House of Sand and Fog

Rating:
Summary: Pleasantly Surprised
Review: I've long been skeptical of Oprah's Book Club. I bear no grudge against Oprah herself, but I honestly assumed that any book she had in her Book Club would be substandard pulp fiction. I'm prepared to admit that I was wrong.

House Of Sand and Fog is that rare novel which inspires awe from the reader for its technical skill whilst also managing to create a human story. House Of Sand and Fog is intricately plotted and beautifully written, but also manages a story which moves without ever being manipulative.

Try to read the book with as little plot information as possible - this is one read that could be easily spoiled by knowing too much, not due to any surprised ending, merely because you won't enjoy the tension nearly so much knowing the outcome. Just the basics: A woman's house is wrongly repossessed by the council and auctioned cheaply to a new owner. The two then try to resolve the situation but both come to the table with the view that they have done nothing wrong.

Dubus is to be congratulated on the skill with which he renders the two main characters and their sides of the story. Sympathy lies equally between the two, making the reader's journey all the more enjoyable. At times it is hard to believe that the two predominant voices of the novel were written by a single author - so rich and original is the prose of each.

Don't let the stamp of Oprah prejudice your view of the novel. Accept - like I have - that she is a woman of excellent taste and enjoy a worthwhile read.

C. James Brown

Rating:
Summary: A novel which should be a short story
Review: I was very disappointed in this book. The tedious description was ad nauseum. Poor development of sand and fog symbolism. One reader called the Colonel's ownership of Kathy's house as "freedom from pretense" and that he ends as a hero. If anything, his determination to make a profit from the sale of the house and his suicide in uniform underscore pretense and superficiality. Furthermore,Lester's desecration of law and order while wearing his uniform points to a more meaningful metaphor. Additional focus on structures - Kathy living in cheap motels, her car, a shack in the woods - shows a transient nature which Colonel Behrani eschues. Enough foreshadowing makes the ending plausible:the Colonel's temper and abuse, his focus on control and Kathy's irrational behavior from page one. Lester is a poorly developed character. The novel reads like an author's first write which should have been a short story.

Rating:
Summary: really annoying characters
Review: Though I had a hard time putting this book down, and the plot was grasping, I was constantly annoyed by the three main characters, especially the way the author developed Kathy and Lester, and their disfunctional relationship. I felt compelled to finish the book, but was annoyed throughout most of it.

Rating:
Summary: No suspension of disbelief possible
Review: Earth to five star people: Five stars is a rating reserved for masterpieces, which this book most assuredly is not. The characters seemed like chess pieces (or checkers, more like it) trundled around quite unsubtly in order to achieve the desired climactic result. Give this one a miss if you value your time.

Rating:
Summary: Andre III has an angel watching over him . . .
Review: Sometimes you cannot appreciate a piece of literature unless you know the life the author has lived. You try to figure out where the story might have come from. Not that this piece is in any way autobiographical. I don't know. But doesn't Andre III's talent make you believe he has lived each and every experience in this book? A gifted writer. I look forward to meeting his next group of characters. We loved the dedication to his siblings, too. Wishing you a heap of success, Andre!

Rating:
Summary: Excellent book
Review: House of Sand and Fog is an excellent book. The characters are flush with personality and individualism, the plot is gripping and the author's style is seductive. Though two of the characters go to unusual circumstances to recover a house, it seems real enough when the author describes how two vulnerable people under incredible amounts of stress might react when their world is collapsing around them. The Iranian characters in the book seem incredibly real and I was amazed to learn that the author learned of the Persian culture indirectly.

Rating:
Summary: Needs more character development
Review: Well, I read this on the recommendation of my wife through Oprah. While the book was easy to read, the only character to be developed was the owner of the house, Behrani.

With much of the first half of this book dedicated to developing the characters, Dubus misses the mark. He could have better developed Burton and the main character.

Logic usually rules over emotion with me. Thus, the whole central backdrop of this book, the house, and the wrestling for control over the house missed. Sure, it was an intriguing story but it's my opinion the common person would be furious not at the new owners but the county. Moreover, the result would be a major lawsuit against the county.

All that said, I could see this book as a great movie. With a little more dialog from Burton(perhaps with his wife and kids), Behrani and Nick, Frank and the rest of the family, it would be an intriguing script and movie.

Rating:
Summary: Poignant insight into modern cultural differences
Review: Dubus manages to capture the dialect and mindset of Iranian immigrant Behrani with intensity and consistency. The narrative, told from varying viewpoints of the three major characters, moves swiftly and compels the reader toward what he knows will be an unhappy end. There can be no other true ending for this tale because the lessons learned from having excessive pride and misplaced trust cannot be anything but tragic. This is "Lear" set in modern times. A tightly woven character study, most particularly of Behrani. Dubus is dead-on when he presents a character who believes all the hype of getting rich in America, while still retaining all the restrictions of a culture few Americans understand. A good read.

Rating:
Summary: Best Book I've Read This Year
Review: I just ran into this guy at the Miami Boof Fair. I didn't know about his Dad. I guess he's a little like Martin Amis. I didn't know this guy teaches at Tufts. America's best writers are teachers, including David Foster Wallace, Denis Johnson, TC Boyle, Jane Smiley...it's a long list.

I think this guy knows how to write a novel and this is a damned good example. It's the California gothic that "Already Dead" tried to do. I like it that like a musician, Dubus kind of plays the characters at you until you're part of their melody. That's art! This book is outstanding.

Rating:
Summary: Cross-cultural Parenting:A house is not a home.
Review: I loved this book, although it was painful reading it. the American protagonists, Cathy and Lester, desperately try to recreate a family life neither one is equipped to live - he for his irresponsibility in his marriage despite his obvious love for his two children, and she because her roots were obviously very shallow and tenuous (the final scene with her mom and brother bears this out). Cathy's tie to the bungalow is desperate, scattered, alcoholic. The Iranian family's tie is tragically drawn, with powerful elements of love, caring for strangers, hospitality, and pride. However, all of these wonderful qualities get subsumed beneath a feverish effort to recapture former grandeur and wealth. Elements of police state tactics and general police bungling in the States become a part of the tragedy of their lives.

Very powerful and worth reading.