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Rating: 
Summary: Strangely disturbing, yet appealing.
Review: I picked up this book because I had read another of Douglas Preston's books,"Relic" (of which he was co-author). "Relic" was a typical horror book--fun, a quick read, without much depth. Definitely a "B-movie" of a book, with the signs of "make a quick buck" all over it. I was expecting "Jennie" to be similar. What a surprise. "Jennie" is a completely different type of book. Sweet, sad, haunting. From the beginning of the book, the foreshadowing strongly warns you that there will not be a happy ending. Through even the fun, joyous scenes, that shadow is hovering, making the joy poignant. I don't want to be too heavy handed here, but this story has elements of a Greek tragedy. The inevitability of the ending gives this story a sad, yet haunting appeal. And, the book raises some disturbing issues about our society, news media, celebrity, and how we think of animals. More depth than I expected!
Rating:
Summary: Wonderful Fiction!
Review: I will admit up front that I am a sucker for a chimp story. I think it's due in part to an overdose of "Mutual of Omaha's Wild Kingdom" and re-runs of Daktari at a very tender age. But this IS an excellent novel. Preston is one half of the team that wrote "The Relic" and several other great thrillers. this is much more gentle fiction than any of those. It is character and issue driven realistic fiction. Jennie is a chimp who is raised as a human child. The story is told as if it were a true history and the viewpoint is split. There are interviews (using sign language) with Jennie, exerpts from her "father's" book, newspaper articles, and other interviews. The story's flow is surprisingly smooth for all that. At turns funny and heart-breaking, Jennie won't leave you along once you pick this novel up. It's short, but block off some time...it's a page turner. And the denouement, while not surprising (what always happens when the wild enters surburbia?) is all the sadder for its inevitableness.
Rating:
Summary: Excellent novel. Ignore harsh editorial reviews.
Review: In real life in the 1960's, a number of experiments were performed in which an infant chimpanzee was raised as a child in a human family. In every case, the ape did astonishingly well until puberty, at which point its strength increased drastically and its moods became unmanageable. In every case, the animal died tragically. "Jennie" is a work of fiction based on these experiments.I'm astonished at the editorial reviews above. One actually describes the book as "cartoonish"? Did we read the same novel? If this is the way the book was handled in the press, then it's no wonder that it's out of print, and no wonder that the author has since resorted to writing "thrillers" that sell better. Jennie is one of the most haunting, intelligent books I've ever read. If you've ever wondered about the psychology of other creatures, or even whether they can be said to have a psychology, you should read this book. In particular, I appreciate that the priest character who befriends the ape is handled completely sympathetically, and not treated as a cruel "monkey trial" caricature. Indeed, the plot rarely takes the "obvious" route, even though the subject matter can lead it to only one possible ending. Disney did a TV movie based on it recently. The commercials made it look like a childish farce, and I couldn't bring myself to watch it. This book is an excellent read. I keep giving it to friends as gifts, and they invariably love it.
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