Kathleen

For “Carolinas” book club read

Hard to read but so, so good.

I think the audio narrator pumped up this book from 3 stars to 4 for me.

Debating 5 stars for this one. Now officially love Wallace Stegner and have to read all he's written.

Not fabulous writing, but pulled along because it was a really interesting “story.”

Good info, and written pretty well. It's worth reading for a broad overview of things you can do to save energy smartly

Nothing wrong with the writing, which was really good. I just really don't like hard core sci fi.

couldn't get into it

Just the kind of history I don't care for – endless, tedious details about battles. Enjoyed first third or so of the book, but disappointed by the rest.

Not in the mood right now – possibly come back to it some day.

Started strong and really interesting, then I got bored. Would have preferred if the author had only focused on his family.

Way too effing long and lost interest. Wanted to find out how it ended, but it was just too much.

Pretty hard core, but extremely informative. I may not incorporate every aspect into my diabetes management to the letter, but certainly an awesome reference. I got this out of the library, but think I'll need to buy it for myself.

Not for me

Gorgeous writing, although the man was definitely of his time. Actually, was it ever really okay to call people “cripples” and dismiss them as unimportant?? Beautiful writer, ugly human.

Enjoyed the writing, but hated every single character!

Wish I could say I loved this book, since Toni Morrison is one of my absolute favorite authors of all time, but I just didn't. I didn't like the main character and didn't understand the prominence some of the secondary characters played in various sections of the book. While her books generally have an element of fantasy that you allow yourself to believe, it felt like it was thrown into this one as part of a formula that didn't work.

And all that said, there were of course the usual passages of brilliance. Glad to hear she intends to write at least one more, because I think this one needs some redemption.

Loved the Civil War era story line, but much harder to get into the modern day one – really didn't like that main character or her brother or her husband (but did like everyone else in the town)

Awesome narrator: Christine Hewitt

Probably didn't give it a fair amount of time, but didn't care for it immediately.

I read this years ago when it first came out, and then re-read it this year. Not the most brilliant writing on the planet (very much in the form of your typical self-help book ... “If you're reading this, you're already on the right track / a better person than most / etc.”), but some great messages that still ring true (if you can get past references to things like audio cassettes and people who are no longer current in the news). While focused primarily on the small business owner, I'd still highly recommend it to anyone.

Good book, but didn't care for audio reader

WAY too confusing at the beginning, but got easier (for a while, until they started adding in grandchildren et al. But solid 3.5 stars for cool concept.

Just couldn't do it - gave it 6 hrs, but couldn't go on when I saw there were 15 to go!

Pretentious and slow.

Boring and disjointed - gave up at Chapter 5. Started out well enough, but didn't realize it would jump from story to disconnected story.