Property Of

Even though this early work of Hoffman doesn't ring with the same depth or poetry as her later work, the story itself is still engaging and urgent. The simplicity of the story and the voice add a sort of telescoping focus to two forces which themselves tend to carry their own intertia: obsessive love and drug addiction, told on the foreground of gang involvement and coming of age. Spinning out from one act of violence that barely has a chance to begin, the narrator's story moves forward with barely any awareness of choice or free will, innocence and a crush giving way to love, obsession, and finally addiction.

At the center of Hoffman's novel is a meditation on the idea of property--the sense of belonging that can itself be addictive and show more the emotional feeling, wrong or right, that being in a relationship leads also to a sense of proprietary (and reciprocal) holding on another human being. Here, slavery is not the question, but being beholden to another individual, and similarly having responsibility for their person, is a question of honor and survival that is inescapable on nearly every page of the text.

This is a quick read, and while it isn't Hoffman's best, the promise and the talent in this early writing of hers are clear, and still far more engaging and graceful than much of the published writing out there.

On the whole, recommended. show less

Mmmmm. This book was strange. I liked the story, but when it started I wasn't sure what type of book it was. A boy named Danny the Sweet and a candy store. So I couldn't really buy in to the danger, even the involvement in drugs and murders had an innocence - maybe not really the word I want - to it. A good story about a girl who gets what she wants and comes to realize that it's not what she wanted after all.

I tried so hard to like this book. Had it not been written by Hoffman, I would've stopped reading after the first 50 pages. I kept reading...hoping it would get better...but it didn't. I read way too much of it before finally realizing that I was giving it too many pages & hours to get better. I feel like the characters kept repeating the same phrases..."honor","what do you want from me?"...the avenue"..."you/she know(s) too much"..."property of"...blah blah blah. None of the characters interested me. I didn't like any, I didn't hate any...they were just boring. I wish I would've spent the time reading a different Hoffman novel.

A coming of age novel about a gang and their 'property', the girls who do their bidding. Violence and drugs are the norm. The 'heroine' who is an outsider at the start makes a play for the gang leader, and actually gets him - but life with a violent drug-addict is not what she wants, and to our relief, she's finally able to turn her life around. Depressing and claustrophobic.
Apparently Alice Hoffman has written many better novels than this one - I shall look forward to exploring some of them.

I tried so hard to like this book. Had it not been written by Hoffman, I would've stopped reading after the first 50 pages. I kept reading...hoping it would get better...but it didn't. I read way too much of it before finally realizing that I was giving it too many pages & hours to get better. I feel like the characters kept repeating the same phrases..."honor","what do you want from me?"...the avenue"..."you/she know(s) too much"..."property of"...blah blah blah. None of the characters interested me. I didn't like any, I didn't hate any...they were just boring. I wish I would've spent the time reading a different Hoffman novel. This book was such a disappointment. I love Alice Hoffman books. She's one of my favorite articles so I'm show more really surprised by how not good this book is. show less

if you like Foxfire by JCO

4.10