Received, Read, Reviewed

The River Wife by Jonis Agee

My review of the book was favorable, although I noticed someone else beat me to the punch with a negative review. Overall I thought the book ambitious, maybe not living up to that ambition, but engaging. Of course, all subjective.

This is the first advance copy of a book I have ever held in my hot, grubby hands. There were a lot of errors. Is that normal? Many more errors than I notice in published books. For instance, the one-armed river pirate is forcing the young girl out in a boat to serve as bait for a robbery, and he runs his hands over her body - kind of hard to run your hands over someone when you only have one arm. Also there were a lot of repeated words and indefinite pronoun problems. Hopefully they will all get corrected in the published copy - the author is a professor...

Anyway, it was fun, an enjoyable read, and I hope I get picked again.

Sam

Sam lol we must have been posting our reviews at the same time!

Okay samfsmith, is it normal for me to be sitting here laughing myself silly over the the one-armed pirate running his hands over her body? Should they have clarified he ran his hand and his hook? Please tell me he doesn't have a hook.

*lots of smiles here*

Its not unheard of to have a lot of errors in an ARC.

Well, the plot does sound a little silly when you condense it like that, but yes there is a one armed river pirate, and, even worse, the young girl is his slave.

Anyway, if you have the book, check page 198, the last paragraph, for the passage I'm talking about: "The touch of his rough hands..." And no, he doesn't have a hook, but he does have buried treasure.

Sam

Sam I had to see what you were talking about and yeap that's what it says! lmbo.
I hope the description on the back of the book is not what they plan to put on the book jacket. Read the first line on the back of the book: "In 1811, moments after a devasting earthquake, French fur-trapper Jaques Ducharme rescues Annie Lark from the ruins of her family home....."
Moments to me implys seconds, maybe minutes. Before Jacques even enters the picture several things happen. So at best it should have read several days after the a devasting earthquake.....
Kathy

I received Forgive Me by Amanda Eyre Ward and I posted my review of it here this morning and on my blog. I was unfamiliar with its author and requested the book based entirely on its plot description.

Turns out that I made a good choice for myself because I really enjoyed the book and now I'm in the process of going back to take a look at Ward's first two novels. It's difficult to describe this book without spoiling it, but I will say that I especially loved the way that Ward brought everything together at the end in such an unexpected way. Great stuff.

Damn - and The River Wife was the one book I was hoping to get! Does it turn into a bodice-ripper novel where he "tears open her blouse and carresses her breast with his mangled stub"?

*ROTFLMAO* :D

I finished my review of Keeping the House by Ellen baker. I really enjoyed it. I posted my review here and on my blog.

I posted my review of Amy Bloom's Away this morning. The bulk of book reviews are summaries, but I'm not one to retell the story. I feel folks can get that information from the cover &/or publishing reviews. What I like to do with my reviews is discuss the writer's style, intent, themes, etc... I sometimes offer personal stories and possible teaching opportunites. I hope others can appreciate this method.

God -- I thought The River Wife was seriously awful. I don't consider myself that harsh of a critic in general -- but that book was a dog. I almost fell out of my chair when I saw that some people gave praise.

Honestly the mistakes were only the tip of the iceberg for me. The flat characters, the unbelievable plot, using "dreams" to forshadow major plot events; the melodrama. It may sound like hyperbole but it probably was the worst novel I have ever read in recent memory.

(what an ungrateful early reviewer I am)

I have Peony in Love and haven't yet written the review because the book is very conventional (boring) for the early part and rather drippy.

Still mulling what to say, and how to say it so there are no spoilers.

I finished Peony in Love late on the 18th. I plan to write a review today sometime and post it here and on my blog. I liked the book, but I didn't think it measured up to Snow Flower and the Secret Fan. I think this is a book that will get some mixed reviews.

I recevied Peony In Love on the 15th... read it in one night and then made myself re-read it again, but much slower. I loved it! I've already loaned it out to another book lover.

>11 jhowell:
Well, no more early review books for you, jhowell ;-)

Os.

My review for Peony in Love is posted to LT...it can also be found at my blog here: http://caribousmom.blogharbor.com/blog/_archives/2007/6/20/3035555.html

Just finished Away: a novel and posted the review. I appreciate the opportunity to get a sneak preview of this book, I thought it was excellent!

I had Forgive Me on hold at the library even before this Early Reviewer thing came up and was happy to receive a copy--I guess the algorithm was pretty accurate in my case. I read and posted my review. I guess I wanted to like it more than I did, but it was still a worthwhile read.

I just finished Away by Amy Bloom and posted my review. The book was alright. I like the rest of you am enjoying being a part of this program.

#1 -- Did the author say he had only one arm or only one hand? He could have had one arm and two hands.

According to one book I've read, there are humans whose feet more closely resemble hands, or at least can grip things like trees easier than those who do not have such feet. Maybe the pirate was using his feet as hands. "The touch of the rough hands . .." I assume anyone that wandered around a pirate ship clinging to the wood in bare feet would have rough "hands". Maybe the author actually meant to write "With his one arm occupied with holding to the thrusting mast, the pirate slowly moved his legs up and used his hand-like feet to maul the frightened woman."

oops, now I can't get that image out of my head . . not so much the mauling as a pirate that runs up and down the ship using both hands and feet to grip the wood

I love catching mistakes as much as the next reader, but on the subject of the caresses of a one-armed pirate, read more closely and you'll see that he actually loses his arm some thirty or more years after the scene described.

I finally got around to reading my copy of Gifted (no touchstone for some reason) and loved it. I posted my favorable review, although I see it got mediocre reviews from others.

I'm not usually interested in books about children or coming-of-age novels about adolescents, but I really, really liked Gifted. I identified with the geeky little heroine (well, not the math genius part, but the growing up part), who reminded me a lot of myself as a young teen.

I put my review on www.allconsuming.net as well.