Mississippi Books

I read Black Boy years ago and wanted to refresh my memory of the book. The author has a way of taking you into his world. I was rivited to the pages as I was all those years ago when I first read the book. I would recommend this book to anyone, young or old.

Often when you see books written about the life of black people in any point and time before the 1960's its main message is "My life was hard because white people are terrible," and that gets very redundant. However this was quite refreshing, as he did not harp on racism on every page. This is a very well written and intresting account of this man's unique life experiences and all the strange, crazy people he encountered within his family and outside them as well. People who have a few or several nuts on their family tree will be able to relate to Black Boy.

The best autobiography EVER, in fact I am not even sure it should be called autobiography because it is much more than that for many reasons. Autobiographies are often flat and either self pitying or glorifying, but this one is completely at another level. I was so impressed by the brilliant mind that shines through all obsacles, and his writing is just so natural, logical and insightful, not just about his personal life experiences, but about human suffering, senseless oppression, and unyiedling human spirit. Wow!

I ordered this book because it was on my nephews book-report list. It's a good book. But it is full of bad language. I think it's an adult book--with a very compelling story. But completely not for kids. I know kids hear bad language all the time. But to have it presented to them by a 'trusted' adult--gives it a kind of condoning that it doesn't need.

Every time I read a book about the plight of blacks in the South in the early part of the 20th century as Jim Crow society solidified I have to shutter in disgust. I have just finished reading communist Harry Haywood's autobiography Black Bolshevik. I have read Malcolm X's words on the fate of his forebears in the post-bellum South and now I have read Richard Wright's autobiographical sketch Black Boy. I will make no defense of the unequal treatment of blacks in the North. There is none. However, Wright's descriptions of the physical and psychological damage, as presented by his own experiences of Jim Crow, done to blacks by Southern whites are positively feudal. There was no room for illusions about the goodness of humankind in that world. To believe so was to face personal humiliation, or worst-the lynching tree.

Wright, after great personal struggle within himself, is able to reflect on his experiences and to articulate the effect that Jim Crow had on him as a black, as a man, as a human being. It was not pretty. One can only image the fate of those less articulate than brother Wright as they try to comprehend a world not of their making but which they early on must learn to navigate. The description of this grinding struggle is heart of the first part of the book.

Wright goes back to the mist of time in his early youth to dissect the hunger, psychological as well as physical, than never was far from his door; the effects on him of a sick and helpless mother; of an absent ne'er-do-well father; and, an overbearing and religiously-driven grandmother on his early development. And those are just the problems in the house. Once Wright steps outside those comparably comfortable confines he faces the outside world of Mississippi reality that he must put on a mask in order to survive in a world that will literarily cut him down if he does not learn the code. Although Wright gives many examples of how this system robbed blacks of their personality the most graphic descriptions, by far, are those that deal with the need to have to put on the mask when whites are around. And the consequences if one did not.

And what of the great escape to the North (via Memphis) to Chicago-the Promised Land that forms the basis for the second part of the book? We have seen that urban story portrayed in other locales as well, for example, in Ralph Ellison's Invisible Man and Claude Brown's Man-Child in The Promised Land. That is where my statement about the treatment, or rather mistreatment, of blacks in the North comes into play. In effect, Wright articulates the contours of a psychological feudalism in the North where the special oppressions of blacks as a race are met with indifference by whites. What makes Wright's case special is that through self-education and willpower he breaks out of the endless and destructive turning in on oneself to articulate his experiences and those of other blacks like him displaced from the rural life of the South to the uncertainties of urban life.

On the face of it seems incongruous that Wright would find a solution to his angst in the American Communist Party during the heyday of the `third period' in the early 1930's. I have mentioned elsewhere, most recently in my review of Harry Haywood's Black Bolshevik (part of which also deals with this period in the American party), that on reading memoirs and autobiographies of the older generations of radicals and revolutionaries I am looking for the spark that broke them from the norms of bourgeois society. I have found that there is a great range of reasons from racial and class hatreds to intellectual curiosity. I find that in the end that Wright's relationship to communism, not without some bumps and bruises along the way, came from intellectual curiosity as much as any sense of racial or class injustice.

In Chicago, in many ways the embryonic black proletarian core of the country in this period, Wright continued his struggle for physical daily survival and for intellectual understanding. His fortuitous linking up with the local John Reed Club helped, at least initially, stabilize his intellectual life. His description of the inner workings of the Communist Party and its role in its own front group creations, like the Reed Club, jibes with other accounts that I have read. The tremendous pressures to conform to party life and the party line are chilling for what, in the final analysis, was a voluntary political organization and not a cult. Moreover, one of the characters portrayed in this section bears a striking resemblance to the above-mentioned very real Harry Haywood. Wright's take on Haywood is very, very different from how old Harry portrayed himself in his autobiography. Surprise.

One of the charges brought against Wright by fellow black party members was that he was an intellectual. Self-taught, yes, but an intellectual nevertheless. One would think that recruiting such a fairly rare person, black or white, would have had the comrades spinning cartwheels. No so in Wright's case. Tremendous pressure was placed on him to conform to party dictates. Or else. This seems counter-intuitive. The relationship between communism and intellectuals and artists has always been a somewhat rocky one. But know this-then and today we need as many intellectuals as we can get our hands on to write, think and lead the struggles of humankind. Ignorance never did anyone any good. Enough said on that. If you want to get a real feel for what that old expression Mississippi God Damn from Nina Simone's song really meant read this well written and thoughtful book.

this is really a book of three parts: 1. one the emergence of the left tackle position in the nfl and how that happened (bill walsh). 2. michael oher taken in by the tuohys. and 3. michael oher becoming high school football sensation and blue chip recruit.
1. is interesting
2. is heartwarming
3. actually starts to totally undermine 2. i went from thinking the tuohys were great people who wanted to help a poor going nowhere kid to thinking maybe the tuohys were in on some master plan to bring big mike to ole miss. this is ultimately where the book fails, the scheming; also the book is entirely rushed at the end and has no sort of conclusion since oher is still a work in progress at a currently bad football school but seems to be highly thought of by nfl draft gurus. one hopes oher makes it but it seems a difficult road, in the nfl they won't diagram plays for you with kitchen chairs or ketchup bottles and the offenses are extremely complex.
all in all i wouldn't recommend this book it starts with promise but about halfway through you really lose faith in everyone concerned in the book and so it leaves a bad aftertaste.

My mom recommended this book to me and I finally saw it at the library and put it on the bottom of my reading pile. But when I started reading, I read it very quickly because it is so engaging. This is a book about football, but it is also a book about race and class relations, generosity, luck, and life. It challenges you to think about how far you would be willing to go to help another person and what might happen if you actually did that. Outstanding.

I saw the author interviewed by Barry Kibrick on the local community college television station. They disgussed the issue of the prohibition against organizations cultivating young potential college-ball recruits with gifts and aid and ["perhaps"] whether this was the motivation in adopting a child from the inner city, it was left unclear, of course BECAUSE IT WOULD BE A MONSTROUS THING TO ADOPT A CHILD SPECIFICALLY TO SERVE YOUR ALMA-MATERS FOOTBALL TEAM!!! This issue is deftly dealt with as an unconfronted secondary matter which really doesn't require that much attention--RIGHT!? This book delibrately avoids a hard look at a real manifestation of SLAVE CULTURE! The act itself renders secondary the childs life to a brief time on a college football team. It is saying that it is less important that a child has a history that is his own, that of his parents and grand parents, and not the history of the rich people who lived across town and were so proud of their third rate college team they just had to have a player--some kind of pet-mascot hybrid whose training program and life perspective and system of values can be molded in any way to suit that end enforcable by law--like a slave. Why? Because in their heart of hearts they believe in slavery. Like Milton Freidman says in "Capitalism and Freedom," [Robinson Crusoe, without his man Friday is not free, because he must fend for his own survival.] It becomes clearer as your read what Freidman means by this... it isn't the freedom of the wage earner that is of value protecting, nor those tied to a salary, or even the freedoms of those with a modicum of wealth, but those who've really created freedom like say in the tens and hundreds of millions of dollars, or even better, billions of dollars worth of wealth. What Freidman shares with most other economists in this regard is this... he chooses to empathize with those most likely to offer him a career and not those who comprise the bulk of humanity. Like this book, "The Blind Side," which acknowldges social strife in the inner city just so far as it hinders a couple of ghoulish gnomes and the recruiting hinderances of their favorite college team! Screw this book, screw Michael Lewis and Barry Kibrick!

My husband made me read this book. I wasn't looking forward to it. After about 10 pages I was hooked. I knew nothing about football going into this book and absolutely loved it. I got it for my brother for his birthday and he was obsessed. He got it for our father...he's hooked.
Great story of overcoming odds while teaching about the sport of football.

Everyone will enjoy this one!

On the surface, this is a book about Michael Oher, a poor teenager in Memphis, whose size and speed turn him into one of the country's top football prospects. Michael Lewis, one of the greats at mapping the intersection between sports and economics, expands the story to include much more. He demonstates why the frenzy occured over someone like Michael Oher (the Left Tackle covers the Quarterback's blind side, a huge gap after Lawrence Taylor showed exactly how fragile the multimillion dollar QB investments can be) as well as how people try to jump on the bandwagon.

The book is at it's finest when it shows the conflicting loyalties of people "helping" Michael Oher improve his life. What are the true intentions of the coach who also is looking for a ticket to a college coaching career? A mentor looking to assist his alma mater? Or even the unwritten - an author looking for a topical subject.

The book is a very easy read, and hard to put down. And you won't ever look at those offensive lineman the same.

This is another of Fannie Flaggs deeply delightful books. The rich characture development is so attention grabbing. What a joy to follow along through the eyes and words of a pre-teen on into adulthood. Another cast of zany oddfellows. I recommend this to young and older readers alike.

I read this book back in 1992 when it first came out in paperback. I was eleven at the time. I can recall finishing it and immediately starting it again. I think I read it six times just that year. When I was eleven, I thought I WAS Daisy Fay. I pictured myself starring in the movie, which I knew was going to come out someday (why, why why why hasn't it come out, 16 years later?). As a young girl, this book captured me in a way that the Babysitters Club or Sweet Valley never could (back then we didn't have Harry Potter!). I even "performed" the first chapter (diary entry) for a class project.

Zoom forward to 2008. I have read this book a MINIMUM of once a year, every year, since I first read it. It is still my favorite book of all time, even with my current "style" of reading being quite different than Daisy Fay (my other favorite book is Steppenwolf - not exactly your DFATMM). Any time I am having a bad day, I know that I can go read Daisy Fay and immediately feel better. I'm 27 now, but sometimes I still feel like little miss Daisy Fay is my best friend.

While I am a fan of ALL Fannie Flagg books and characters, this one strikes me as the most heartfelt, warm, and genuine character that she has ever created. Daisy Fay is a quick read (even the slowest reader can get through it in a week - quick readers, bet on an afternoon), but aside from the ease of reading - it is a powerful, touching story of a goofy, awesome, hilarious, and outspoken girl - the girl we all love.

Thank you, Fannie Flagg, for filling my entire life with your fascinating and wonderful characters (especially my Daisy Fay). :)

Fannie Flagg Is the Best Writer I have come across in many years. She has a magic on par with Mark Twain. You will fall in love with her novels and I would recommend any and all. I cant say enough good things about her. Even before I finished my first book of hers I ordered all of the rest! I only hope she writes many more as they are each a jewel and a treasure. Happy reading.

This is one of the funniest books I have ever read, if not the funniest. Great for a gift or for an introduction to the work of the author, Fannie Flagg. I highly recommend this book!

I love Fannie Flagg's books, this book I found to be very funny, everyone I lent it too also thought it was funny. Enjoy

Aint She Sweet is the remake of all SEP's previous stories, it's the same plot: a woman with problems, a dark brooding man, she finds a fortune, he talks like a woman and they live happily ever after.

First of all a character like Sugar Beth cannot turn around like this. If she was a jerk in highschool, to a point of being evil and vindictive, she will always stay like that, and she will most definatelly NOT turn into a nice person. I understand that romance novels are supposed to be fairy tales, but come now, this is rediculous. There is the same cheesy humor on ever page that is annoying as hell. Why can't they talk normally, why do they have to talk like they give a performance? That makes the characters so superficial and pretentious that i couldn't help but dislike most of them.

Clearly, SEP needs to come up with new ideas, all of her books are the same. Her best book, IMO, is Nobody's Baby but Mine. That was hillarious and smart. This book is not.

The Heroine is unlike any heroine I've ever read about. Growing up, she was the 'Mean Girl'. The author did such a superb job making the reader sympathetic to her character, not because she was 'blameless', but because she realized her errors the hard way and turned herself around.

I'm sure we all have done things in the past that we wish we could go back and correct. It made me cheer Sugar Beth on all the way. I wasn't sure I would like this book at the beginning of the book, Sugar Beth was a bit too trashed, but after about 20 pages, when the dialogue between her and Colin began, it became whip smart, and I couldn't put the book down.

There are some sizzling love scenes, and some serious tearjerker pages. Amazing writing.

I didn't think I'd like this book to be perfectly honest. However, the author created a realistic story with so many problems, not overly done, but told the story in such a way you were hung to every word. I liked all the characters, Sugar Beth (though not the name), I liked Colin and Winnie and Ryan and Gigi. They all grew and you enjoyed the unravelling of this great story. A real good read! (or listen as I did)

This is the first book I have read by SEP, and it will not be my last. Sugar Beth Carey is a compelling and interesting heroine, and I didn't expect to enjoy her story as much as I did. How could I get behind a girl who made everyone's lives so miserable in high school? I'm sure those of us who felt awkward or our of place in high school may have enjoyed her comeuppance while reading this book, but I for one turned the corner from indulging in a little schadenfreude to admiring her grit during the dinner party scene where she took everything dished out to her, so to speak. I also really enjoyed the portrayal of the small Southern town where your business is everybody's business and gossip spreads like you-know-what. But the book really shines thanks to uncommonly snappy and entertaining dialogue - I wish I had so many witty comebacks as Sugar Beth and Colin, that's for sure! The only reason I didn't give the book five stars was that I just didn't find the love story as convincing as I would have liked. The transition from animosity to sexual infatuation to honest-to-God love was a little rapid for me. It was almost like SEP realized she was getting to the end of her page limit and ratcheted up the emotions accordingly. I could have used a few more insightful meditations from Colin and SB to support what seems like a giant leap. But, in all, it was a very entertaining and fun read that I will recommend to others, and I plan on reading more from SEP.

Ain't She Sweet by Susan Elizabeth Phillips

I never thought I would rate one of SEP's books as a one-star, but this one earned it. I'm a very happy person, so when a book makes me angry on page five and keeps me that way until the end of the book, it's not a pleasant thing. And this book did just that. The antics of the entire cast are petty, mean, vindictive, cruel, and just about every other horrible thing you could say. I couldn't find a single one of them likeable. And for 383 pages, every single person in this town is stepping all over the heroine to "get even". The new brat pack in town is more vicious that the heroine Sugar Beth, and they're adults.

So here's the plot. Sugar Beth Carey is the town debutante in Parrish, Mississippi. Her mother runs the town socially, while her father runs it economically. Her father, as a means to make her mother suffer, is cruel to Sugar Beth her entire life. And, as a child, you see just how cruel that man can be, constantly lashing out at a child with petty meanness, viciousness, and just plain Nazi-like cruelty. Seriously, this man was evil. So it's no big surprise that Sugar Beth has issues. But he also punishes her by keeping his mistress and other daughter not too far from his legitimate family's home. In fact, Sugar Beth finds out about her half sister Winnie and sees first-hand all of the love and affection her father lavishes upon Winnie, while treating Sugar Beth with such cruelty you're wondering why on earth the mom doesn't call 911.

After deserting Parrish when she was eighteen, Sugar Beth is forced to return home fifteen years later. Within five months, her mother dies, her father marries his mistress and gives her all of his dead wife's wealth (which should have gone to Sugar Beth), dies himself, and then Sugar Beth's beloved 71 year-old husband Emmett dies. She's left bankrupt by her rich dead husband and the sole custodian of his 51 year-old daughter, who has the mind of a 10 year-old. Sugar Beth's stepdaughter, Delilah, lives in a facility that she cherishes, where she's cared for and feels safe, but it's expensive. So Sugar Beth must go home and try to find the valuable painting she has inherited from her aunt. The painting will pay for Delilah's care. And she loves Delilah so she swallows her pride and returns to Parrish.

Enter the mean-spirited group set out for revenge. Colin Burne, the 22 year-old school teacher she got fired for sexual assault (yes, a particularly mean way to get rid of someone); Winnie, Sugar Beth's half sister who I think hated more than anyone else in this book; Ryan, Sugar Beth's old boyfriend who coincidentally married Winnie; the Seawillows, a group of snotty bratty girls who turn into even more monstrous women set out to make everyone not a part of their group miserable; and a whole town of mean-spirited gossip-mongering monsters straight out of an eccentric trailer park. I was angry from almost the moment I began reading it, and was even angrier by the time I finished it. Mean people being rewarded with wealth is not a message I like hearing, especially in a book. And a man who knows he loves a woman, and continues to let others berate and viciously attack her is sick, something I'd expect to see in a codependency seminar.

There are little barbs here and there throughout the book, insulting various life styles. In particular, the chumminess that SEP tried to pull off with the Seawillows came off as though she was applauding their vicious behaviors. Then there's just the unrealistic way this story unfolds. Winnie marrying the guy who helped humiliate her? The lover of her worst enemy? And she gets pregnant to force him to marry her? And her best friends are the Seawillows, the exact women who tortured her through high school? I don't think so. Although I'll continue to read SEP books, I will never pick up this one again.

I wrote a paper historical truth in Absalom! Absalom! in graduate school and decided to revisit the novel. The edition I purchased through Amazon is the one I used 35 years ago and consequently has some associations for me. I am pleased with the condition of my purchase. Thanks.Absalom, Absalom!: The Corrected Text (Modern Library)

Just looking for some great reads for the summer As much as I like Faulkner and many say this is his best I really look to the time alone with this book Great shippiing price and the hard cover quality is excellent

Gives an understanding of what it means to be Southern as only William Faulkner can.

Absolutely incredible! The writing structure is extremely difficult along with the shifting narrators, but it is an amazing book in large part because of these challenging aspects. Faulkner's use of language is exquisite, so that you feel like you are flowing down a meandering river and taking in the sights as you move through the text. Definitely one of the best ever!

Thomas Sutpen is a man with one single, unfailing goal: to forge a dynasty in 1830s Jefferson, Mississippi. A century later, young Quentin Compson, obsessed with Sutpen, slowly uncovers the interweaving, ever-expanding story of Sutpen's ruthless ambition, the intervention of the Civil War, and his ultimate failure and destruction through his children. A gothic novel of the highest degree, this book is rich with complicated family histories, race issues, and above all complex character motivations that create a slowly evolving story of increasing depth and darkness. The writing style is lengthy and dense, becoming at times frustratingly difficult, but in the end the pieces of the story unify into a whole truth: a vivid analysis not only of one man's life, but of the lives of those he touched and of Southern identity itself.

The major fault of this novel is the lengthy, wordy, sometimes difficult writing style; the major strength is the complex layers of plot which confuse, reveal, confuse again, and reveal more, building an ever more complex and meaningful complete story. In many ways, this weakness and strength feed in to each other: it would not be the same book if it were written any other way, but the novel may be difficult or off-putting to some readers as a result. Faulkner's writing style is often dense and presented as a stream of consciousness, where topics shift, articles go unspecified, and phrases or words are repeated for emphasis. In Absalom, Absalom! the style is even more exaggerated, with incredibly long sentences and paragraphs. Worse, despite the fact that the narrator changes a number of times through the book, the narrative voice is almost always identical, making it difficult to separate speakers and determine character relations. The difficult, dense narrative may make it hard for the reader to begin this book--it takes a few chapters to get into the rhythm of the writing, and the reader has to accept a certain degree of confusion and trust that the story will explain itself in time.

However, granted some hard work and some faith in Faulkner's storytelling, the novel expands into a story of increasing complexity and great depth. Like the writing style, which often begins with confusing references and repetition before resolving into comprehensible storytelling, the plot is alternately confusing and revealing. Once one relation, motivation, or event is revealed, it again becomes confusing, and then again reveals new information--information which often revises previous events or complicates an earlier character. As such, the story may come back to the same event three times, but each time exposes more about the event, the people involved, and their motivations, creating an ever more meaningful story as the truth is revealed. Such complexity would be impossible without the dense writing style, and both style and story aid the other into new settings, rich language, new events, greater motivation.

As the book comes to its conclusions and the final revelations unfold, there is a classically tragic sense to Sutpen's story: stuck between the reality and the appearance of his own success, he watches and enacts the repeated downfall of his personal dynasty and finally himself, all by way of his offspring. Quentin, the reader's companion as he researches and knits together Sutpen's story, must interpret this underlying failure, the crisis of Southern identity: what it means to be a part of, what it means to be great in, the South--and ultimately, of course, this is an identity crisis that reaches from the South to all humanity. The end of the book is heavy with motivation and character, and ultimately fulfilling, even as it raises doubt and a sense of personal dis-ease. So while the writing style can be difficult at times, while the constant confusion and re-confusion of the plot may become frustrating, this is ultimately a satisfying read: satisfying to the very heart of the reader, a brilliant piece of storytelling and a wonderful analysis of humankind. I greatly enjoyed it and very highly recommend it--to all readers, even those that have to force themselves through the first few chapters.

This book will make you laugh, cry, and leave you hungry for more. Do yourself a favor and read the entire series. Maupin creates a coterie of friends that I love and revisit often. They may be fictional, but I think of his characters as family.

This is a fun, late-20th Century take on the old theme of the virtuous midwestern girl who moves to the big city. Ulnlike Sister Carrie, though, Mary Ann Singleton is not so much the focus of the book as she is the touchstone by which other characters are measured and reveal themselves. Unfortunately, she lacks some of the emotional depth and appeal of Siste Carrie. Indeed, most of the characters in the book are paper thin. The result can be amusing and an excellent vehicle for satire, but not something that has great literary value. Maupin is more like Tom Wolfe than Dreiser in his ability to spin amusing yarns that have a good sense of the pulse of American culture, but without the depth and pathos that make for great literature.

The real hero of the book is not so much Mary Ann as it is the two most appealing gay characters (Michael Tolliver and the closet gay gynecologist) who, despite their untraditional lifestyles, conduct themselves according to a moral code that would resonate with traditional American and Christian values. Indeed, perhaps the book is most significant for its ability, 30 years ago in a different and less tolerant time, to portray gay characters realistically and sympathetically.

I find some of the upper class characters to be unbelievable and less than paper thin. Maupin is at his best in portraying the less lofty. Also, as a heterosexual who lived in San Francisco just a couple of years after this was written, I did not witness the ridiculously loose sexual mores portrayed in the book. Either Maupin is exaggerating to an unpardonable degree, or I horribly mis-spent by youth.

The plot is a soap opera, but the book on a whole is entertaining and worthwhile.

If you are going to San Francisco be sure to wear some flowers in your hair, someone sang. If you are not going - but you want to, just for starters pick a copy of Armistead Maupin's "Tales of the City" a novel that was first serialized in the mid-70's in a local newspaper and some time later was published in a single volume. But he didn't stop, and last year he reached the seventh installment.

"Tales of the City" is a quick read - what doesn't mean is a disposable one. The characters are unforgettable and after a couple of pages it feels like we have known them for ages. It all begins when Mary Ann Singleton a Cleveland twenty-something spends vacation in San Fran and decides she does not want to go back home.

As she starts her new life, we are introduced to a group of people who are somehow related - although they are not aware of the ties all the time. The most important scenario is a building in 28 Barbary Lane, where Mary Ann moves to. The owner is Mrs Madrigal who receives her favorite tenants with a special gift.

By this time, "Tales of the City" has become classic. It is funny and it also has cultural and sociological importance. The new P.S. edition brings some interesting information on the writer and his work. But the most touching part is a short text he wrote recollecting the time when the series started to become popular. The stories, has been said, are a love letter to San Francisco. His text is a love letter to the art of creating a world using imagination and observation of his life and times.

Armistead Maupin not only captures the zeitgeist of San Francisco in the '70s, but through his characters, carries us through moments of the human condition, seperate from time, place and gender.

Who am I to review this man's writings? Still, it's fun to be asked to share my ignorance. Many books, by todays' authors, are touted as being hysterically funny, etc. Unfortunately, for me, I find that although I am said to have an excellent sense of humor, these fall rather flat well before the end of the stories.

Maupin allows us to enter the world of the Gay and Straight communities, without forcing either on us as being the "correct" one. I enjoyed how brief he made each chapter, yet (at any given point) tied them together and continued the stories of the several lives, to whom he has introduced us.

There were some "whimsical" moments, and fewer "outright humorous" scenes, however, I had no trouble finishing the book, and look forward to reading his next two installments.

As they used to say on one of the 1950's Teen Dance Shows, on TV, "It's a catchy tune, but a little hard to dance to. I'll rate it as a 7. I will rate this book with 3 stars. If I had laughed, 'til I had tears in my eyes, I'd have given it 5 stars.

I am finding this book a fascinating, read. Only part way through book, but I find it riveting. Insights into the personalities of two engineering giant whose conflict shaped the approach to managing the river -- the wrong guy won. I am discovering things about the political and social history of the first half of the 20th century in America that are profoundly disturbing, but add new understanding of where we are today. Uncomfortable similarities between 1010 - 1930 US and today. Can't wait for the flood. I'm almost there. Oh by the way, it is brilliantly written!

Living near the Mississippi river made this particularly interesting. However, it is a good read in itself, while presenting a part of history that Gen X'rs and younger never heard about.

The beginning - about Humphreys, Eads, Ellet is interesting; and you feel like it is all a set-up for whats to come.

I had three problems with the book:
(1) About halfway through the book, the plot zeroes in on Greenville, MS and never leaves. If you're from west-central MS then you'll love it, but otherwise, it'll be really boring.
(2) The two sections titled "The Club" are VERY boring. They discuss in painstaking detail the relationships between a dozen men who you didn't care to know about in the first place.
(3) There is more than a little repetition of the main points throughout, making you wonder if you have accidently slid back a few chapters.
(4) The author twice uses the word "niggardly" to describe peoples actions. Despite being a real word, I still think it is a poor choice, given the subject matter being described in those chapters.
For these things, I deducted a star in my review.

Overall, this is the best book I've ever read. It's a fact-packed research novel about the MS River and the entire era. But it's more about politics more than flood control. By covering the backdoor deals and backstabbing political aspect of the Flood Control Project, Barry really just showed how all politics work.

A great story about an event no one seems to know about. John Barry does a great job of weaving together several contributing themes on this epic disastor as he takes the reader down the "mighty Mississip" from the 19th century forward to the culminating big flood in 1927 and its finale.

The story begins with a capitalist genius, one James B. Eads, a brilliant self taught engineer compelled to contend with a power mad West Pointer named Andrew Humphries, and it's all about who will determine how the Mississippi River can best be controlled. It's a fight where Humphries and his corps of engineers use every unfair advantage at their disposal, but in a split decision Eads gets the nod. As an engineer, Eads is deemed to be on a par with Da Vinci and Edison and his story as told here is quite impressive.

Barry goes on to describe the culture in the Mississippi river delta including a look into the aristocracy and its race relations with the negro populace; those who provide the labor for the plantations in this god forsaken place, one of snakes, mosquitos, scrub pines and low-land living, all subject to its not infrequent floods.

On balance the blacks eak out an existance with some doing much better as share croppers, but you can trace the beginnings of their slow move up the economic ladder in the old south. The plantation owners live large as they develop impressive wealth out of this constantly labor-starved environment though also one with rich and fertile soil borne of the river's many floods. The struggle to keep labor handy vs the exigences created by the flood is a key theme of the story.

Barry gives us a colorful description of those who control the river from the upper delta down to New Orleans: the newspapers, the banks, the society and its social clubs, the race and labor relations, the transportation systems, and the politics which reach beyond Mississippi to Washington and the greatest financial centers in London and the continent. These Cotton guys are connected at the highest levels, as in all the right schools and all the right parties. The poor people, not so much.

The story begins to take shape when the rains dispense water in biblical volumes over several months which causes a swelling not only in the Mississippi, but in all its feeder rivers which make up 2/3 rds of the country. I was amazed at how large this system is and am further amazed that I never knew of this before now. Just amazing!

As the water in this mighty river, which widens to 3 miles or more in places, deepens and quickens you can almost feel the blinding sheets of cold rain hitting the blacks who load the sand in the bags which shore up the levees (dikes in Holland.) It's dark and the temperatures drop into the low 40's while the river continues to rise and wash against the levees which can reach 5 stories in height. The power of this rapidly moving mass of water is something to behold as it threatens to wipe out the livilihoods of a million people, poor as well as rich. The way in which this whole scenario is handled will lead to a quickening of the negro migration in the general direction of Chicago (the roots of todays "P. Blackstone ranger" gangs on the south side) and other cities along the way. Think of the bombed out apartment buildings such as Pruitt Igoe (St Louis) and Cabrini Green (Chicago) and you begin to get a picture of what the Percy Family, the centerpiece of the books description of a plantation family in Greenville Mississippi, was contending with, and the Percy's were not always a "box of chocolates" for the blacks.

The beauty of the story is that it shows the caprice so evident on all sides including the Percy's. The dynamiting of the levees in two parishes (countys) down river from New Orleans, by the city fathers, was not the finest moment for the rich and powerful and you can't help but feel for the poor, black and white alike. If you aren't already one with a liberal slant on life, you'll have more of one when you've finished with this part of the story.

The fact that Herbert Hoover gets the Republican nomination in 1928 because of his managing of this situation, after the flood breaches a number of the many levees on the river, is a story all unto itself, one that summoned up the best and worst in the men dealing with an unmitigated disastor. The flood also began to pull our national worldview away from one of rugged individualism, toward something more egalitarian. When you consider that Hoover (who leaned left by todays standards) implemented policies that FDR continued, you can see how much of a transitional figure he was. You can easily contrast him with Coolidge who seems to have had a "let them die on the hill side" mindset before and after the flood.

The book does a good job in describing how the Negro population was driven from the arms of the Republican party, who freed the slaves, into the halls of the Democrats, Ku Klux Klan and all. Strange bedfellows, eh? It also chronicles the decline of New Orleans from one of the most powerful cities in the world into what it is today, a shell of its former self. Every school boy and girl should read this harrowing and informative tale as it includes all of the best and worst from which America is made. And, on full display are the seven deadly sins: pride, sloth, gluttony, envy, greed, anger and lust. And oh what a tale it is!

John Barry clearly did his homework. A flood from over 80 years ago is ancient history to most people, but Barry makes the people in the book come alive. He's not afraid to provide well-supported opinions about the people at the helm (such as Herbert Hoover) and their character flaws. As a result, it's not so much a book about a flood as much as a book about the people dealing with the flood. From New Orleans to Baton Rouge to the heart of the Mississippi delta to Washington DC.

Sure, the book is about a huge, continent-changing flood of almost Biblical proportions. But it's also about the US Army Corps of Engineers and all of the events leading up to the flood.

Well written, excellent character studies, strong and clearly documented summations. Now I better understand why New Orleans isn't the powerhouse it once was. Now I better understand Calvin Coolidge and Herbert Hoover. Now I better understand the Mississippi delta, race relations of the era, southern politics in the early 1900's and the early Corps of Engineers.

And oh yes, Old Man River.

In several books I've read regarding Southern History and slavery, this story actually surpised me. Without giving much detail, she becomes famous overnight. Ironic, but to drive into Jackson, Ms. you would never guess just how dangerous a place with was, in fact, all along the Delta and Mississippi was dangerous. She's a born fighter. Good book, takes off towards the end.

A must read for anyone interested in first hand accounts of the Civil Rights movement in the United States.

This is by far one of the best books I have ever read. "Of Coming Age In Mississippi" shows segregation and Civil Rights hardships like it has never been shown before. You feel Anne Moody's heart break and understand segregation how it really was in the deep south. HIGHLY recommended to anyone who wants to open their eyes to another cultural period and understand it for what it really was. It is real, heartbreaking, and impossible to put down.

Though I read this book many years ago, I had to strongly disagree with part of the editor's initial characterization of this book as being "angry". Powerful, painful and anxiety producing, yes. Angry, no.

I personally came away with the lasting impression of a very honest and heart-felt description of the events and struggles that shaped Ann Moody's life, and her active participation in the Civil Rights Movement. She describes beautifully the fears and pains felt by communities during tragic events such as the murder of the young Emmett Till, and injects the intensity felt by the leaders of the Movement, including MLK Jr., as they constantly tried to dodge authorities.

I strongly believe, and echo other reviewer's opinions, that every High School and young college student should be required to read this book.

Thus a civil rights advocate was born.

I read this book seven years ago, on a whim, because I was wanting to understand why Southerners were especially proud of their heritage when there was so much suffering among its own people, especially its blacks.

Ann Moddy lived a life that most whites would be ashamed of, but that many blacks endured. This is a part of American history that mainstreem history books seldom cover in any detail and leave to the "Black Studies" department.

Moody lived her life struggling for identity, struggling for change, struggling for advancement. She made something of herself and has never looked back. (I read somewhere that she doesn't like to talk about her growing-up years and has lived a life of seclusion.). She can only be admired for what she has made of herself.

Moody never once expresses hurt. All she wanted was justice for all. She left Mississippi with more than a tinge of anger.

This book should be required reading for all social studies classes. It is engrossing without being sentimental or overly emotional (and it certainly is not "girly" at all.) For anyone, regardless of color, gender or legal status, this should be a must-read.

This book held my interest till the end. I did think that the two main characters were slightly over the edge, but never in my wildest dreams did I think that the murderer was so close to home. A truely great read and would recomend to all Nora Roberts fans.

This is one of Nora Roberts best. An older story but a wonderful one. It is fast paced and contains some extremely funny scenes woven into a plot within a plot, within a plot! Ms. Roberts carefully disguises her villans and the heros are foggy at best in the beginning. But when the plots thickens and the fog clears the story unfolds into a dramatic, romantic and sometimes funny original saga of the Longstreets. If you are a Nora Roberts fan, I know you will be thrilled with Carnal Innocence.

This is my favorite Nora Roberts. My copy went to the library when I moved years ago so I'm getting another copy so I can reread it...again.

This is one of Nora Roberts' older books and I just ran onto it recently! It kept my interest from the first page. I loved all the characters of this southern town. For once I liked the hero and heroine of the story from the beginning. Sometimes one or the other of them is sort of a jerk and then redeemable by the books end. However, Tucker and Caroline are both likable throughout the book. Nora Roberts was able to add a lot of humor to the story even though there is a serial killer running amok. Nora is great at bringing into the story a pet or child and in this case both, to give the story humor and some nice touching moments. I loved Tucker's easy going manner and his story telling.


I did suspect who the killer was. I sort of wished it could have been someone else but guess that is what made it such an interesting story.

I have some favorites of Nora Roberts and think this one will rate right up there.

Caroline Waverly is a world-renowned violinist in desperate need of some overdue relaxation. She decides that Innocence, Mississippi is the perfect place to find some peace in the only place she has truly ever felt roots. As she makes her grandmother's old home her own, her serenity is shaken when she finds the body of young woman in the lake, and in to the path of a serial killer.

Tucker Longstreet is a true southern gentleman and appears as easy going as a man can get. He enjoys fast cars and faster women, but Caroline is a challenge for him. Tucker is immediately taken with her, and appoints himself her protector. It is then we learn that the good ole boy surface hides a very smart and sharp-witted man.

As the town lives in the grips of fear, Tucker and Caro must identify the killer to have any chance of a future.

This was very well written with wonderful characters. The secondary characters are especially good - LuLu was a scream! This one kept me guessing till the very end!!

The American paperback editions of Faulkner published by Vintage are far more readable and user-friendly than the British editions due to font size, layout, page size, gutter width, paper and general design. This is a wonderful book which should be a pleasure to read. My one concern, and I am not alone in expressing it, is that the 'corrected' text is to some extent a reversion to a draft that Faulkner himself (as I understand it) agreed to change in the light of editorial suggestions which, in many cases, he accepted as improvements. To correct back to an editorial stage before the involvement of an editor is an odd editorial practice and, when a writer has been as tactfully and agreeably edited as Faulkner, rather a doubtful one. A parallel text, or a fuller description of the logic of the Polk emendation, would have been useful, for the general as well as the specialist reader. All the same, a wonderful edition to read.

I found my first Faulkner a bit too disquieting to be rated as a 5-star classic. Faulkner's flashback-filled style of writing in "Light in August" goes backwards as much as forwards, and the first major character introduced and followed through the first third of the book disappears for the middle third and most of the last third. While Faulkner makes Lena Grove likable and unforgettably strong in her straightforward simplicity, the character Joe Christmas who is introduced and dominates the middle third seems too over-the-top to be believed; he ends up reading more like a literary type than a real character.

Faulkner by toning down Joe Christmas and focusing on Lena Grove could have written a heartwarming story about the girl who redeems her youthful mistake to become a strong Southern women in, in spite of, and even because of her heritage and surroundings. But that wouldn't be the story Faulkner has in mind--every character has flaws, and one's heritage and surroundings may be greater than even the most moral character can overcome. The best one can hope, as does Lena by the end of the story, is to survive by moving on (as another great Southern writer would pen, you can't go home again).

The story is heightened and perhaps driven by its contrasts--set in the Depression-era deep South, townsfolk live uneasily alongside country folk, whites share geography but can scarcely be said to live beside blacks, cars and mule-drawn wagons share the roads, houses are lit by kerosene and electricity, the occasional open-minded unprejudiced citizen (universally hated and condemned by their neighbors) lives uneasily alongside and amidst the virulently racist majority and the atmosphere that breeds this backwards-looking, closed, feudal society.

I can tell from this first reading that I concur with the majority of literary critics that Faulkner is one of the great writers of the last century. I respect him, I'm just not sure I can say I found the story likable. The Amazon-suggested tag "southern discomfort" captures the essence of this book succinctly.

This "Absalom,Absalom", and "Go Down, Moses" are my favorite novels by Faulkner. "Light in August" has the advantage of being his most readable book. I will let you in on a little secret, though. I have found that Faulkner is much better to LISTEN to than read straight. I'd read several of his books when I discovered my local library had a number of tapes and CDs of his work. Those read by Mark Hammer are in a class by themselves. Not only does he have the proper accent, but his pauses in Faulkner's often long,involved sentences show a great familiarity with the work and add a strong element that make his words sparkle like jewels with brilliance and an uncanny insight into the characters he displays for us. After that, reading Faulkner is never the same.

A friend recommended this to me. I cannot belive how wrong he was about it. First off, I found it extremely annoying and confusing that there were several characters who had the same or similar names; it was kinda hard to keep track of who was who or what was going on. Second, and my main problem with the book is that I just could not relate with or even like one character in this book. I can't connect with a book if I hate every single character. Overall, this book was just dismal, although its one redeeming quality was its narratives about racism and the differences between whites and blacks. That is the only thing keeping me from giving this a one star review.

This book has been touted as being Faulkner's most accessible. Although a bit easier to follow having less stream of consciousness it still requires some patience and appreciation for nuance. Further, if you take the story at face value you will be missing out on 90% of what it has to offer. The themes run deep and the characters symbolic. I'd recommend reading exerpts from One Matchless Time by Jay Parini who provides some good insights into Faulkner's life and his writings. I'd also read the review written by A.Mason (below). This was one of the more violent and sexual books that I have read of Faulkner. Although I was surprised, I was in awe of his tact and style in portraying these events in a subtly gruesome way that takes the reader off gaurd. The climactic scene of Joe Christmas's undoing was Faulkner at his best. I'd recommend this book to anyone who loves good writing and is fascinated with the tragedy of the post-Civil War southerner.