Synopses & Reviews
The Jarrets are a typical American family. Calvin is a determined, successful provider and Beth an organized, efficient wife. They had two sons, Conrad and Buck, but now they have one. In this memorable, moving novel, Judith Guest takes the reader into their lives to share their misunderstandings, pain...and ultimate healing.
Review
"As has already been noted, all happy families are alike. All ordinary ones are not: some have extraordinary things happen in them. The extraordinary events here include the death of one son and the attempted suicide of the other. The focus is on 17-year-old Conrad, who struggles to understand himself, which necessitates coming to terms with his brother's death.
It is not a very good novel. At times the dialogue is unconvincing; it is almost always trite; one senses, always, the sun ready to shine through the storm. The best writing concerns Conrad's mother, who damns others as she damns herself. There are painful scenes, very convincingly done, between husband and wife over the way to handle their son. He, alas, remains too much the stereotyped troubled adolescent for us to pay too much attention to. With everyone else trying so hard to help and understand, the reader guiltlessly dissociates himself.
Is Robert Young looking for a new TV series?" Reviewed by Daniel Weiss, Virginia Quarterly Review (Copyright 2006 Virginia Quarterly Review)
Review
"Admirable...touching...full of the anxiety, despair, and joy that is common to every human experience of suffering and growth." The New York Times
Review
"Guest has the ability to move a toughened reviewer to tears." Newsweek
Review
"A writer's novel. A reader's novel. A critic's novel. A very importanrt novel." Detroit Free Press
Review
"Rejoice! A novel for all ages and all seasons." The Washington Post Book World
Synopsis
The Jarrets are a typical American family. Calvin is a determined, successful provdier and Beth an organized, efficient wife. They had two sons, Conrad and Buck, but now they have one. In this memorable, moving novel, Judith Guest takes the reader into their lives to share their misunderstandings, pain...and ultimate healing.
Synopsis
The novel that inspired Robert Redford s Oscar-winning film starring Donald Sutherland and Mary Tyler Moore
In Ordinary People, Judith Guest s remarkable first novel, the Jarrets are a typical American family. Calvin is a determined, successful provider and Beth an organized, efficient wife. They had two sons, Conrad and Buck, but now they have one. In this memorable, moving novel, Judith Guest takes the reader into their lives to share their misunderstandings, pain...and ultimate healing.
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Synopsis
One of the great bestseller of our time: the novel that inspired Robert Redford's Oscar-winning film starring Donald Sutherland and Mary Tyler Moore
In Ordinary People, Judith Guest's remarkable first novel, the Jarrets are a typical American family. Calvin is a determined, successful provider and Beth an organized, efficient wife. They had two sons, Conrad and Buck, but now they have one. In this memorable, moving novel, Judith Guest takes the reader into their lives to share their misunderstandings, pain, and ultimate healing. Ordinary People is an extraordinary novel about an "ordinary" family divided by pain, yet bound by their struggle to heal.
"Admirable...touching...full of the anxiety, despair, and joy that is common to every human experience of suffering and growth." -The New York Times
"Rejoice A novel for all ages and all seasons." -The Washington Post Book World