Rating: 
Summary: what has happened to the novel?
Review: Simply put, this novel stunk. The language is imprecise, the characters boring and unlikeable, and the situations stupid. It's tedious, rambling, unreadable verbal muck. It'd be easier and less painful to get it into your brain by ramming it through your ear rather than reading it. You'd be more entertained watching hair grow.
Rating:
Summary: A not unusually not unlaborious exercise in MFA not art
Review: The first 100 pages read like Beavis 'n Butthead do Writing. Huh. Huh huh. Then Kinder shows his stuff, not unlike the not unusual not untalentless nonpeople who spend years sustaining each other on a vague notion they call literary. And he "teaches" writing. Oy vay. Why can't he write a simple simile without using a double not for flourish? This book was just plain annoying.
That this was a New York Times notable book is clear evidence that the literary/academic complex wants to rule "art" in America. Bah.
Rating:
Summary: Rambling and Uninteresting
Review: There's no plot to this book, which would be fine if the book was populated with interesting characters. It isn't. The characters aren't likable or interesting. Getting through this book was a challenge and became purely a mechanical exercise.I'm irritated that I could have read several good books in the time it took me to wade through this one.
Rating:
Summary: Rambling and Uninteresting
Review: There's no plot to this book, which would be fine if the book was populated with interesting characters. It isn't. The characters aren't likable or interesting. Getting through this book was a challenge and became purely a mechanical exercise. I'm irritated that I could have read several good books in the time it took me to wade through this one.
Rating: 
Summary: Too Funny
Review: This book is simply hilarious. If you enjoyed the film "Flirting with Disaster," you'll have a good appreciation for this wonderful, touching, earthy novel. See the plot descriptions above for what happens in the book, but read it to enjoy the numerous moments of surprising lyricism, astonishing humor, and enough literary pot-smoking and alcohol consumption to put you into rehab. Too funny? Thankfully yes.
Rating:
Summary: A Larger than Life Book
Review: This is not the sort of book I usually read. The author is male. The setting and time are ones that don't generally interest me. The characters (in their real lives) were obviously larger than life. So what else was there to say? In a word -- PLENTY. This book surprised me again and again. The women, drawn as bold and savvy as can be written. The setting and time intrinsic to the story, but not dated, for I was there -- right there -- as I followed this story along. And sure, the real life people from whom the characters were based were larger than life by the time I heard about them, but this book gave me a chance to meet and feel for them in a way I never could, reading about then in non-fiction. Gave me a chance to know them in a way. To suffer, to triumph, to cheer, to take comfort.
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