Olive Kitteridge (the book) is a collection of 13 short stories set in the small town of Crosby, Maine. Olive Kitteridge (the character) is a retired school teacher who makes appearances in each of the short stories. In some, she is the main character and the story is told from her point of view; in others, she just passes by in the background. Each one of the short stories could (and has, as I understand) stand on its own. Typically, I prefer to invest my time and emotions into reading a full novel - getting to know and care about the characters in a way that is difficult to achieve in a short story. Somehow, Elizabeth Strout manages to overcome this challenge in each of her short stories - I found myself easily relating to many of the characters and feeling as though I've met them before in my own small town. In regards to Olive, sometimes I liked her, other times I was irritated by her - which felt very authentic and comparable to relationships in real life. I would recommend this book to others. ( )

I found this to be a very depressing read. ( )

Olive Kitteridge was selected by my book club The Page Turners, as our November read. Olive Kitteridge was also awarded the Pulitzer Prize in 2009. After reading it, I can say that I am very pleased with this choice of winners. I have a certain expectation for story telling and writing when I pull a Pulitzer awarded book off the shelf and Olive Kitteridge did not disappoint.

The book is a collection of short stories of ordinary folks from a small town. I didn't feel like I was reading short stories that end and leave me wanting more. After hearing the second story, I was confident that I would be satisfied with another story that would some how connect me to the character, Olive Kitteridge. I was engrossed in the stories as if I was reading a novel. I was reminded of Russo's, Empire Falls. (Pulitzer Prize 2002). Often the best stories seem to come from a day in the life of ordinary people with every day family dynamics and issues.

The book takes place in the small town of Portland, Maine and the stories revolve around a central character Olive Kitteridge. At times she is a grumpy, outspoken, and a rude woman. As the stories unfold, more is revealed of Olive. Who is Olive Kitteridge? Do we love her or hate her? I appreciated her for being ordinary and sensible despite her flawed demeanor. For me Olive is " the town staple" like the local store or any other structure that individualizes a town.

Henry Kitteridge, Olive's husband, is a wonderful man and perhaps it may seem that he is too nice and too kind for Olive. Does he deserve the wrath of Olive? Yet we can sense at times that Olive has a deep love for Henry, her son and others. Why oh why doesn't this come through in her dealings with them at all times. The stories interconnect in a way to reveal Olive's insecurities and the depth of her character in relation to the perils of the community. Outwardly it seems that she doesn't have deep compassion to love those in her life, and yet the stories reveal more to us.

Who of us doesn't know an "Olive." And do we see or feel an "Olive" in our own self? So often it seems that Olive could use a word or two to "mend" a situation. What gets in the way of a kinder word being spoken to heal or mend the situation?

The writing is utterly fantastic. I do regret that I only listened to the audio book of Olive Kitteridge and I don't have any quotes to share as I was driving a lot when I listened. However, I want to say that this audio book was outstandingly well read. This is also book that I want to put into my own library.

How did my group like the book?

A member in Mississippi said, "I liked the book a lot and of course marked several Olive-isms." She had a lot more to contribute than just that and she enjoyed reading the book and savoring it.

Another member had this review to share:

" I gave Olive Kitteridge two stars because I liked the format of the book (a collection of short stories) and thought that some of the stories had profoundly thought provoking points. Unfortunately, the book didn't grab me. It could be because every short story seemed to start off the same... it took a several pages to figure out what was going on because of the exhaustive use of "they," "he," "she," or "it" before anything was clear. Overall, it wasn't a terrible book but not one I may recommend either."
-Chuluota Book Junkie

I give the book high praise for my favorite read of 2009. ( )

What enjoyable writing! I flew through the book because it was such a satisfying read. I really liked how the book was organized as short stories that added up to tell about Olive and her town in Maine. All the characters were so real that I found myself amazed at times. My only complaint is that it got to be pretty depressing. All the stories are about life changing calamities that aren't necessarily balanced out with hope. There was an overriding theme of the fear, loneliness and uncertainty that goes along with old age. Strout seemed to do a great job in expressing those feelings. ( )

What an interesting book. It was like reading a collection of short stories in that the stories were not really connected. The real connection between the stories was that the people lived in the same town, knew each other, and had each had some kind of experience with Olive.
The first two stories or chapters I really disliked Olive. She grew on me. It's a completely different book than you think it will be after reading the first story. ( )

Beautifully written; all stories are connected. I had mixed feelings about Olive, but in the end, she is honest with herself and learns about the fragility of life and the wisdom in accepting love where one finds it. Everyone in the small town has secrets, including Olive. Perhaps secrets are just part of life. ( )

The best book I've read this year. The structure - a portrait of a woman and a town told in 13 stories - is so much more powerful than a linear story. People reveal themselves in bits and pieces over time and Olive does too. I know Olive and the people of Crosby ME. My life is full of them. Incredibly moving, powerful and true. ( )

This book grabbed me with its first story, about the friendship between Olive Kitteridge's husband, Henry, and the young woman who worked at his drugstore. Strout captures private moments and musings beautifully throughout the book, and creates vivid settings with a few, well-chosen words. She understands the ambiguity of feelings and imperfections that every husband, wife, son and daughter experiences. The title character is revealed to different degrees in each story, and the book covers most of her adult life. She is only one of many well-developed characters, but the fact that much is unexplained makes the book all the more interesting. The stories were written over a long period of time and published here and there, but as a collection they hang together well, with a couple of exceptions (the exceptions are why this is a 4 1/2 and not a 5). For me a book is great when I want to start reading it again as soon as I finish it, and I keep thinking about it long after reading it. This book had both of those effects on me. ( )

Olive Kitteridge is a good book, well written. Its reach is impressive, yet its grasp is perfectly firm. This is a series of related short stories, all of which refer, overtly or no, to the character Olive Kitteridge. Olive is one of the most arresting and memorable literary figures I’ve “met” recently, but she is surrounded by a dazzling panoply of others. Strout is masterful with characterization, and does much with little in each story. We see Olive most often through the eyes of others–her husband, neighbors, and son.

Yet we also see them through her eyes, and its a dizzying feat of perspective, pulled off so well I didn’t think to wonder how Strout managed to create umpteen authentic voices.

The stories progress in linear time, though with flashes to the past. Each can stand on its own, yet together they form a complex whole. Olive is a woman of strong opinions, and she often irritates those around her, including the reader. Yet I found her by the end irresistible. Olive’s honesty, her pain, and any hard-earned joy she’d won were a pleasure for me to read about. ( )

http://www.bostonbibliophile.com/2009... ( )

Don't try to read this if you are tired or ready to go to sleep. Watch for the foreshadowing - an interesting tale of life in a small Maine town. I do identify with Olive which is scary. ( )

I reallly enjoyed this book. It brings Maine to life and I think the method of fusing interconnected storis bring her to life.

simply wonderful. e. strout just makes time, place, and people so real. ( )

I loved this. Being from Maine, I felt like it was very authentically 'Maine', from the speech patterns and atmosphere to phrases like 'Jeezum Crow', which I haven’t heard myself in at least 13 years. Add to that Olive’s occasional resemblance to my great-grandmother, and in a lot of ways reading this book was like visiting home. It’s not a particularly happy book, though there is a little bit of light at the end. Sometimes Olive is the center of the story, sometimes she’s a bit player, and sometimes she’s just walking by, but she always makes a mark. Olive’s life is hard, and there’s so much you really don’t know about her, which you realize during her heart-wrenching visit to her son’s home in New York. I think the thing that sticks with me the most is the tangible love between Olive and Henry, which is most apparent when she calls to talk to him at the nursing home and maintains her one-sided conversation. Overall, it’s just a beautifully constructed collection of stories. ( )

I think I liked the Olive character a lot more than most people (judging from the NPR interview I heard with the author). Not sure what that says about me. Great little stories about intertwining lives in a small Maine town. ( )

very interesting and unique writing style. a great book - would absolutely recommend. ( )

You read it and you think that's exactly what you do not want to happen to you when you get old, even though you somehow know it is going to be like that. ( )

Short stories about live in a small Maine town that weave into each other. Touching, delicately wrought fiction. ( )

Olive Kitteridge is a collection of short stories, some published previously in periodicals, which bear the common thread of touching on the character of the title character. In a few of the stories, Olive, a large woman and retired middle school math teacher, is the central character. In some of the stories we see Olive as others in her family and community see her. And in at least two stories, Olive makes only a passing appearance much like Alfred Hitchcock walking briefly through each of his movies.

In this way, we see Olive's character reflected in many ways, not all of them flattering. At the same time we see glimpses of the community and its underpinnings. The seasons, fauna & flora, and the water of the bay and river figure prominently in the motif of the stories. They lend an atmosphere of hope, longing, sorrow, and loss.

In the latter third of the book, Olive spends much time in what she calls the "bump out room" of the home that she and Henry built. This seems to represent some sort of waiting room where she looks over the tulips and waits for the next stage of her life begins. Perhaps in some ways this book is a coming of age story for the boomers who are also moving into that next, late, unexplored phase of life.

This is a book that definitely improves with a discussion group. ( )

Beautiful and thorny collection of stories set on the Maine coast. The characters are not always likeable, not always 100% sympathetic, but always human. ( )

I was not a big fan of this book and am surprised that it won the Pulitzer.

"Olive Kitteridge" consists of a series of short pieces written about the personal and internal lives of folks in a town on the coast of Maine. These glimpses show us so clearly, in language unerring and deceptively simple, folk that aspire against all hope for love, fulfillment, even survival. Sometimes the piece illuminates an episode from Olive's life, sometimes Olive plays only a cameo in this or that person's current crisis.

And the crises abound in this collection. Lives and marriages and families tread the razor's edge, hoping for the day when that blade can become something a little more stable, a little less threatening. Mostly, though, we get a character's forced accommodation; he or she must give up the grand hope or design for the lesser but more realistic outcome. Disappointment, even desperation, inevitably follow, and Olive is no exception. People struggle with inner demons here, some more severe than others. Olive's own demons put her at odds with others, often for no overt reason. Olive has little patience for anything or anyone, especially after her affable husband Henry becomes ill. Her son, from whom she feels estranged, and with reason, invites her at length to New York to meet his second wife - he didn't tell her he'd married again - and after Olive loses her composure and her patience, he confronts her calmly with the fact of how difficult she is. To Olive, it's an outrage, and she feels cast adrift again.

Olive Kitteridge the character is one exceptionally fine fictive creation. We come to know her, loudmouthed and irascible, through a series of encounters, and we know how she will react in any situation. This very slowly and very subtly changes over the course of the stories, and in this under-the-surface mutability Strout performs her ineffable and exraordinary trick: Olive the obdurate, Olive the obstreperous, begins to discover, very, very late in life, what it might mean to acknowledge her own and someone else's need.

Ms Strout takes us along at a careful pace, but doesn't spare the emotions. These oblique peeks into these tortured internal lives and dialogues capture us and capture our sympathy. And Ms Strout has certainly captured an avid fan. ( )

A series of stories that are connected by their locale and the presence of the character, Olive. They are mainly slice of life stories - well written though not always terribly compelling. ( )

A beautiful collection of stories ( )

An interesting portrait of Olive Kitteridge, a unique and fairly appalling middle school math teacher in a small Maine town. Each chapter is a different story of someone in the town, and Olive morphs a little bit in her connection to each character. Though I normally wouldn't be drawn to "a novel in stories," Olive was a strong enough character with enough facets to keep me intrigued. Each chapter was thought-provoking and I think I got much more from Olive than I would have expected. Recommended. ( )