunch of quirky characters on the magazine staff, you'll love it!
Rating:
Summary: Long but worth it!
Review: It took me awhile to finish this book. But as soon as I did I realized how much I actually enjoyed it. I found myself crying and laughing with Smokey through this book, I loved how "Downtown" takes you from Smokey's life as a naive young Irish Catholic girl moving away from home for the first time TO an amazing grown woman. If you can handle a 500 page book with a heroin who's searching for herself and a bunch of quirky characters on the magazine staff, you'll love it!
Rating: 
Summary: What's up with this?
Review: Just wondered if anyone else has ever cottoned to the fact that the scene where Smoky visits La Carrousel with Luke, and sits with him, John Howard, and Juanita the Black Panther, is duplicated from "Peachtree Road"? Check out Chapter 16 of PR, in which Shep, Lucy, and Jack Venable visit the same club. Much of it has been translated verbatim, even to Smoky's awareness of her white flesh glowing "rottenly among all the rich shades of blackness around her" (or something like that), the same dialogue with two of MLK Jr's lieutenants, and the same description and encounter with King himself. What's up with that, I wonder? Did the author run out of inspiration...or did she underestimate her audience's intelligence? I agree with the assessments below, by the way, that it's a substandard effort. Siddons can do, and has done, much better.
Rating:
Summary: An interesting book about Smoky O'Donnell.
Review: Maureen Aisling O'Donnell is tired of living in plain old Corkie. Other wise known as Smoky, Maureen has lived in the same neighborhood all of her life, and so she wants to leave. When the opportunity comes along for her to work on a promising magazine in Atlanta, GA, she leaps on the chance, and leaves. This novel is about her many discoveries about life outside of a dominantly Irish suburb. Smoky lives in a period where the civil war is still going strong, having loose morals is common, and the start of the Vietnam War has begun. I found this book to be very interesting. I read about the civil war from someone else's point of view. I did find that many of her chapters were somewhat pointless, and felt that she could have done a better job on the overall plot of the book. The main character, Smoky, is only somewhat realistic, in comparison to the remarkable imagery. While I could feel what she was feeling, and see what she is seeing, I could not identify with the character. I would only recommend this book to someone who has a lot of time, and little expectancy of a book.
Rating: 
Summary: As a big Anne River-Siddons fan, I was disappointed in this
Review: Most of Siddon's characters are introduced early in their lives and when a major occurrance happens, they weather life-changing growth. Downtown's character was too one-dimensional; her growth wasn't really believable and the ending jumping to present-day circumstances and a "surprise" husband was contrived. Siddon's characters are what I ready her books for and Smokey did not come across as a real person. Read all of Siddon's other books before going to this one. If this is your first Siddon's book, it may be your last.
Rating:
Summary: Disappointment for a Siddons fan
Review: The author is not at her best. Her books like Hill Towns and Fault Lines about middle aged women in troubled marriages are much more interesting. The prose doesn't flow well either. It required concentration for a relatively light subject.
Rating: 
Summary: Engrossing, intriguing, entertaining
Review: This book set me on the trail of many other delights by this author. It gave me insights from a young "career woman's" perspective about the South during the era that I was growing up in the northeast. Lots of wish-you-could-meet-them characters. Wonderfully rich language and images. If you like spunky heroines in a thought-provoking upbeat storylines, this one may transport you for a while like it did me.
Rating:
Summary: my review
Review: This is the first book I read from Anne Rivers Siddons. I had just moved to Atlanta, and I had heard that this author also lived in Atlanta and that all her novels were based in the South.I enjoyed reading this novel, not only because I was familiar with most of the places described in the book, but also because I liked very much the style the author uses to describe the characters, their emotions. Suffice to say, I was totally "hooked" and I have read almost all of her books.
Rating:
Summary: my review
Review: This is the first book I read from Anne Rivers Siddons. I had just moved to Atlanta, and I had heard that this author also lived in Atlanta and that all her novels were based in the South. I enjoyed reading this novel, not only because I was familiar with most of the places described in the book, but also because I liked very much the style the author uses to describe the characters, their emotions. Suffice to say, I was totally "hooked" and I have read almost all of her books.
Rating:
Summary: Wonderful
Review: This is the first book I've read by Siddons and I've just finished reading it for the second time tonight. I have to say I enjoyed it just as much as I did the first time, even with knowing the "surprise" ending. The characters were loveable, the hate-able ones immensely so. Her descriptions of the south during this particular point in history was fascinating, the book a true page turner. I couldn't put it down! Perhaps I'm just a young idealist with low standards but I found Smoky (the heroin, as it were) to be refreshing (if a little unbelievably naive, but hey I didn't grow up in a strict Irish Catholic home in the sixties so i really wouldn't know)and I found myself relating to her on many different levels. I laughed right out loud and often cried with the characters. I can't wait to read more!
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