The City of Falling Angels

Amazon.com

Past Midnight: John Berendt on the Mysteries of Venice

Just as John Berendt's first book, Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil, was settling into its remarkable four-year run on The New York Times bestseller list, he discovered a new city whose local mysteries and traditions were more than a match for Savannah, whose hothouse eccentricities he had celebrated in the first book. The new city was Venice, and he spent much of the last decade wandering through its canals and palazzos, seeking to understand a place that any native will tell you is easy to visit but hard to know. For travelers to Venice, whether by armchair or vaporetto, he has selected his 10 (actually 11) Books to Read on Venice. And he took the time to answer a few of our questions about his charming new book, The City of Falling Angels:

Amazon.com: The lush, cloistered southern city of Savannah was the locale of Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil. Venice, the setting for The City of Falling Angels, is vastly different. Was it the difference itself that drew you to Venice?

John Berendt: Savannah and Venice actually have quite a lot in common. Both are uniquely beautiful. Both are isolated geographically, culturally, and emotionally from the world outside. Venice sits in the middle of a lagoon; Savannah is surrounded by marshes, piney woods, and the ocean. Venetians think of themselves as Venetian first, Italian second; Savannahians rarely even venture forth as far as Atlanta or Charleston. So both cities offer a writer a rich context in which to set a story, and the stories provide readers a means of escape from their own environment into another world.

Amazon.com: I enjoyed your rather declarative author's note: that this is a work of nonfiction, and that you used everyone's real names. In your previous book you did use pseudonyms for some characters and you explained that you took a few small liberties in the service of the larger truth of the story. Why the change this time?

Berendt: When I wrote Midnight I thought I would do a few people the favor of changing their names for the sake of privacy. But when the book came out, several of the pseudonymous characters told me they wished I'd used their real names instead. So this time, no pseudonyms. As for the storytelling liberties I took in writing Midnight, they were minor and did not change the story, but my mention of it in the author's note caused some confusion, with the result that Midnight is sometimes referred to now as a novel, which it most certainly is not. Neither is The City of Falling Angels. In fact, I dispensed with the liberties this time and made it as close to the truth as I could get it.

Amazon.com: In The City of Falling Angels, a number of fascinating people serve as guides to the city, each with a different idea of the true nature of Venice. Who was your favorite?

Berendt: I don't have a favorite, but Count Girolamo Marcello is certainly a memorable, highly quotable commentator. "Everyone in Venice is acting," he told me. "Everyone plays a role, and the role changes. The key to understanding Venetians is rhythm, the rhythm of the lagoon, the water, the tides, the waves. It's like breathing. High water, high pressure: tense. Low water, low pressure: relaxed. The tide changes every six hours."

I nodded that I understood.

"How do you see a bridge?" he went on.

"Pardon me?" I asked, "A bridge?"

"Do you see a bridge as an obstacle--as just another set of steps to climb to get from one side of a canal to the other? We Venetians do not see bridges as obstacles. To us, bridges are transitions. We go over them very slowly. They are part of the rhythm. They are the links between two parts of a theater, like changes in scenery. Our role changes as we go over bridges. We cross from one reality ... to another reality. From one street ... to another street. From one setting ... to another setting."

Once I had absorbed that notion, Count Marcello continued: "Sunlight on a canal is reflected up through a window onto the ceiling, then from the ceiling onto a vase, and from the vase onto a glass. Which is the real sunlight? Which is the real reflection? What is true? What is not true? The answer is not so simple, because the truth can change. I can change. You can change. That is the Venice effect."

I was not terribly surprised when he later told me, "Venetians never tell the truth. We mean precisely the opposite of what we say."

Amazon.com: Now that you know Venice well enough to be a guide yourself, what would you say to a visitor looking for insight into the character of the city?

Berendt: Tourists generally shuffle along, on narrow streets so crowded as to be nearly impassable, between the major sights of St. Mark's Square, the Rialto Bridge, and the Accademia Museum. All you have to do is to step off these heavily traveled alleyways, and in a few moments you will find yourself in quiet, much emptier surroundings. This is more like the real Venice. Another thing to do is to go into the wine bars where Venetians stand around drinking and talking. They will very likely be speaking the Venetian dialect, so you won't be able to understand them, but you will get a sampling of the true Venetian ambiance enlivened by the pronounced sing-song rhythm of the language. I'd also suggest stopping someone in the street and asking for directions. Almost invariably, you will be rewarded with a genial smile and the instructions, Sempre diritto, meaning "Straight ahead." This will only leave you more confused, because when you attempt to follow a straight line, you will be confronted by more twists and turns and forks in the road than you thought possible, given the instructions. This is part of what Count Marcello described as "the Venice effect."

Book Description

The author of the record-breaking bestseller Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil unveils the enigmatic Venice as only he can

Twelve years ago, Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil exploded into a monumental success, residing a record-breaking four years on the New York Times bestseller list (longer than any work of fiction or nonfiction had before) and turning John Berendt into a household name. The City of Falling Angels is Berendt's first book since Midnight, and it immediately reminds one what all the fuss was about. Turning to the magic, mystery, and decadence of Venice, Berendt gradually reveals the truth behind a sensational fire that in 1996 destroyed the historic Fenice opera house. Encountering a rich cast of characters, Berendt tells a tale full of atmosphere and surprise as the stories build, one after the other, ultimately coming together to portray a world as finely drawn as a still-life painting.

Customer Reviews:

The City of Falling Angels.......2007-10-08

This is a book I could not put down. I suggest this to anyone who is planning a trip to Italy (or not!)

Life in the City of Venice.......2007-10-03

In 1996, a fire started in the Fenice Opera House in Venice, Italy. And not just any fire. A fire that would consume not only most of the beautiful building, along with it paintings, frescoes and history in this last of it's kind building. No, this fire consumed almost a decade in the life of Venice. How did the fire start? Was it arson? Was it negligence? Who had the most to gain? Was it the Mafia or was it the contractors that were working on the remodeling? These are just some of the questions that drew John Berendt to extend his stay in Venice and try to capture the city and it's people in print.

In the course of the investigation, Berendt introduces us to many of the citizens of this city. We meet Archimede Seguso, a renowned glass maker, that watched the Fenice burn and then created over one hundred glass vases to memorialize it. Of course, most of these pieces still haven't been seen by the public because they are tied up in a litigation of a weird brotherly feud. We meet the Rylands - Jane, an American Expat and her British husband that waylaid a poor old lady and took her incredible achieves for their own profit. The woman was Olga Rudge, the famous Mistress of writer Ezra Pound, who's writings and letters were worth a small fortune. And we meet members of the Save Venice foundation, a non-profit organization that was created to help restore buildings and art in the city of Venice. But an implosion of the group was caused by mixing too many people with large egos wanting the Title and prestige involved with this organization.

I will readily admit I had high hopes for this book. I thought Berendt's Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil about the city of Savannah, Georgia was fantastic! He did such a wonderful job describing the beauty of the city, as well as the eccentricity of it's people. Not so much with Venice, although he certainly tried. Maybe it's the fact that I just don't understand the Venetian culture the way I do culture in the US. Or maybe this book was more about the glitterati instead of just the average folks. Either way, it fell short for me. I really didn't get a chance to CARE about the people in this book. There were too many exceedingly shallow people that cared more for their titles and their parties than they did about anything else. The back story of the Fenice fire just seemed to get lost in it all. And since reality is never as cut-and-dried as fiction, we still don't know what really happened that night at the Fenice.

I did enjoy learning more about Ezra Pound and Olga Rudge. And I was intrigued about the side story of the poet Mario Stefani, a man that took his own life during this time period. But reading about the Save Venice Organization and their constant bickering over whose name would be at the top of the stationery and who got the best seats for a gala rather turned my stomach. As did the story of the Rylands and how they swindled a poor elderly woman AND her family out of their birthright. Maybe my expectations were just too high for this one. Venice is a beautiful city, one I'd love to visit some day. But this book didn't do much for me! Like a Seinfeld episode, it was a whole lot about nothing.

Only 'ok'........2007-09-19

I prefer books with a strong plot. This didn't really seem to have a strong plot and the pieced never really seems to come together as strongly as I had hoped. It may just be the style of this author... and if you like that type of style this would be a book for you.

Immensely enjoyable, but not up to Midnight in the Garden standards..........2007-09-03

Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil by John Berendt is one of my favorite books, so I decided to read his latest, The City of Falling Angels. While the formula for both books is pretty much the same, Midnight is a much better book--only because Savannah is a much more quirky city than Venice, Italy.

As with Midnight in the Garden, Berendt combines many elements to create The City of Falling Angels. He provides a little history of Venice. He interviews dozens of colorful characters. And he focuses on a possible crime. In Falling Angels, this is the burning of Venice's famous opera house, La Fenice. As far as history, I felt the author could have provided a little more information about Venice's rich past. Venice has many interesting characters, and Berendt did his best to seek them out. He interviewed Murano glass blowers, city officials, American expatriates, artists, and even a man who considers himself a culinary expert. His specialty is making the world's best-selling rat poison. He also looks into the many famous Americans who made Venice their home, including Peggy Guggenheim and Ezra Pound. But the characters in Venice fell short of Savannah's eclectic bunch including The Lady Chablis, the Voodoo priestess Minerva and antiques dealer Jim Williams. Also, the Fenice fire didn't quite have the drama as the murder in Midnight in the Garden

But I still enjoyed The City of Falling Angels immensely, and John Berendt is a fine writer with a keen eye when it comes to describing places and sites that he visits. After witnessing the opera house fire, glassblower Archimede Seguso goes to his shop and starts creating glass vases like he's never made before. "Against an opaque background as black as night, he had set swirling ribbons of sinuous diamond shapes in red, green, white, and gold, leaping, over-lapping, and spiraling upward around the vase. He never explained what he was doing, but by the second vase, everyone knew. It was a record of the fire in glass--the flames, the sparks, the embers, and the smoke--just as he had seen if from his window..." As for why he chose this city, "Venice was uniquely beautiful, isolated, inward-looking, and a powerful stimulant to the senses, the intellect, and the imagination....Because I could not imagine a more enticing beat to assign myself for an indefinite period of time."

I don't think that The City of Falling Angels is going to do to Venice what Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil did to Savannah. However, after reading The City of Falling Angels, I'm certainly considering a trip to Italy.

Gave up after 103 pages.......2007-09-01

If a book cannot grab me within the first 100 pages, then I have to stop. Not only that, but it was due at the library, and there is a waiting list (why?). I just have little time, and so many other books to read.

I will say that what I did read was somewhat interesting, and the writing was good. I just wasn't that interested in the story - at least at 100+ pages. It must get better, but I wish that I was made to care earlier in the writing.

Sorry if this wasn't very helpful, this review is more of my opinion than a critique.

Average customer rating:

Historical fiction that educates as well as entertains
Insight into history
"Absolutely loved this book!!!!"
yawn....
o.k.

Falling Angels
Tracy Chevalier
Manufacturer: Plume
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

Contemporary | General | Literature & Fiction | Subjects | Books

Literary | General | Literature & Fiction | Subjects | Books

Historical | Genre Fiction | Literature & Fiction | Subjects | Books
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ASIN: 0452283205
Release Date: 2002-09-24

Amazon.com

Set among the sweeping skirts and social upheavals of Edwardian London, Tracy Chevalier's Falling Angels is a meditation on change, loss, and recovery. Her central characters are two young girls of the same age, whose family plots are situated side-by-side in a cemetery modeled on Highgate. Lavinia Waterhouse is respectably middle-class, devoted, like her conventional, doting mother, to the right way to do things, although suspiciously well- schooled in subjects like funerary sculpture and the English practices of mourning. Her friend Maude Coleman comes from a slightly more privileged and free-thinking background. In contrast with Lavinia's mother, Maude's mother Kitty Coleman is well-educated by the standards of the day, and it has made her restless and irritable. But neither her reading, nor her gardening, nor her affair with the somber, high-thinking governor of the cemetery is enough for Kitty. She comes alive only when she discovers the women's suffrage movement, and her devotion to the cause takes her away from Maude in every sense.

Although the point of view shifts between many characters (with even the Coleman's maid and cook getting their say, sometimes unnecessarily), Falling Angels is essentially the children's story, since it is their lives that are most open to change. The narrative spans exactly the years of Edward VII's reign, from the morning after his mother Queen Victoria's death in January 1901 to his own death in May 1910. Chevalier (Girl with a Pearl Earring) deftly uses the nation's dramatically different mourning for these two monarchs to signal the social transformations of the period. Readers at ease with English history will find Falling Angels an unusually subtle novel, with an emotional range that recalls the best of the Edwardian novelists, E.M. Forster, and his quintessential novel of Edwardian manners, Howard's End. --Regina Marler

Book Description

Time magazine crowned Girl With a Pearl Earring "a portrait of radiance...a jewel." In her New York Times bestselling follow-up, Tracy Chevalier once again paints a distant age with a rich and provocative palette of characters. Told through a variety of shifting perspectives- wives and husbands, friends and lovers, masters and their servants, and a gravedigger's son-Falling Angels follows the fortunes of two families in the emerging years of the twentieth century. Graced with the luminous imagery that distinguished Girl With a Pearl Earring, Falling Angels is another dazzling tour de force from this "master of voices" (The New York Times Book Review).

Customer Reviews:

Historical fiction that educates as well as entertains.......2007-04-25

The story of Maude Coleman, Lavinia Waterhouse and their families is told in the first person by each character involved so it reads very much like a diary. I like how the reader gets to see everyone's perspectives on a situation instead of hearing a story from just one angle. We hear the traditional and modern views of the time...in a changing world where the women's suffrage movement is getting more and more forceful leading (in this story) to the Hyde Park demonstration.

As someone who enjoys walking around old Victorian cemeteries it was lovely to have this one brought to life with the people who visited and worked there. I found the details of mourning etiquette during the Victorian period and the early 1900's fascinating: How long is acceptable to mourn, what to wear and what to do with it after the mourning period is over, and the views of the time on cremation and who should be buried where in the cemetery.

A sensitive and fascinating book.

Insight into history.......2007-01-03

Boy, a cemetary as the lead character! This was the way our book club handled the discussion of this book. We were able to tag each character with how the cemetary affected their lives. I liked the short bursts of narative in the small chapters. There was much to discuss regarding the customs of the time and the role of women. How the marriages worked out - or not - was quite surprising.
We left the book wanting to know what happened next.

"Absolutely loved this book!!!!".......2006-11-07

I could not wait till bedtime to pick this book up and read on. It was written so well and kept me wanting to know more. This book was fantastic and I would recommend it to everyone.

yawn...........2006-10-31

I typically loved historical novels but this one was a snoozer. Totally uneventful until the end--and then bad things happen to the only characters you can actually like! The constant change of voice was too choppy.

o.k........2006-08-06

i didn't find is quite as good as her other books, but it''s still a very good book.

Average customer rating:

I am proud to own this book!
Thrilling and athmospheric
A Horror Classic-a Shocking Ending
not for publication
greatly exceeded my expectations -- four and a half stars

Falling Angel
William Hjortsberg
Manufacturer: Millipede Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

General | Mystery | Mystery & Thrillers | Subjects | Books

Psychological & Suspense | Thrillers | Mystery & Thrillers | Subjects | Books

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ASIN: 1933618086

Book Description

"A terrific book-what might have happened if Raymond Chandler had written The Exorcist."-Stephen King

" Falling Angel combines the best of the classic detective story . . . with elements of the occult with surprising humor and wit. . . . This is the literary love-child of Raymond Chandler and Stephen King. . . . Not for the faint-of-heart."-from the foreword by Ridley Scott

Falling Angel pits a tough New York private eye against any detective's most fearsome adversary. A routine missing-persons case soon turns into a fiendish nightmare in which the shadow detective Harry Angel chases seems to be his own.

Customer Reviews:

I am proud to own this book!.......2007-06-01

In mystery there are lot of great writers. I horror, nowadays, you name it. In expetional cult and urban details, it has become a trend.
Mr.William has it all in on in lifetime book, amd with twist in the tale that makes it an inordinary book. Stephen King, the master said, I never really read anything like it. Well, neither have I?
Angel is a detectecitve with an awkward edge, asked by amysterious Lu Cypher, if you know what I mean, to investigate the disppearence of a famous singer. Simple. Easy. And to the point investigation that takes you into the darkened alleys of New orleans, the wicked melodies of jazzy contabass players, chicken foot naked women voodoo, sexy black girl history, rich white girl delllima and her father who holds the keys to not just solving teh mystery or finding the singer or exposing who the man is who wants to find the singer. Bur ultimately, to Angel himself.
The writing is very easy relaxed, Hjortsberg does nothing but just tell you the story. No comlications, mastery of prose, innuendo writing. He is much more brilliant than that. He know he has a climax in the novel that will shock you and will break through into your very soul. A climax dealing with one the most suppressed and hidden fears in history. If I had a plot like that handy, I would have become a millionare and took a six figure check in advance.
If you are into horror or mysteries, this is a must book on your shelf.
Remember , the end is shocking and you will read this book again.

Thrilling and athmospheric.......2006-06-07

That's a book magnificently written, devilishly coiling the reader in a chilling spiral of madness and evil.The title is truly apt. The athmosphere of late forties -early fifties New York is magnificently rendered. As for the occult part,it's interesting to note that one of Dashiel Hammett novels, The "Dain Curse", also featured an occult sect. This novel has all the crisp pacing of Hammett and Chandler's labyrinthine convolutions of plot. Esgar Allan Poe meets Jonathan Lethem A must read!

A Horror Classic-a Shocking Ending.......2005-09-13

Like some of the other reviewers, I tracked this book down after I had seen Angel Heart. Angel Heart was such a thrilling, frightening movie (I'm not easily scared, either) that I had to read the book. The book was even better than the movie, which is saying a lot because I believe the movie was top-rate as well.

I won't give away the absolutely shocking ending to the story because I hope that potential readers will enjoy the surprise as much as I did. However, I will say that if you loved the movie you will not be disappointed by the book. The book's gripping plot is the same as the movie's, however, as might be expected, there is more character development in the book.

Namely, and most importantly, the character Epiphany Proudfoot, played in the movie by Lisa Bonet (better known as Denise Huxtable, and after growing up watching her play that role it was strange to see her in such a drastically different one) is far more interesting in the book. In both versions she is a beautiful teenage girl of mixed ancestry, but in the book she is brilliant, kind, funny, and surprisingly wise for her years. Her book character is more emotionally present and has more invested in her relationship with the main character, Harry Angel.

She has been educated in Latin and religion at a Catholic School and helps Private Detective Harry to unravel the mystery of the missing person he is looking for.

In the movie, however, her dialogue is somewhat vapid and we don't care that much about her character. Also, they gave her a child of uncertain parentage in the film, which I found an odd decision, especially since the author of the book worked on the screenplay. I understand of course that there is less time to establish character in screenplays, but there was enough time to make the Lisa Bonet character more interesting. She is an intelligent actress and would have been good at conveying the sophisticated Epiphany.

For some reason, the film decided to make Epiphany a native of New Orleans. Presumably this was to have the aura of both Louisiana and Harlem, NY in the 1950s. The effect was cool, but I wish something else had brought Harry to Louisiana, because Epiphany seemed so New York in the book. No one even goes to Louisiana in the book. Everything happens in New York.

Another thing about the book was that the character Cypher, played very well by De Niro in the film, was more developed, if that's the right word, in the book. He said more revealing things. I wonder if I would have guessed his nature earlier if I'd read the book first?

Definitely pick up this fascinating read-truly a chilling book and perfectly written horror tale!

not for publication.......2004-01-29

Please please remove Jack Felson's review of Falling Angel from your site. It gives away the ending! (And it has no merit as a review.)

greatly exceeded my expectations -- four and a half stars.......2003-09-20

It is difficult to review FALLING ANGEL without giving too much away, but here goes:

Basically I bought this book on a whim, having seen the film which it inspired. In short, the book greatly exceeded my expectations, being both more entertaining and more literary than I ever would have expected from a novel of the mystery or suspense genre. Hjortsberg's writing is the epitome of unpretentious intelligence. Each chapter advances the plot in some way, with the precision of a well-written short story. Often, seemingly casual details of the setting or a character turn out to be subtle and wryly-humorous bits of foreshadowing. Another reviewer has praised the evocative descriptions of post-war New York. I was simply compelled at every point in this novel to keep reading, not because of some cheap cliff-hanger ending to a chapter, but because the plot was always getting thicker, juicier, and definitely creepier.

Of all the books I have bought in the last few years this is the one that was the best reward for taking chances on unknown books or authors (and the consolation for all the ones that were disappointments). Whether you call it horror, mystery, suspense or just simply literature, FALLING ANGEL is a great read.

Average customer rating:

The City of Falling Angels
John Berendt
Manufacturer: The Penguin Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover
ASIN: B000OSEZ2W

Average customer rating:

The City of Falling Angels

Manufacturer: The Penguin Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback
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ASIN: 0739466917

Dangerous Desires Collection (Too Wild To Wed, Montana Man, and Falling Angel)

Average customer rating:

nice collection of reprints
3 fabulous stories
Romance from Heaven and Earth

Dangerous Desires Collection (Too Wild To Wed, Montana Man, and Falling Angel)
Jayne Ann Krentz , Barbara Delinsky , and Anne Stuart
Manufacturer: Harlequin Books
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

Contemporary | General | Literature & Fiction | Subjects | Books

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$The Pirate, The Adventurer & The Cowboy: The Pirate\The Adventurer\The Cowboy$ The Pirate, The Adventurer & The Cowboy: The Pirate\The Adventurer\The Cowboy

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philosophy hope in a jar daily moisturizer

ASIN: 0373834314

Customer Reviews:

nice collection of reprints.......2002-10-14

WOW it was hard to rate this as a whole because the tales are very different. This is a trade side reprints of stories that have been reprinted several times.
(the weakest of the three) JAK's The Waiting Game is not one of her best earlier works. Still a good read, but the female character is really stupid at times and it hurts the rest of the book. The male character more than makes up for the silly female, but he can only do so much. This has been reprinted several times by itself so I suggest you check you old series romance and recent JAK's before you buy this one.

Delinsky's Montana Man is one of her best early works. She shows a strong hand in male-female attraction and it was riveting.

Anne Stuart ( one of my favourite writers) gives us a touching story of second chances. And as usual, Stuart is the BEST at the bad boy being redeemed by love. Emerson Wyatt McVey was a ruthless corporate executive that destroyed hundreds, maybe thousands of lives by closing factories. On a Wintry holiday night, his car goes off the road and he dies, but he is given once chance to come back as another man and make right three lives he destroyed. Carrie Alexander is one of those he destroyed and it is through her love McVey will be redeemed or not. A beautiful holiday tale, with Fallen Angel being a special special Stuart tale.

3 fabulous stories.......2000-06-04

It is very unusual in a collection of stories to enjoy all 3. I definetely enjoyed all three. TOo Wild to Wed by Jayne Ann Krentz was great! Montana Man by Barbara Delinsky was super as well, but I kept thinking that I had read it or a story just like it before. Falling Angel by Anne Stuart was also good - but not quite a believable.

Romance from Heaven and Earth.......2000-03-26

Jayne Ann Krentz and Barbara Delinsky deliver their gifted tales of strong female characters who create their own dilemmas. Krentz's professor, Letty, and Delinsky's hitchhiker, Lily, both meet her own Mr. Wrong who worms his way into each heroine's heart by trying to rescue her from a risky situation to become her Mr. Right. I always enjoy both of these authors and have added Anne Stuart to my "must read" list. Anne Stuart brings Gabriel, a beautiful angel of slippery status, back to Angel Falls, Minnesota, with 30 days to right the wrongs he visited on 3 people before he died. His new visage enchants Carrie Alexander when he arrives at her door Thanksgiving day after his truck slides into a ditch during a blizzard. Gabriel's attraction to Carrie makes him wonder how he will correct his sins against her and two other unnamed people in time to make it back to heaven, when all he wants to do his stay with her at the risk of eternity in Hell. The ensuing interaction between Gabriel and the people he meets results in an entertaining love story.

Falling Angel (Harlequin American Romance, No 513)

Average customer rating:

A gentle Holiday Tale
If We all Could Have a 2nd Chance?
Love this book
humorously funny novel
Different, but very good romance novel

Falling Angel (Harlequin American Romance, No 513)
Anne Stuart
Manufacturer: harlequin
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

General | Romance | Subjects | Books

Harlequin American Romance | Series | Romance | Subjects | Books

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ASIN: 0373165137

Customer Reviews:

A gentle Holiday Tale.......2002-10-19

If We all Could Have a 2nd Chance?.......2002-06-11

The book begins with Emerson Wyatt MacVey III being in Heaven for 17 months after dieing of a heart attach. He has not changed from his greedy,selfish and self centeredness he possessed while on Earth.He is sent back to Earth with an assignment to right the wrongs he was responsible for when he was alive. He goes back as Gabriel Falconi with a new appearance and new identity.

Gabriel works very hard to accomplish his assignment because he is being weighted in the balance to see if he will be allowed to return to Heaven or will he be sent to "that other place".

Gabriel's character shows both sides of the human nature.The reader is able to feel the emotions (or lack of)in MacVey's personality which is typical of many people but also the warm,loving and caring personality of Gabriel which is found in most everyone.

I enjoyed reading the book very much.It really made me stop and think about what I am doing to others while I am alive because,in reality,I do not think I will have a second chance.

Love this book.......2000-12-07

I love re-reading this book. Redemption and remorse are strong themes - but overall there is a comforting feel about the book. I'm not sure whether it's because it's set in a loving town at Christmas or whether it's because the characters are all so heart-warming, but there is definitely a cosy, loving feel tot his book. It's one of Anne Stuart's lighter romances but definitely up there with the best!

humorously funny novel.......2000-07-07

This is a story that is, in a word, hilarious but also sad. Loved this novel, its premise is rather stretching the imagination a bit, but yet you don't seem to mind. Emerson is the "Ebenezer Scrooge of the 20th Century" who like Scrooge is able to mend his ways. This story is warm, and yet a little heartbreaking at the same time. Tremendously funny book ... love Emerson's guardian (the old woman)... she is a hoot! Great book for being a romance!

Different, but very good romance novel.......2000-03-27

I really enjoyed this book. In the beginning, I did not think I would like it because it was about someone coming back from the dead. But how wrong I was. This book was VERY, VERY good. It really held my interest.

Average customer rating:

DECEPTIONS AND PERCEPTIONS...

Falling Angels
Tracy Chevalier
Manufacturer: HarperCollins Publishers Ltd
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

Contemporary | General | Literature & Fiction | Subjects | Books
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ASIN: 0007108265

Customer Reviews:

DECEPTIONS AND PERCEPTIONS..........2005-08-01

This book covers the period in the lives of two families that stretches from January 1901, the end of the Victorian era, to May 1910, the end of the Edwardian one. The lives of these two families, the Colemans and the Waterhouses, converge and become inextricably woven together when they inadvertently meet at a cemetery while paying their respects to deceased loved ones. Unbeknownst to them, their lives are moving inexorably towards a tragic denouement, one that is to have ramifications for both families.

Two of the daughters of these respective families, Lavinia Waterhouse and Maude Coleman, find that they have formed the beginning of a friendship during the brief interlude at the cemetery. The two girls also befriend Simon Field, the son of one of the gravediggers at the cemetery. The friendship of the two girls is cemented when they later discover that they are to be neighbors, as through happenstance the Waterhouse family moves onto a property adjacent to that of the Colemans. Despite differences in social class and personal taste, as the Waterhouses are definitely sentimentally bourgeois and the Colemans have pretensions to more refinement, the families are brought together, however unwillingly, through the friendship between Lavinia and Maude.

The mothers of these two girls are unable to form a true friendship, as stolid Gertrude Waterhouse and pretty Kitty Coleman are unable to find much common ground. Gertrude is bound in tradition, while Kitty, dissatisfied with her marriage and her life, is looking to escape tradition and expand the role allotted in society to women. Never the twain shall meet, as these women will never see eye-to-eye, despite the friendship between Lavinia and Maude.

This is a well-plotted novel with each character adding his or her perspective to the events that unfold, many of which are of a secretive nature. Even the husbands, Albert Waterhouse and Richard Coleman, have something to say that contributes to the development of the story, as does Richard Coleman's mother, Edith, as do the Coleman's maid, Jenny Whitby, and their cook, Dorothy Baker. Lavinia's younger sister, Ivy May, who plays a small but pivotal role, also has her say, as does Kitty's admirer, John Jackson. There are also a number of twists and turns in the tale.

The story is told in the clean, spare prose that fans of the author have come to expect. It is told through first person narratives, and it is almost as if the narratives were taken from the personal diary or journal of each character. Therein lies the rub, as the author is unable to make the voice of each character truly distinguishable from that of the others. The book suffers somewhat from the failure of the author to develop a truly unique voice for each one. This is, however, the only failing of this otherwise absorbing and intriguing story that is suffused with period detail. This is an otherwise excellent book that fans of the author will enjoy, as will those who love historical fiction.

Angel Christmas (Five Heavenly Romances): Catch a Falling Angel/Brush of Angel Wings/The Trouble With Angelina/Tin Angel/Guarded by Angels

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Angel Christmas (Five Heavenly Romances): Catch a Falling Angel/Brush of Angel Wings/The Trouble With Angelina/Tin Angel/Guarded by Angels
Mary Balogh , Marilyn Campbell , Carole Nelson Douglas , Emma Merritt , and Patricia Rice
Manufacturer: Topaz
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

Contemporary | General | Literature & Fiction | Subjects | Books

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ASIN: 0451406281

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Innocent yet worthy
"Snappy Dialogue, richly worded"

Falling Angels
Barbara Gowdy
Manufacturer: Soho Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

Contemporary | General | Literature & Fiction | Subjects | Books

ASIN: 1569471169

Book Description

The three Field sisters live in the sanitized suburbs of the fifties and sixties, but their plastic world is askew. They are growing up crazy in a very eccentric, often miserable, sometimes hilarious family. Their home is a war zone ruled by an abusive father - a philandering used-car salesman hooked on booze, guns and discipline. And whenever their mother's coffee mug is empty they hurry to refill it with whiskey, for they know she's living precariously in the wake of the strange unspeakable act she once committed against the family.

These falling angels - tough-talking Lou; sensible, sentimental Norma; chic, naïve Sandy - go through rites of passage each in her own way. They turn to drugs, swinging sixties sex, schmaltzy fantasy - and, repeatedly, to one another. And, even after her death, they turn to their mother, and to the bizarre love they discover their father bore her, a love he must commemorate at Niagara Falls--

Customer Reviews:

Innocent yet worthy.......2005-08-23

I absolutely loved this book....you feel as if you are a part of each of the sisters lives...the author really draws you into the story. It talks about all the little things that girls go through growing up that they probably would never dare tell you Wonderful book.....55555555 Stars.

"Snappy Dialogue, richly worded".......1999-09-18

I loved this book. The three main charactures of this book are sisters growing up in a very disfunctual family in the 60's. I caught myself laughing out loud so many times, at the authors use of humor during some very un-humorous moments in the book. The characters are real, and reminded me of the different emotions I felt growing up. I think it is a gift for an author to write of shrewd and tragic situations with a sense of humor at the same time. If you enjoy a book that "you cant put down"...this is a book for you. I am excited to read more from this author.

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