The Catcher in the Rye

Rating:
Summary: Irony at its best
Review: I loved this book because of its brutal honesty and its irony. The main character Holden Caulfield is the extreme of most people, he thinks like the majority. It is ironic because Holden is everything he hates and everything he complains about. Some people may not like the book because it is so brutally honest and sadly a lot of people think like him. People are always judging and act the way they don't like others to act. Overall it is a book of bluntness and hypocritcal acts. I read this book on my own free time and not as a school assignment and I am glad I did. This book is for people who have a deeper sense of humor and not the generic kind. By all the irony and everyday situations it eventually drives Holden insane. Anyone can find alittle bit of themselves in this character.

Rating:
Summary: The Catcher in the Rye
Review: Have you ever thought to yourself : "I am in the mood to go shopping", and then by time you get to the mall, all of a sudden you find yourself thinking: "Why am I here? I really don't want to be, I'm just not in the mood."
I think this perfectly describes Holden Cuafield's life in the novel The Catcher in the Rye by J.D. Salinger. During this book you are constantly introduced to things that Holden, the main character, wants to do but by time he gets there or does it he is already bored.
Holden is also the most indecisive character I have ever read about. The great part about that is because it describes everyone perfectly, because everyone is indecisive when it comes to making decisions in life. Mostly because when you make a decision it affects your life forever and no one really enjoys it.
The biggest reason why I liked this book so much is because Salinger allows you to get into the mind of Holden Caufield for a few days. Have you ever looked at someone sitting on a bench and thought to yourself "I wonder what they are thinking?". In this book you get to be in the mind of someone and know their deepest thoughts. Holden may have been indecisive but he is also human, so his actions in life are just like anyone else's. He was struggling with what he was going to do with his life which is what we all do at a young age.
The only part about this book that I found disappointing was the end. I feel as if it wasn't complete because Salinger leaves the reader hanging. You never get to see what lies before Holden to understand what he does with the rest of his life. Other than that, I would recommend this book to anyone!

Rating:
Summary: One of the all-time greatest
Review: This book is amazing. The instant you fall into it flows amazingly. It plays out like your own thoughts do. The writing is great and the story is great. 16 year old Holden is a lonely character and is one you will never forget. This book delivers some serious messages without boring you. It is an easy read. but a very very tough idea. The themes in this boo are soo extremely deep that holden can only scratch the surface for you, and if you do not like this book than you are missing the point. Many self-richous morons will disagree with this book, but it is the fact that holden is not an adult that makes his raw untouched, unfiltered point of view unique. His point of view can tell you a lot about many a things. Overall if you are going to read one book, make it this. And if you enjyed this then you might also enjoy A seperate peace.

Rating:
Summary: The Greatest Character study in Literature!
Review: There are plot-driven books and there are character-driven books. The Catcher in the Rye is definitely a character-driven, minimal plot book. BUT, it is the GREATEST CHARACTER-DRIVEN novel EVER! It took the author ten years to write this book, and the character of Holden Caulfield is so distinctly, three-dimensionally rendered (with particular speech patterns and personality nuances) that you will swear this character is a real person! You MUST read this book at least once! It is simply unforgettable! Also recommended: [e-mail] by Tom Grimes, The Losers' Club by Richard Perez

Rating:
Summary: Holden Caulfield
Review: The Catcher in the Rye, begins with Holden Caulfield, the narrator, while in psychiatric care remembering what happened to him last Christmas. He begins his story when he was a student at Pency Prep at the age of sixteen. Holden had been having a hard time at school and failed four classes causing him to become expelled from his fourth school. He struggled with school, because of his immaturity and lack of responsibility.
Throughout the novel Holden puts himself in situations of self destruction. He allows himself to be bossed by another peer, he clearly stated to a teacher that he found what he learned a complete bore, and accepted his unfortunate fate without trying to improve his life and get back into school.
Fed up with Pency Prep, Holden leaves early and decides to stay at some cheap hotel in New York City. There he finds his way into several night clubs and realizes how phony everything seems to him. He had strong feelings for wanting to escape as far away as the woods to live in a cabin with Sally Hayes, a girl he had feelings for.
By the end of the story he tells Phoebe, his sister, that he will be leaving soon and this causes much grief for her, because all she wants is for her brother to get his life together. Holden begins to become more distraught and feels as if he were going to die. By the end we are left hanging with the curiosity of what happens next as he goes back to the present time ending with how he misses his peers from Pency Prep.
I would recommend this book to anyone especially a teenager who could possibly have an easier time relating to the story. Holden's struggles were very interresting to follow, because at times they reminded me of how I have felt in the past, because of all the pressures I have in life. It was interresting to follow how he interpreted life and how difficult it was for him to be happy with himself. The ending was excellent, because it didn't leave a definite ending. On the other hand it allowed me to continue the story in my own mind according to how I came to understand it.

Rating:
Summary: Makes me wanna cry and laugh at the same time.
Review: OK OK! for all of you who hated this book I KNOW WHY! the fisrt time i read it i was like "WHAT THE HECK IS IT!?" it seemed to be a meaningless rambeling of a teenage boy who liked to cuss... but its FAR FAR MORE! THIS BOOK IS NOT MENT TO BE CASUALY READ! EVERY SINGLE SOLITARY THING in that book is placed there for a REASON. it takes thinking and analyzing to get below the surface of this one... from the microcasum of society that is Pency Prep to Holdens struggle to let go to the past and realize he cant protect the innocent its beautiful and EXTREAMLY sad and laugh out loud funny.... but it takes THINKING! thats why i hated it the fisrt time... but go back... read and reserch ((NOT ON SPARK NOTES OR ANY OF THAT CRUD... theyll get you all screwed up)) ... if you REALLY come ot understand the book theres no way you wont love it!

Rating:
Summary: Talks endlessly, says nothing - I hate guys like that!
Review: I read this book in my teens, and just now re-read it 20-plus years later. The only part I remembered from before turns out not to be in the book, to tell you the truth. Hmm... (maybe it was Midnight Cowboy"?). I'm really crazy, the craziest guy.

Anyways, this guy Holden Caulfield is a whiney loser prep-school expellee and all, and walks around NYC for a few days complaining about everything and everybody, he really does. Funny that the way the book is written you know, in the sort of phoney realistic manner that some notorious writers use, is pretty good and all, but Holden can't really put together a grammatically correct sentence, although he was supposed to be good at English, at least he didn't fail that at school.

Anyway, I did like the book a little - I really did, but I did not much care for Holden or his problems. I suppose this book would have been better in the fifties when it came out. The notorious "cursing" - oh, my! - is tame. Mostly GD this and GD that, and only gets into the F word at the end.

I would not recommend it, but I would not keep anyone from reading it. Sort of like Holden, he takes both sides.

Rating:
Summary: My favorite book of all time
Review: This novel has so many great qualities. I don't know what it is but whenever I think Holden, I think of it as a reflection of myself. Obviously everyones favorite part of the novel is the middle, Holdens sexual exploration. the thing is though, that he's still a virgion by the time the book ends, it is his way of catching kids from falling out of the field of Rye, where Holden would dream of suddenly becomming Peter Pan and taking kids with him to neverland where you never had to grow up, which is that night of his exploration in New York he passes up several sexual oppertunitees.
The novel was about ten to fifteen years ahead of it's time with Holden noticing societies flaws and urban decay, in which the film "Taxi Driver" comes into mind. But that's another story. Several essays have been written on "The Catcher in the Rye," and if you want to check them out then I suggest you look for "Readings on 'That Catcher in the Rye'" have fun!

Rating:
Summary: A Timeless Classic. 5 STARS *****
Review: You don't need Cliffs Notes or any other thing other than your own brain to read this and understand what Salinger was saying here. There's a little bit (and a lot also) of Holden Caulfied in each of us. I don't care who you are, or what you do.

Salinger writes this with a fresh youthful narrative, both demanding your attention and causing you to think and let out a sigh of pleasure after you've read it. There are funny bits in here, and also serious directions to the mental state of Holden Caulfield.

The swearing? Come on people: best said in Stephen King's book, On Writing, where he explains his answer to his own mother's question as to why he had swearing in his writing: because the writing is a direct reflection of 'real' life. A truck driver gets cut off on the highway, almost plowing into another car, he's not going to say, "Oh, darn!" Caulfield'd dialogue is his real dialogue; he's not going to hold anything back.

Don't read this for a teacher's book report, not for a creative writing class, but only for the pure intention that J.D. Salinger intended: for the enjoyment of it.

5 STAR ESSENTIAL RATING FROM SCRAGGY'S TOMB OF CLASSIC LIT, USA.

Rating:
Summary: My personal favorite
Review: The Catcher in the Rye is the best single piece of literature I have ever read. It was easy for me to relate to the main character, Holden Caulfield, throughout reading the novel. J.D. Salinger is inspiring.