Rating: 
Summary: Is it live or is it memorex??
Review: I just finished reading this novel for a Lit. class. When I read a book, I do it for enjoyment or knowledge, this gave me neither. When I read a novel I do not want to feel as if I need to be note taking in order to keep the events in order, hence my title. Did it happen or didn't it?? I found it to be totally unrealistic and very confusing at times. If you decide to read this novel, I truely hope you find it more enjoyable than I did.
Rating: 
Summary: A great novel
Review: I had to read this novel for my AP english class and i wasn't exactly looking forward to reading it. But once i got down to reading it, the book took on a life of its own. William Kennedy's brilliant prose and selection of words defined the character of Francis Phelan. The reader can truly feel sorrow, joy, disgust with each action of Francis, all through the excellent writing of Mr. kennedy. The book is a sad look on a depressing era, but it is also a novel that demonstrates the love and bond of family and the tenacity of human nature to hold on. A great book...highly recommended.
Rating:
Summary: rooting for Francis Phelan
Review: This Pulitzer Prize Winning entry in Kennedy's Albany Cycle of novels tells the story of Francis Phelan, an ex-baseball player, now bum, who is haunted by ghosts in Albany, NY in 1938. Twenty two years earlier Phelan picked up his thirteen day old son by his diaper and the boy slipped to the ground and was killed. He also killed a scab driver during a strike when he beaned him with a rock. In the intervening years, he has taken to the bottle. Now the ghosts of these and other figures from his past are coming back & Francis must try to reconcile with their spirits and with the remaining members of his family. I happen to have recently read Sophie's Choice & Beloved (see review) which also deal with parental guilt over culpability for a childs death. I found them both to be hopeless. This book, on the contrary, like Fearless by Rafael Yglesias, offers hope of redemption and the reader inevitably ends up rooting for Francis Phelan and hoping he can exorcise the demons that drive him. GRADE: A
Rating:
Summary: Literary Wine
Review: This is a novel that you don't guzzle. It has to be sipped, like expensive wine, to be appreciated for its lush use of language, crisp and witty dialogue and, most of all, the depth of the characterizations. The story is about Francis Phelan, a drunk and a hobo whose life has hit bottom. In 1938, for some reason that even he doesn't know, he returns to his hometown of Albany to face the people he loved and left behind, and the ghosts of his past. This is a memorable journey into a failed man's soul. If you appreciate fine writing and unforgettable characters, you will will savor this fine work of literature.
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Summary: An amazing story of redemption.....
Review: None too often does a book come along that makes you think of life, the wrongs done to yourself and to others. Ironweed cuts to the very heart of human despair and longing, and raises the eternal question of redemption. Never before have I seen such flawed, beautiful characters so lovingly rendered. This book has made its way into my personal top 10, and each time I read it, it never fails to bring me to tears. Francis Phelan is a flawed hero to be sure, but even in his most desperate of times, he carries a not-so-quiet dignity that the best of us could only hope for under the same circumstances. A profound exploration of the human spirit...one that will not be soon forgotten.
Rating: 
Summary: What I Thought...
Review: Uhm, ok well it is a WEIRD book i dont get the part where he talks to the dead people & them eating flowers? And they curse way to much in this book! It has sex and very vivid words! I checked this out at my school's library & it said it had a reading level of 7.2, now i think it should be a little higher with all the curses and sex in it! jeez!
Rating: 
Summary: Good, but did I miss something?
Review: I just finished Ironweed and sat down to write this review, reading the other reviews first. I appreciated the writing and the wonderfully painted characters as well as all the spectacular dead characters around Francis. The totally foreign world of the homeless in the 30's was pretty fantastic reading as well. But my favorite book ever? I found Helen difficult to fathom. I thought the book moved a little slow. Good, great even, but not the best ever. ( that's Love in the Time of Cholera)
Rating:
Summary: A Novel That Sees To The Heart of Things
Review: This is simply one of the great American novels. A lot of us can see ourselves in Francis Phelan--battered by the world, maybe even hugely damaged, but still game. Kennedy's poetic language fuses even the grimmest situations with God's grace. The Jack Nicholson/Meryl Streep movie doesn't really begin to do justice to this book.
Rating:
Summary: Pulitzer, hell, give the man a Nobel
Review: I've always liked imperfect heroes, but never so much as Francis Phelan, a bad husband and father and a worse drunk, stooped as low as the gutter but still capable of seeing stars in the lives of the other bums, vagrants, and drunks who populate this incredibly written novel. This is the kind of book that makes you reconsider those you ordinarily dismiss, like those imperfect men and women we see everyday on freeway offramps with a sign in one hand and a cup in the other for change. This novel rightfully earned Kennedy a Pulitzer. A few more like this and he should get a Nobel.
Rating:
Summary: A human tale
Review: Kennedy has written a wonderfully, disgustingly, evocatively human tale that will hold up for the ages. Read this novel and gain a deeper understanding of man's relationship with death.
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