Order from a Major Online Bookstore
Ultimate Book Price Comparison Engine
Save Your Time And Money
| AnyBook4Less.com | Order from a Major Online Bookstore |
|
| Home | Store List | FAQ | Contact Us | | ||
| Ultimate Book Price Comparison Engine Save Your Time And Money |
||
 |
Title: Saul and Patsy : A Novel by Charles Baxter ISBN: 0-375-41029-5 Publisher: Pantheon Books Pub. Date: 09 September, 2003 Format: Hardcover Volumes: 1 List Price(USD): $24.00 |
Average Customer Rating: 3.73 (11 reviews)
Rating: 4
Summary: Not disappointing.
Comment: The number of reviewers who passionately disliked this book makes me wonder what they were expecting, or if they just weren't in the mood for this kind of book. "Saul and Patsy" is a very well-done novel that keeps your attention throughout, even though there's something a little, I don't know, uncomfortable about the couple's decision to relocate to a small town in rural Michigan. There's something a little off-putting about these two and their choices that is hard to put your finger on.
"Saul and Patsy" does have the sense of having been worked up from short stories, notably because characters who have already been introduced get the full intro treatment several times, as if this were the first time you were meeting them. Besides this small annoyance, it is hard to pick out where the stories were knitted into the larger novel.
I looked forward to "Saul and Patsy," which, after all, is what reading a good book should be all about.
Rating: 4
Summary: ¿The great pageant of life here in the Midwest.¿
Comment: Saul and Patsy is an interesting story and a sharp and intuitive look at love, parenthood and marriage in Middle America. You can read the novel as a harsh indictment of the vacuity of modern life or also as a rather grand and eloquent account of a relationship in various stages of crisis and salvation. Gloominess and pessimism is established at the outset, so is there hope for these characters? Judging by the end of the story, there probably is, although it's not the sort of hope that one would expect. Saul and Patsy as newlyweds, living in the Midwest, together with a small child, are forced to question their values when a young local schoolboy, Gordy Himmelmam, enters their lives, and carries out an act of suicide that sends a terrible emotional ferocity through their lives.
Saul is constantly disappointed with the world after having moved to the town of Five Oaks and resents having to "mingle with the Cossacks." He feels his disappointment beginning to fester, when he thinks that his life in the Midwest is presenting itself as both bland and coarse. His relationship with Patsy provides his solace, and he is the first to admit that they have an "oddball marriage" and they know it. Their love for each other has created " a magic circle around themselves that outsiders cannot penetrate." The secondary characters flesh out the narrative and provide an emotional juxtaposition to Saul and Patsy. There's Delia, Saul's self obsessed and "city wise" mother who after years spent in an unremarkable marriage - a marriage that was a practical economic arrangement - commences having an affair with a young boy half her age. And there's Saul's high flying brother Howie, living on the West coast, making lots of money, but ultimately betraying his bother and sister-in-law with secrets and lies.
Baxter is a beautifully eloquent writer, and he effortlessly weaves the domestic, sexual and emotional lives of Saul and Patsy through the narrative. The strength is in the trivial - the "candied goo covering a toothbrush," the taming of sexual passion into a marriage ceremony, and the "kitchen windows rattling from the stage-managed wind." But the story seems to lose its focus at the end, as though Baxter is having trouble finding a conclusion, or an ultimate resolution to the crisis that presents itself to the two main protagonists. Nevertheless, Saul and Patsy is a charming and sincere read, and I'm looking forward to reading more of Baxter's work.
Michael
Rating: 4
Summary: Not Feast of Love, but Baxter is still supberb...
Comment: Baxter's Feast of Love is simply a masterpiece. This book, as most do in comparison, falls short. Neverthless, it is a beautifully written and sometimes fascinating account of a marriage, a family, and a community in these changing times. The story does not always satisfy, but it is much like life in that way. Baxter's eye is incredible and writing is often lyrical. The story may not feel complete, but I think that may well be the intent. Well worth the read--particularly if you don't have to pay full price.
 |
Title: The Namesake : A Novel by Jhumpa Lahiri ISBN: 0395927218 Publisher: Houghton Mifflin Co Pub. Date: 16 September, 2003 List Price(USD): $24.00 |
 |
Title: The Fortress of Solitude : A Novel by Jonathan Lethem ISBN: 0385500696 Publisher: Doubleday Pub. Date: 16 September, 2003 List Price(USD): $26.00 |
 |
Title: The Feast of Love : A Novel by Charles Baxter ISBN: 037570910X Publisher: Vintage Pub. Date: 01 May, 2001 List Price(USD): $13.00 |
 |
Title: The Amateur Marriage: A Novel by Anne Tyler ISBN: 1400042070 Publisher: Knopf Pub. Date: 06 January, 2004 List Price(USD): $24.95 |
 |
Title: Liars and Saints by Maile Meloy ISBN: 0743244354 Publisher: Scribner Pub. Date: June, 2003 List Price(USD): $24.00 |
Thank you for visiting www.AnyBook4Less.com and enjoy your savings!
Copyright� 2001-2021 Send your comments
