Rating: 
Summary: Faulkner's Second-Most Decipherable Puzzle
Review: Just when I thought the only Faulkner book I would ever remotely understand was his Sanctuary---along comes the serendipitous discovery of Light in August. It is a relatively straightforward journey into the lives of yet another cast of tragic Southern characters; a dark, mythic voyage into the subterannean caverns of their souls...or something like that. Faulkner truly does an impressive job of mining the psychological depths of his characters, often through the technique for which he's famous---Stream of Consciousness. If you've stumbled over Faulkner's difficult style in novels like As I Lay Dying and Intruders in the dust then this book, along with Sanctuary, is an excellent starting point. Grab a strong cup of coffee, make sure your reading light is bright, and good luck.
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Summary: I come from Alabama
Review: Lena came from Alabama. She traveled to Mississippi looking for Lucas Burch. Beside Lena Grove, Gail Hightower, Joe Christmas, and Joe Brown are characters in the story. Hightower's wife had jumped or fallen from a hotel window and had died. He had been the Presbyterian Minister. Even the Ku Klux Klan had not managed to persuade Hightower to leave Jefferson. Hightower and Byron Burch commence to discuss a fire at Mrs. Burden's house. Christmas and Brown lived in a structure in the back. Mrs. Burden had started praying over Joe Christmas. It was not her fault she had gotten too old. Joe Christmas went from an orphanage to the home of the McEacherns, a Presbyterian couple. As a teenager he started to see a waitress in town. McEachern watched Joe. He ordered the waitress away. Joe went to Chicago, to Detroit. Finally, age 33, he was on a Mississippi country road in the vicinity of the Burden house. During the first four or five months of his stay in a cabin on her property, Joe and Mrs. Burden would stand and talk like strangers. Later she told him she was pregnant. Now he had a partner in the whiskey business--Brown. After the fire and Joanna Burden's death, the people searched for Christmas. Brown was placed in jail for safe-keeping. Christmas ran off to Mottstown. He becomes obsessed with getting food. Joe Christmas is killed. He is sent across the square with a deputy and unidentified men take him. Gavin Stevens is the district attorney, a Harvard graduate. Stevens tells the authorities that Christmas will plead guilty and take a life sentence. His death follows. Lena's baby is born around the time Joe Christmas dies. The mother of the baby had started her journey in Alabama and three months later she is in Tennesee.
Rating:
Summary: I come from Alabama
Review: Lena came from Alabama. She traveled to Mississippi looking for Lucas Burch. Beside Lena Grove, Gail Hightower, Joe Christmas, and Joe Brown are characters in the story. Hightower's wife had jumped or fallen from a hotel window and had died. He had been the Presbyterian Minister. Even the Ku Klux Klan had not managed to persuade Hightower to leave Jefferson. Hightower and Byron Burch commence to discuss a fire at Mrs. Burden's house. Christmas and Brown lived in a structure in the back. Mrs. Burden had started praying over Joe Christmas. It was not her fault she had gotten too old. Joe Christmas went from an orphanage to the home of the McEacherns, a Presbyterian couple. As a teenager he started to see a waitress in town. McEachern watched Joe. He ordered the waitress away. Joe went to Chicago, to Detroit. Finally, age 33, he was on a Mississippi country road in the vicinity of the Burden house. During the first four or five months of his stay in a cabin on her property, Joe and Mrs. Burden would stand and talk like strangers. Later she told him she was pregnant. Now he had a partner in the whiskey business--Brown. After the fire and Joanna Burden's death, the people searched for Christmas. Brown was placed in jail for safe-keeping. Christmas ran off to Mottstown. He becomes obsessed with getting food. Joe Christmas is killed. He is sent across the square with a deputy and unidentified men take him. Gavin Stevens is the district attorney, a Harvard graduate. Stevens tells the authorities that Christmas will plead guilty and take a life sentence. His death follows. Lena's baby is born around the time Joe Christmas dies. The mother of the baby had started her journey in Alabama and three months later she is in Tennesee.
Rating:
Summary: The South rises
Review: Nothing is ever simple in a Faulkner book. However plainly the people talk, however straightforward that the situations seem, there are layers and layers of things to dig through to find the ultimate truth, if indeed there is any. I've already read Sound and the Fury and as glorious as that book was, this novel absolutely captivated me. It's Faulkner's way with words, he's not flashy like some contemporary authors, preferring to slowly wind his way into your consciousness with his gift of writing. It's only as you read, maybe as you peruse a passage for the second time do you see the little details that you missed the first time out, the choice of a word here, the flow of a paragraph. And his characters, all beautifully drawn, with flaws and cracks and everything, but even the farthest gone of his lowlives has some pearl of wisdom to impart, his pillars all have dark secrets. In short they're just like his, if we lived in the South at the turn of the century. Faulkner captures it all, weaving his characters together with the skill of a master, no seams showing, everything seeming to happen naturally. Even when the story detours to tell someone's backstory, it seems to come at the perfect moment. If I sound a bit fawning, that's because this book deserves it, nothing puts together the picture of a time better than this, and as an aspiring writer I am in sincere awe of Faulkner's ability to reflect even the more complex of emotions with a word or a sentence. He has to be read to be believed and it definitely must be experienced. Just immerse yourself in a time and place thought long gone, that still lurks in the corners of people's thoughts and the traditions that never die.
Rating:
Summary: The South rises
Review: Nothing is ever simple in a Faulkner book. However plainly the people talk, however straightforward that the situations seem, there are layers and layers of things to dig through to find the ultimate truth, if indeed there is any. I've already read Sound and the Fury and as glorious as that book was, this novel absolutely captivated me. It's Faulkner's way with words, he's not flashy like some contemporary authors, preferring to slowly wind his way into your consciousness with his gift of writing. It's only as you read, maybe as you peruse a passage for the second time do you see the little details that you missed the first time out, the choice of a word here, the flow of a paragraph. And his characters, all beautifully drawn, with flaws and cracks and everything, but even the farthest gone of his lowlives has some pearl of wisdom to impart, his pillars all have dark secrets. In short they're just like his, if we lived in the South at the turn of the century. Faulkner captures it all, weaving his characters together with the skill of a master, no seams showing, everything seeming to happen naturally. Even when the story detours to tell someone's backstory, it seems to come at the perfect moment. If I sound a bit fawning, that's because this book deserves it, nothing puts together the picture of a time better than this, and as an aspiring writer I am in sincere awe of Faulkner's ability to reflect even the more complex of emotions with a word or a sentence. He has to be read to be believed and it definitely must be experienced. Just immerse yourself in a time and place thought long gone, that still lurks in the corners of people's thoughts and the traditions that never die.
Rating:
Summary: One of the greatest Faulkner Books
Review: Out of all the Faulkner novels I've had the pleasure to read, Light In August has to be the one of my favorites and is easily the simplistic of his novels to read. It's a love story but not in a traditional sense and yet after you read it you'll fall in love with the characters.
Rating: 
Summary: Light in August
Review: The book Light In August by William Faulkner was definitely a challenge. This was the first Faulkner novel I had read. I became intrigued with his work after reading the short story, A Rose for Emily. LIA's central focus was the plight of Joe Christmas, a half black/ half white man who is not accepted by either world and a young girl's search for the father of her unborn child. Although slow at times, the different twists and plots within plots make it an interesting read! I'm ready to read more Faulkner!
Rating: 
Summary: Light In August
Review: The Book Light in August is definitely a complex book to read. This is the first novel I have read by William Faulkner. Light in August ranks among the very finest of novels of world literature. The book incorporates great moral themes relating to the ruins of the Deep South in the post-Civil war era. The characters in the book are all unique and complex in there own way. One main character in the book, Joe Christmas, still sticks in my head after I read it. He is a contemptuous man who looks white, but whose father is black. He ends up being the murderer of a woman. People who have a lot of time on their hands and want a good book to read should read this book. The story is filled with great themes, is extaordinarily complex, and is almost always laced with trauma and misery!
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Summary: The Mixed Stories of Southern Lives
Review: This book gives an interesting depiction of the lives of poor Southerners. The importance of racism and religion continue to be stromg themes through the lives of each of the individuals that Faulkner follows. While the story is a little slow at times, Faulkner's unique style keeps the reader interested and hookes.
Rating:
Summary: Light in August
Review: This isn't your run-of-the-mill pot-boiler. One can't wing through Faulkner's prose; one has to immearse themselves in it with patience. But if your able to connect with his style, you'll not only be transported to a different time and place; at times you'll go inside the minds of some of the characters to feel their emotions and know their thoughts. But be warned: Readers who prefer happy endings should stay away from Faulkner. But realistically, isn't that part of the South's heritage? - tragedy.
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