Rating: 
Summary: At long last some romance from Patterson!!
Review: I took this book on my honeymoon in Maui. I started reading it as I lay in the sun, took the book into the pool with me, and could not put the book down long enough to enjoy a romantic dinner with my new hubby......I finished reading the entire book in one day!! I became so involved with the characters. I wanted to know what happened to Suzanne. The ending just blew me away. A GREAT piece of work by Mr. Patterson. Let's hope he writes more like this.
Rating: 
Summary: Just OK
Review: Funny.... this book has all the ingredients of a Fairytale... and yet, in my opinion it just isn't one...I liked the plot... not a lot, but enough to keep me reading, but I really didn't liked or enjoyed the way the book was written. It seemed to me way too unrealistic... especially the way a mother would write to her child. It sounded just too objective and straight forward and so unpersonal, it simply didn't feel real. Also, the characters are, in my opinion, like cookie cut characters... flawless, beautiful, nice, good... too perfect.... Still, I gave the book 3 stars because it does have some good advice, like the 5 balls of life theory, and it is a fast read with a nice, although 100% expected fairytale ending.
Rating: 
Summary: What do I tell my book club friend who picked this "book"?
Review: How do I politely tell my book club friend what I thought about the book she recommended? Shall I say "Novel concept!" or "Probably very readable for those who like romance novels!" or, more honestly, "How could you have picked such juvenile trash on the heels of our experiences with "The Founding Brothers", "Empire Falls", and "Age of Innocence". To even accept the chronology of the Diary flow, you would have to find believable that:
1) ...diaries are written without dates
2) ...a well-balanced hero never recovered from the death of his father 30 years earlier
3)...same hero can't tell the "love of his life" what has mattered the most to him
4)...the first two men the protagonist falls for in her new town have the same first name (the author's amateurish way of saying "fooled you")
5)...like Garrison Kealer's characters, "everyone is above average". In fact, they are so way above average as to be utter caricatures. If your book club chooses this book, read a good one instead and "play hooky" when they discuss Diary. That way you don't offend anyone.
Rating:
Summary: A tear jerker that have you hugging your kids....
Review: I have never really been interested in James Patterson's other books. I tend to enjoy chick books, packed with emotions and issues for women. That being said I can tell you, this book does not disappoint. I was drawn in, reading late into the hours of the night, and then running to kiss my kids as they slept and I tearfully finished the book. You will watch as the lives of four people mix and mesh in an unusual way. One woman, going through a rough time with her lover, reads the diary of another women, the former wife of this same lover as she writes it to their child. Sound confusing? It isn't at all, and Patterson is good at delivering the unexpected twist here and there to keep you wanting to turn the pages. If you like books that are sad at times, but thrilling at others, this is the book for you. If you need to read something to end your burnout on parenting and appreciate your family this will do the trick. Read it with a box of tissues close by.. and enjoy the little moments within ("....if I'd have known how great your father was going to be I would have run right into his arms..."). It is packed with this warm fuzzy stuff. Enjoy!
The only reason I gave it only 4 stars is because the writing isn't necessarily unuasual or WOW but still good enough that I can recommend this book highly.
Rating:
Summary: emotionally manipulative piece of [junk]
Review: This book is padded with extra pages and an extra-large font in order to make it appear long enough to be worth your while. It's not. I skimmed through the whole thing in 20 minutes, because I knew from reading the first few pages that it was going to be pretty nonsubstantial. Well, that's OK. The frame-love-story was just pathetic, the new mommy's gushings were trite, and the tragic event I won't spoil for those who actually care didn't come as much of a surprise. However, when the other shoe dropped, I DID cry--but at the same time I realized how I was being emotionally manipulated. The whole climax of the book shows that the entire book was a set-up to elicit maximum tears from the reader. It worked. AND, the actual conclusion of the book was so LAME I threw the book across the room. The last time I did that James Joyce was involved.
Rating:
Summary: Break out the tissues...
Review: I am a die-hard James Patterson fan and have read every one of his Detective Alex Cross books. I was not only surprised that a man wrote this book; I was surprised James Patterson wrote it. His descriptions of murders and crime scenes in his other books are usually so descriptive and sick; I couldn't imagine him having this much of a softer side. I was wrong. This book proves what a truly versital writer James Patterson is. The story has three main charaters: Katie, Suzanne, and Matt. Katie thinks Matt is the perfect man until he suddenly leaves her. He then sends her a diary a new Mother (Suzanne) is keeping for her new-born son (Nicholas). In the diary the mother writes about her life before she met his father and how his father and mother came together. She writes down how she feels being a new mother and her hopes for his future. The story goes back and forth from Katie reading the diary and Suzanne writing the diary. Although I did feel the story was a little too-sappy in the romance department, I loved the way Patterson was able to capture the emotions of a new mother. I felt much the same way with my daughter. I though I could see where things where heading and I was glad that Patterson remained true-to-form and threw in those little twists that always makes his books worth reading. Make sure you have a box of tissues handy. Unless your heart is made of stone, you will need them. I give this book 4 tissues and a nose blow.
Rating: 
Summary: I kept reading despite wanting to barf...
Review: I bought this book while on vacation, and literally read the whole thing while my fiance was taking a nap one afternoon. From the very beginning, I thought that the story was way too sugary and predictable. And the constant talk about Nicholas being the perfect baby, and Matt being the perfect husband, and life in general being just so wonderful and perfect... ugh, it was just too much for me. I gave it two stars instead of one because it did keep me reading. Within the first 50 pages, I thought I had figured out what happened to Suzanne and wanted to confirm... it turned out I was right. I agree with the reviewer that said James Patterson probably wrote this book on a bet, that he could write a Nicholas Sparks kind of book... he's probably somewhere laughing about all the money he's made.
Rating:
Summary: A
Review: = A "Love Story" by Any Other Name . . . "
Reviewer: A reader from Buffalo, New York
I am a romance-novel junkie. Happily everafter moments in print have given me much relief from the stress of my life. Perhaps I have become jaded - a word foreign in the world of romance - but James Patterson's "Suzanne's Diary for Nicholas" did not sweep me off my feet: the characters were too sugary and predictable; the sense of doom from the opening pages reminded me of Erich Segal's "Love Story"; and even though I enjoyed the literary allusions and relived my own honeymoon memories of Martha's Vineyard - carousel and all - I just couldn't buy it. James Patterson writes a great suspense/mystery novel; that formula is his forté. Contrary to the blurbs, there was no mystery here. The attraction to the romance genre IS knowing everything in the end will turn out wonderfully. It's the getting there that makes it interesting. Nora Roberts - Jane Austen reincarnated - is the master of creating interesting relationships. LaVyrle Spencer's characters live and breathe - and her readers wish she would write just one more novel. Julie Garwood has successfully crossed-over from historical romance to suspense. Anne Hoffman, certainly not romance in the Harlequin sense, presents a realistic romance - an oxymoron, I know - for the 21st century reader. And even though Patterson's short chapters mimic the pace of Sandra Brown and Sidney Sheldon, something is missing. And here's the rub. Women everywhere will weep and pass this book to their best friends. Matt, the handsome, rugged fix-it-all carpenter (every woman's REAL dream) is the stereotype of those wedding-cake-under-the-pillow wishes, and he even writes poetry! The women are successful, take-charge, "I don't need a man but it's great when the right one comes along." The only thing I found of interest was Patterson's "Five Balls of Life" theory. I just can not shake the feeling Patterson is trying to: (1) take advantage of the lucrative romance market or (2)prove anyone can write a romance novel. Patterson knows the recipe and has all the right ingredients, and that is all.
Read it? There are better writers of the genre out there. The good ones do it well, but even they have "honed" their craft. Read any one of Sandra Brown's early novels and compare it with "Envy." Ditto for the prolific Roberts and I'm sure her J.D. Robb series give Patterson competition in his regular genre. "Suzanne's Diary for Nicholas" is the stuff summer reads are made of. Hopefully, it is not a prelude of the summer market this year. Two sighs.
Rating: 
Summary: Absolutely heartbreaking and beautiful
Review: This is an excellent book. If you love stories with both tears and smiles in them, this is for you. I cried more than once while reading it but I was glad to see the story ended so happily. I absolutely loved this.
Rating:
Summary: The Best Book I Have REad In Years!! EXCELLENT!!
Review: This book is a tear jerker, a smile maker and a warm fuzzy, it is a wonderfully suspenseful book with twists and turns, it pulls at the heart strings and pushes all the buttons...
A definate READ!!!!!
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