Customer Comments

The Night Circus is a truly original book. Morgenstern's fantastical exhibits at the circus, together with her descriptions of the effects they have on the observers, is wonderful. I can't help but look longingly at the few open fields in our area and wonder if the circus might appear there soon! I would have loved a bit more character development, but was fully engaged by the environment that she created. I look forward to reading more from this author!

The Help received so many rave reviews that I was actually nervous about finally reading it -- after all, how could a book possibly meet such high expectations? And so it was one of the last books I read in 2010. What a remarkable book!!! The voices of the various narrators evoked their experiences in a way that a more traditional, third-person narrative could not have captured. The characters had depth and plenty of flaws -- other than Aibileen, I'm not sure I truly liked any of them. I found myself frequently having the same kinds of reactions as Skeeter -- how could I not have understood these things? I finished the book wishing that I knew more about whether and how the community of Jackson managed to heal its wounds.

The best compliment I can give a book is to recommend it to everyone I know, and that's exactly what I've done with Gilead. When a friend of mine said she thought "all modern fiction is trash," I said she needed to read Gilead. She loved it. I shared it with my mother, who promptly bought copies for several other people. I lent it to my mother-in-law, who was so moved she wrote an essay about the book. I have not read another book in the past decade that has had such an impact on so many people. Read it.