The Weight of Water by Anita Shreve Summary and Reviews
|
List Price: Our Price: $3.15 You Save: $10.84 (77%) Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days Buy Used: from $0.01 (click here) Category: Book See more book details and other editions |
|---|
Book Reviews of The Weight of Water
Book Review: Couldn't put it down!!!
Summary: 5 Stars
We just returned from a trip to southern Maine and Portsmouth, NH (where I bought this book)-- I loved the challenge of being on your toes to know which story the author was referring to at times. If you judge a book by its ability to pull you into the plot(s), then this is just top notch -- loved the writing style!! I'm sorry I finished.Book Review: Deep water
Summary: 4 Stars
We tell stories, in part, to get us through hard times and to heal past hurts. But are there some areas of human experience that transcend the healing power of stories? Anita Shreve explores this question in "The Weight of Water."Jean, a journalist, is researching an article about a brutal double murder that occurred in 1873 on Smuttynose Island, an isolated encampment off the New Hampshire coast. Jean's husband, five year old daughter, brother-in-law, and his girlfriend accompany her to the island where she takes photographs, and to a nearby town where she discovers a journal written by an eyewitness to the murders. The journal's author, Maren, lived on Smuttynose, survived the murders by hiding in a cave all night, and later identified the killer. Or so the story goes.
Maren's journal reveals a life of incredible isolation and psychological distress, strained by outside forces (much as Jean's own marriage is strained). Maren's repressed sadness and rage eventually build to a moment of release, one that will affect her and her family forever. Beneath her story lies Jean's own, likewise one of sadness, repression, and hidden anger that is headed for its own moment of release.
More compelling and sadder than "The Pilot's Wife," this novel shows Shreve as a true master of the human heart.
Book Review: Definitely Shreve's best
Summary: 5 Stars
Having read all of Shreve's fictional works, I would call this book my favorite. As she has done in her previous novels, she alternately weaves the past and present, a writing style which I love. The difference here is that the two stories are only related by themes and not by the actual characters (usually, it is past and present of the characters involved, like Eden Close and Strange Fits of Passion). It is so effortlessly done--you can just feel the jealousies of the female lead in each story rise to the surface. I am surprised that many readers of Pilot's Wife did not like this book as I have always found this to be Shreve's best.Book Review: Discovery on Maine's Isolated Coast
Summary: 5 Stars
I understand why so many books are set in New England. Its rich history allows for layered story lines and the picturesque but craggy coastline makes for dramatic settings. This book by Shreve is no exception. The suspense is doubled in the story with a contemporary story line mixing with the unearthing of an old mystery. Two couples make a vacation of a journalists expedition to re-examine the events of a double homocide. Both story lines deal with the strains of marriage and the hostile weather found off Maine's coast. It's a great read.Book Review: Don't waste your time
Summary: 1 Stars
I have three gripes with this book: 1) Its annoyingly self-centered characters for whom you can't muster even a smidge of empathy, let alone sympathy; 2) the melodramatic tone of the modern-day storyline, which is completely unjustified by the humdrum events; and 3) the unnecessarily sordid, pandering climax to the murder mystery that is unrealistic in light of what we have come to know about the characters.I don't say things like this often, but this book is truly not worth reading. If you're wanting an introspective "women's" book that you can really chew on, read "The Poisonwood Bible" by Barbara Kingsolver or "The Wide Sargasso Sea" by Jean Rhys.