Rating: 
Summary: Great Historical Novel
Review: Doctorow's historical novel, Ragtime, cracks this century's top 100 novels around position 75. The story, whose setting is in New York during the early 1900's, has several non-fictional characters in it. The reader catches a personal look at escape artist Houdini, investor and millionaire J.P. Morgan, mechanical inventor Henry Ford, and feminist Emma Goldman.Inadvertently, these characters play an important part in causing an event that involved a Negro looking for justice. Coalhouse Walker was a ragtime musician whose car was wrecked by jealous firemen. Walker, seeking restoration of his car, escalates the fight after going to authorities. He fails to find justice and eventually a group of his men hold Morgan's museum / library in New York City as hostage and cause a stand off until the leader of the firemen restores his car. At the start, the reader is lead to think he is getting an expose into the lives that made the early 1900's. However, there is a sense that Doctorow is taking the reader somewhere, but it isn't revealed until midway. Doctorow has done his research and captures the turmoil and amazement of the period perfectly. If you like this period of American History, this book will certainly interest you.
Rating: 
Summary: A Look at Factual History Through a Fictional Story
Review: This book is very amusing, presenting an interesting story as well as portraying nonfictional characters (such as H. Ford, J.P. Morgan,Evelyn Nesbit,and Harry Houdini) in their true identity. One gets to experience the early century and pre-Great War era. Each chapter allows the reader to enter a life of character all intermingled with one plot. As one reads, the reader experiences the times as an African American, an immigrant, and rich businessmen. What I enjoyed most was the immigrant (Tateh & Daughter) which reminded me of my Great Grandmother's trip into America for the first time. After reading, I did background research on many characters. For what reason? to see if Doctrow was telling the truth about the nonfictional characters, such as J.P. Morgan. It turns out that Doctrow was on the dot with all characters, which shows the hidden secrets of people we thought we knew. I find this book very entertaining. Although not recommended for anyone under the age of 16 for some sexual content and vivid descriptions, I think anyone of any age old enoguh, would enjoy the read. It is a very interesting and a page turning history lesson as well as drama. After reading consider getting the CD for the musical, which very precisely follows the book.
Rating: 
Summary: Historical Fiction or Laborious Diction?
Review: This book was just not very interesting. A snapshot of American life at the turn of the century, the book starts out promising enough (for 40 or so pages I thought that the narrator was the son, or that there was a twist somewhat like that) but disintegrates into a ridiculous tapestry of nonsense. Two stars, one for Coalhouse Walker, the other for the description of the Morgan Library on Madison and 36th (not too many people know about this place). This is considered literature? It seems as if the book was based on the musical, instead of the other way around.
Rating:
Summary: Another reason why history is better than historical fiction
Review: I read Ragtime after seeing it made Modern Library's 100 Best Books of the 20th Century. Bottom line: I don't get it, and so what? Two stars for the somewhat interesting Coalhouse Walker (the only character who approaches "likable") plot line.
Rating: 
Summary: Worst book I've ever read (to put it LIGHTLY)
Review: This was a pure pain to read, especially with my interest in American history. I don't claim to be a literary critic of any sort but Dotorow's writing is consistantly poor and bland. And that's not the only problem: he's writing about historical figures mixed in with his own little cast of characters: very unbelievable and laborious to read. I knew the book was going to be incredibly poor when he said 'Catlike Chinamen gazed at them out of dark shops' in an early scene describing Sigmund Freud seeing New York (in this case Chinatown, NY) for the first time. It's stupid, unnecessary description like this that makes reading this book so goddamn painful. I mean, if you're going to be Thoreau and analyze things such as the insignificant Chinamen staring at Freud (which is sophmoric and stupid in its own right.. somehow working in that there were Chinese people in New York, while their staring at Freud is rather inexplicable as he wasn't really a "famous face" at the time which makes one question if Doctorow is commenting on the lack of contact with white people that early Asian Americans had---- who the hell knows?), do so. But Doctorow is no Thoreau; his sentences are short, undescriptive and to put it simply, lame. IN CONCLUSION: I think more people are in love with the IDEA of a book like Ragtime (American history told through a cast of characters intermingling with historical figures)...rather than in love with this "rag" of a book (pun intended, but clearly failing!)
Rating:
Summary: NOTHING ELSE LIKE IT
Review: Ragtime is a wonderful novel, filled with twists and turns. The characters are rich and fully developed. The story is amazing. You MUST read this book! It is the best book in the world!
Rating:
Summary: a major modern novel
Review: I would differ slightly with Eddie P.(who's insights I appreciate) who likened the novel to Fitzgerald's or Lewis' and say it has more in common with John Dos Passos' USA Trilogy. The vignettes Doctorow draws for us have a great deal in common, I believe, with Dos Passos' snapshots. In answer to Banger's question about why this time period, I would suggest that this is an era that is generally regarded in the American historical consciousness as being primarily bucolic and carefree. The nation, relatively innocent, having shaken off the aftereffects of the civil war, has recently won the spurious Spanish-American war, and is generally revelling in a sense of purpose and civility. What Doctorow is suggesting is that this serene surface was already infected, with a host of social ills festering beneath it. A shift was occuring that would lead to labor riots, race riots, change in mores (sexual attitudes), loss of faith in institutions, etc. that would define the 20th century. If this were all of Doctorow's plan however, it would have been interesting Sociology, but a pretty boring novel. Doctorow is above all an interesting storyteller. He knows how to keep a plot moving and how to invest it with enough intellectual hardware to make the reader feel that his/her time has been worth the effort. He can bring a scene to life with a few fresh (never shopworn) details. He doesn't spend a great deal of time elabortaing over these details, as James or Wolfe do, but he makes the reader just as cognizant of them. A few brushstrokes and we are there. His writing is cinematic, in that we can "see" the scene he is depicting, without burdening us with excess verbiage. This is the hallmark of a really good author. Ragtime is a primary example of this kind of shorthand acumen. The novel flashes by as seen in a kinescope. I, for one, was delighted I had inserted my nickle.
Rating:
Summary: Innocence and Celebrity in Doctorow's Ragtime
Review: Doctorow's great achievement with Ragtime is an authentic feeling of early 20th century America without extended realist passages (ie Grapes of Wrath). Instead, he chooses to appropriate some of the era's iconic figures in an enjoyable, kaliedosopic panorama of a time oft-forgotten in favor of the great wars and depressions of the the past century. The early 1900s saw the beginning of an exponential increase in technological advance while retaining social naivete and ignorance ("There were no Negroess...There were no immigrants'). Ragtime leads us through approximately a decade of change, we follow a family as they discover that, yes, there are Negroes and immigrants and the poor. We now stand on a similar precipice looking both backward at the past 100 years and forward to the next 1000 and Doctorow reminds us that just as the ideas and fame of Morgan, Ford, Houdini and the rest still glow, they are but shadows here in the future.
Rating:
Summary: Excellent Example of 20th Century American Literature
Review: I saw the Tony Award musical of the same name and, after being swept away by the brilliant story-line, I was compelled to buy the novel. I was not disappointed! The amount of feeling and emotion that Doctrow puts into this rather short novel is amazing. I believe that this is a book that EVERYONE needs to read! After you do so you will certainly reevaluate the way you think about many things.
Rating:
Summary: Time Capsule of Early Twentieth Century America
Review: Esay to read saga of the experiences of an American family around the turn of the century. Real people such as JP Morgan, Harry Houdini, Emma Goldman and Elizabeth Nesbitt play supporting roles with cameos from notables such as Henry Ford, Sigmund Frued and Stanford White. The main charcter is Ragtime America with its melting pot of new imigrees arriving daily from Eastern Europe, Italy, and Ireland, and their infleunce on American society and business. Rgatime America was also heavily influenced by industrial and financial genuises such as Henry Ford and JP Morgan.The most significant plot line, involves the story of Coalhouse Walker a black man who is humiliated by a group of redneck Firemen.
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