Rating: 
Summary: Amy Bloom succeeds in the novel format.
Review: "Love Invents Us" began as a short story in Amy Bloom's collection of short stories "Come to Me". I enjoyed the further exploration of the lead character in this novel. Ms. Bloom continued to write emtionally and eloquently about provocative topics and unique characters. However, I was not unsatisfied by the short story and there was nothing left unsaid that made a novel necessary. "Love Invents Us" was a good read, but Ms. Bloom's true gift lies in the short story.
Rating: 
Summary: A worthwhile read.
Review: Amy Bloom certainly has an interesting slant on growing up. Her main character goes through some pretty rough stuff, and holds her ground really well. This book is definetly worth reading, it has a certain charm and intrigue combination that make it one of a kind.
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Summary: Love Invents us Blooms with Love
Review: Amy Bloom creates another wonderful world of a teenage girl growing up in New Jersey, and the men and people that love her. A beautiful read
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Summary: Sometimes Bumpy for the Heroine and the Reader
Review: Amy Bloom's Love Invents Us can sometimes be a very beautiful book with a challenging character at its centre and it can sometimes be a very frustrating book with a challenging charater at its centre. Ultimately, it is a satisfying read but the journey is not always pleasant as Elizabeth grows up and grows older. The male characters are not always drawn as finely but it is, of course, not their story but Elizabeth's. The need for love creates and sustains this story and gives the novel its razor sharp painfulness. I wished I enjoyed the character of Elizabeth more as then it would be her personality that took me through this novel instead of being propelled by the wonderful prose of Amy Bloom over the slow spots. In the end, a good book if not always a pleasure.
Rating: 
Summary: Fascinating Characters, Elegant Prose
Review: Amy Bloom's stunning writing made what might have been a depressing story a terrific read. I found her characters not only believable, but sympathetic and fraught with the complicated baggage that makes real people interesting--and at times intolerable, as these characters were. Elizabeth Taube's quest for love begins with the strange fur salesman Mr. Klein and continues through a series of longer-lasting relationships, none of which completely satisfies her--although all of them do, as the title says, invent her. From Mrs. Hill, who teaches her how love through service, to Mr. Stone, her obsessed English teacher, to her parents' disconnected affection, Elizabeth learns about love in the complex forms in which it presents itself to us, and Amy Bloom shows us how Elizabeth learns in elegant prose.
Rating:
Summary: Fascinating Characters, Elegant Prose
Review: Amy Bloom's stunning writing made what might have been a depressing story a terrific read. I found her characters not only believable, but sympathetic and fraught with the complicated baggage that makes real people interesting--and at times intolerable, as these characters were. Elizabeth Taube's quest for love begins with the strange fur salesman Mr. Klein and continues through a series of longer-lasting relationships, none of which completely satisfies her--although all of them do, as the title says, invent her. From Mrs. Hill, who teaches her how love through service, to Mr. Stone, her obsessed English teacher, to her parents' disconnected affection, Elizabeth learns about love in the complex forms in which it presents itself to us, and Amy Bloom shows us how Elizabeth learns in elegant prose.
Rating:
Summary: Love is her own invention created for her own incapacities
Review: Amy Bloom, who doubles as a pyschoanalyst with a small practiceof her own, brings an expertise into this novel, a disturbing tale ofa woman with a perverted, emotional adolescense that deceived her into thinking she was being loved. This poor tortured girl has many people to blame, mainly parents who were too busy to notice the traps set to catch their budding fifteen year-old about to enter her rite of passage. She looks for for love beyond the places she should find it and falls victim to the eyes, thoughts, and illegal actions of older men. Amy Bloom has captured teenage sexuality in all its fragrant lust and unstoppable fervor. Innocence that loses itself unwillingly, falling into a dark, dangerous world where two stumble as one that is blind. Some of us are chosen to endure the suffering of their mistakes and in one of the most incredible scenes I have ever read about a miscarriage, Amy Bloom shows us sometimes love demands the agony of loss and suddenly we are victims of our own selfishness. Everyone is looking to be loved, even the smallest offering. When it comes, many of us lunge for it and fall on our faces in the attempt. Too late we realize there was nothing there or worse we discover the danger and the damage is irrevocably done.
Rating: 
Summary: Doesn't hold together
Review: Bloom is another example of a reasonably talented writer who blows it in terms of style and character motivation. LOVE INVENTS US is about the life of a woman and the men who love her throughout that life. And while the story flows effortlessly at many points, at others -- especially when sex is being described -- the language becomes self-conscious and overly flowery, trying a bit too hard to be stylistic.
I could tolerate that if I found the characters a bit more likeable. But I could never get a handle on them. I didn't believe that they really loved one another, not for so long, not throughout so much separation. I might have accepted that for the central couple, the high school sweethearts in an interracial relationship separated by an intolerant father. But I couldn't believe that the junior high school teacher would fall for his young student and maintain that love until she becomes an adult and nurses him during his terminal illness, seemingly motivated to do so by her own asexual love for him.
That's where the story fell apart for me. What were these people doing? When were they going to change? By the end, I didn't particularly care.
Rating:
Summary: Heartbreaking and lovely...
Review: I first encountered Amy Bloom's keen insight and matter-of-fact humanity in the pages of New Woman magazine, where she writes a monthly advice column called "Sex/Life." Upon discovering she had written a novel, I ordered it without hesitation. I was not disappointed. Love Invents Us is a startling and sensuous look at human relationships. Bloom shows us how every love affair (define that as you will) leaves its footprints on our personalities, with wonderful or disastrous results
Rating: 
Summary: Will trigger your depression
Review: I had only read the occasional magazine article by Amy Bloom, and i liked her style. However, this novel is a complete disappointment. For one, there is nothing lovable in Elizabeth as a character. She is a sad and selfish person who does absolutely nothing to redeem herself. In fact, she acknowledges at the end how she is 'dangerous' to her own son. Elizabeth has drifted through life being no good, knowing it, doing nothing about it, and taking advantage of whoever dropped by her side, like a leech. Maybe it all started because her parents were very indifferent to her, maybe because she felt abused by the variety of pedophiles that crossed her path. Why the revelations about her mother's past? Did that explain anything about her behavior? I was repulsed by Max, because he is unwilling to justify his fatal attraction for Elizabeth ('whatever is, is'), and (to Amy Bloom's credit) also because of his gruesome physique. I did not understand how Huddie's uncle would "root" for his nephew and then intercept the love letters he was sending Elizabeth. The relationship between Huddie's parents was never made clear. Also, there were too many people narrating the story. The ending is a sheer cliff. What kind of resolution was achieved? The part i enjoyed the most was when Elizabeth took care of Mrs. Hill, and the relationship between the two. Amy Bloom does a very good job describing physicality and the erotic nuances of melons (make sure you always wash your fruit after purchase. Who knows what your grocer had been licking). Other than that, this novel is a humongous disappointment.
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