Rating: 
Summary: I thought this book was boring
Review: This book could have been much better if there weren't so many unecessary characters. That made it very hard to keep each one of them in line with their part in this book. This book could have been hundreds of pages shorter because there was more information that we DIDN'T need than information that we did. I like more exciting books that grab your attention in the first few pages. This book definitely did not do that.
Rating: 
Summary: I thought that the book was boring.
Review: The novel "Snow Falling on Cedars" is a boring book that I would not recommend it to anyone. The love story between Ishmael and Hatsue was just about the only thing that interested me. It was the only thing that motivated me to keep on reading. I was curious to what would happen between them. This book only got two stars though because it just had too much boring information in it. It gave so much useless information on each page that I almost fall asleep on every page I read.
Rating: 
Summary: This book captures every kind of reader imaginable.
Review: Snow Falling On Cedars was a great book. It relates to every kind of reader ever imagined. It's full of heart break , rejoyce, mystery, love, and intenseness. While reading this book your heart pounds at every turn of the page never knowing what will happen next. I recomend this novel to everyone who has ever read a great book, because I guarentee it will be right up there with the best of the best books ever written. I hope you enjoy the book just the same way as I have.
Rating: 
Summary: A great book to read in the winter
Review: I liked the book, it seemed to draw you into it. I found myself reading it late into the night and not wanting to put it down. I found it very interesting how the writer move the reader from past to present as he did. He seemed to mold your thoughts and emotions as if he predicted how you would feel when you read lines in the book. The weather in the story really controlled my thoughts also, as the lines in the book did, I really think that this book is a book for almost anyone.
Rating:
Summary: a book for patient readers
Review: Prepare for a long journey through a time of many prejudices and upsetting rememberances through one of our nations most mournful times--the war between Japan and the U.S. This novel not only touches the hearts of many, but allows us to have first-hand experiences of the Japanese during this terrible war. I give it 3 stars.
Rating: 
Summary: I just liked that book
Review: This was really a great book, even though it didn't look like in the beginning. It was pretty confusing in the first few chapters, because of the many characters acting in the story. But once I was in that book, I got to know all of them and I could tell who is who. Then it was hard to lay it away. It just sucked me in. I felt like I live on that Island and know all those people. I liked the courtroom scenes very much. Especially when the witnesses where crossexaminated by the attorney of the accused and the prosecutor. It was pretty cool to get to know what they tried to find out and to do. The end was pretty good and surprising. I had to keep my eyes from reading too fast all by themselves sometimes. (that happens to me when I want to know everything at once and just can't wait till my brain comes with me). Just go ahead and buy that book and don't let you stop from the first few chapters...
Rating:
Summary: This book was kind of a jumble, and pretty disappointing.
Review: I don't understand why this book was so popular. The mystery element -- including the courtroom scenes -- was pretty good, and several other sections -- the depiction of the internment camps and the war scenes -- were very well done, but on the whole I found myself annoyed by the overly long descriptions, the interminable flashbacks, and the author's constant need to explain every character's thoughts and motivations ad nauseum. A more skilled writer would know that character can be revealed by SHOWING us how the character acts, not constantly TELLING us what he or she thinks about everything. Moreover, even with the endless descriptions of what the main characters felt and thought, I didn't find them particularly well drawn or true to life. The author seems sympathetic to the Japanese characters, yet doesn't get very far beyond pat descriptions of "inscrutable orientals." And most annoying of all, while the reader thinks for a long time that the novel is about Kabuo's murder trial and the fate of the Japanese, it turns out that it's largely (if not primarily) about Ishmael, the emotionally stunted, immature nonentity who can't get over an adolescent love affair. I believe this is why the phrase "Get a life!" was invented. And so, after 460 pages, he finally realizes that maybe he ought to do so. This is profound? And yet, there were some chunks of good writing buried in between the scores of pages of tree descriptions, snow descriptions, and Ishmael's thought descriptions, leading me to believe that the author could have written a fine novella based on this material if he just hadn't larded it up quite so much with all those excessive descriptions.
Rating:
Summary: A let down
Review: After the glowing reviews I had received from others, I must say that I was a bit let down with this book. Granted, I wasn't expecting an action-adventure novel, but I did expect to become engrossed with the plot. Throughout the whole novel, I was waiting for the plot twist that never came. I found the book to be predictable, both in its story line and its message. Also, I wasn't able to connect with any of the characters, nor did I have any opinion either way on the verdict of the trial. Maybe I rushed through the book or maybe I'm too used to the trash-adventure novel, but I didn't think that this book was all I was led on to believe.
Rating:
Summary: One of the Best Written Works of Fiction This Decade!
Review: I would recommend this book to anyone who likes mystery stories, romance or just well-written novels. Gutterson's work is certainly all three of the above. It is a passionate love story of forbidden romance and ethnic hatred fused into a great mystery. I found the quality of the writing outstanding and very moving. For example, the descriptions of the Battle of Tarawa in WWII rival "Saving Private Ryan" for their powerful criticism of the futility of modern warfare. One of my favorite books of the past ten years!
Rating:
Summary: A lovely piece of prose, but unsatisfyingly constructed
Review: In a steady, conventional sense, Snow Falling on Cedars is beautifully written. Guterson is absolutely on-target in his vivid descriptions of life in the extreme Pacific Northwest, never failing to create stunning, haunting imagery. Guterson's greatest triumph, however, is his depiction of the emotional strain tugging at his characters. The story of Ishmael's painful childhood love affair is undeniably, utterly poigniant. It's wrenching.Where Guterson fails miserably, however, is in the story of a local fisherman's mysterious death. Despite his great lyrical and poetic success, Guterson elects to allow Snow Falling on Cedars to descend, very unnaturally, into a mediocre detective/courtroom drama. The emotional and metaphorical investments in the case simply aren't enough to prevent the two aspects of the book from feeling disjointed. A hurried, unsatisfying ending contributes to the problem. For this, Guterson can be forgiven. Snow Falling on Cedars is an example of a finely written, poorly constructed gem. It's a good read.
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