Rating: 
Summary: A Compelling Novel About Political Activists
Review: A finalist for the National Book Award, this novel tells the story of once-idealistic Kate and her American friends who struggle against political and economic oppression during the 1980's. Kate is exhausted from her years of midwifery and nursing in Nicaragua and Guatemala, of the deaths she has known, of the love she has lost, and wants to return to the United States. She travels to Antigua, which she hopes will ease the transition to the safety and opulence of the U.S., but finds herself caught, unwilling to stay, unable to return to a world she had left. She and her friends try to forge small platforms of stability in love and friendship, but the overbearing presence of their political causes and the danger they face threaten to destroy what small pleasures they have.I would give this book five stars if not for the slightly flat and predictable conclusion, but it was well worth the read. This novel is for all those who have engaged in or who support socio-political causes as well as for those who enjoy high quality literary fiction.
Rating: 
Summary: Excellent Read!
Review: Hummingbird House is an excellent read reason for several reasons. First, Kate is an awesome woman. I learned so much from her character. Second, it is set just south of the US. It is scary and unnerving to read about the unjustices that are happening so close to home. Finally, it is a great love story without being sappy like the "typical love story". You will definetely come away with a lot after reading this novel.
Rating:
Summary: A rich and tersely cogent novel for real readers
Review: I believe this novel would impress anyone, especially those who have intimate awareness of the political chaos of Guatemala, Nicaragua and Mexico. However, as discussed in other interviews, it does little to politically penetrate these disturbances. I felt this omission was the genius behind the novel. It is a very dense book, with subject matter quite complicated and diverse. It was, as other reviewers have noted, somewhat challenging to get into. It was difficult to feel just where the protagonist (Kate Banner, midwife) was going and what exactly motivated her anxiety. But, in the end, I find that given the situation, it is a perfect reflection of where and what was going on. How can plans be made when everything can change overnight? Meet Kate Banner, in the first chapter delivering a newborn in a boat during the aftermath of a hurricane. The infant lives and the mother unexpectantly dies. After years of giving medical care to the poor, managing women's clinics, daubing in dangerous activist circles, exhausted, unsatisfied in love and mentally bereft, she seriously flirts with going back home to the United States. It is not a surprise to see her attempts thwarted in just about every way. Friends from the past unveil their secret lives, placing all contacts in peril. The horrors of the Sandinistas and Contras become increasingly obvious to her, and unexpectantly, a helpless orphan toddler latches on to her hand and never lets go. The more she tries to pull away from Central America, the more the people, the history and the turmoil itself hold her fast. There is joy for Kate, though. In stark contrast to the political environs, there is joy in a new love, joy in the nurturing of her adopted orphan girl, joy in the beautifully described region, fauna and people. There is joy in making plans to open Hummingbird House, offering a clinic and school to a small pocket of Guatemalan mountain villagers. and the vision sustains and nourishes her. It is a story of hope and survival. This is an extremely sensitive novel, and the restraint that the author maintained placed the emphasis just where it belonged.
Rating:
Summary: A rich and tersely cogent novel for real readers
Review: I believe this novel would impress anyone, especially those who have intimate awareness of the political chaos of Guatemala, Nicaragua and Mexico. However, as discussed in other interviews, it does little to politically penetrate these disturbances. I felt this omission was the genius behind the novel. It is a very dense book, with subject matter quite complicated and diverse. It was, as other reviewers have noted, somewhat challenging to get into. It was difficult to feel just where the protagonist (Kate Banner, midwife) was going and what exactly motivated her anxiety. But, in the end, I find that given the situation, it is a perfect reflection of where and what was going on. How can plans be made when everything can change overnight? Meet Kate Banner, in the first chapter delivering a newborn in a boat during the aftermath of a hurricane. The infant lives and the mother unexpectantly dies. After years of giving medical care to the poor, managing women's clinics, daubing in dangerous activist circles, exhausted, unsatisfied in love and mentally bereft, she seriously flirts with going back home to the United States. It is not a surprise to see her attempts thwarted in just about every way. Friends from the past unveil their secret lives, placing all contacts in peril. The horrors of the Sandinistas and Contras become increasingly obvious to her, and unexpectantly, a helpless orphan toddler latches on to her hand and never lets go. The more she tries to pull away from Central America, the more the people, the history and the turmoil itself hold her fast. There is joy for Kate, though. In stark contrast to the political environs, there is joy in a new love, joy in the nurturing of her adopted orphan girl, joy in the beautifully described region, fauna and people. There is joy in making plans to open Hummingbird House, offering a clinic and school to a small pocket of Guatemalan mountain villagers. and the vision sustains and nourishes her. It is a story of hope and survival. This is an extremely sensitive novel, and the restraint that the author maintained placed the emphasis just where it belonged.
Rating:
Summary: A good book from a great person
Review: I had the pleasure of meeting Ms. Henley through my writing program at Northwestern University. She was attentive, intelligent, and curteous. _Hummingbird House_ was my favorite book on this class's reading list. It is touching, informative about a place most Americans are not familiar with, realistic, and passionate. It is a refreshing return to "the story," contains beautiful descriptions and sensory detail.
Rating:
Summary: Authentic Storie Stirs Memories of Central America
Review: I really wanted to love this book. It's very earnest, reflecting the author's obvious commitment to human rights and her concern about abuses-she's even donating some of her royalties to human rights organizations. So I feel almost like a traitor when I say I felt the book to be curiously schizophrenic. The book is set in Chiapas, Mexico and in Nicaragua and Guatemala, areas in which an indigenous population has been systematically brutalized by corrupt governments, exploited by "freedom" movements, and terrorized by just about anyone with the power to do so. Horrifying and heart-breaking examples of such brutality abound here, especially in the last third of the book. Yet the first third of the book concerns itself largely with the failed romances of the various main characters, especially of Kate Banner, a 42-year-old nurse from Indiana. This pre-occupation with romantic relationships continues throughout the book, perhaps as a way to connect the settings in several different countries and in several different time periods, and perhaps as a way of illustrating that even in the midst of terrible wars, love can flower. However, with a large cast of characters, flashbacks which cover many years, and settings in three Latin American countries, plus, occasionally, the U.S, the development of character which makes a reader care about the romantic outcomes is missing. While some readers may find that the focus on romance makes it possible to bear the horror of the abuses, I found myself thinking that such a focus leads to an unfortunate trivializing of the years-long commitments many of these expatriate volunteers have made to the human rights struggle and, more importantly, that it removes the focus from the very real, life-and-death upheavals in the lives of the native population. The depictions of the abuses were very powerful, vivid, and often heart-breaking; the romances, by comparison, frivolous. Though love and war can coexist and can be the subjects of powerful novels, they just do not seem to coexist comfortably here.
Rating:
Summary: supremely haunting
Review: Patricia Henley has woven a most spectacular story in this book. It was difficult at first to find a way into the story -- I was confused and lost for a bit, but I managed to find my way in and unearth the triangle of lives that she builds the story around. Kate Banner is a noble and flawed woman -- and beautiful all the more in dealing with her struggles personally as well as in the treacherous world she choooses to live in. Into her world come a myriad of people -- most notably a priest with questions about his path in life (without compromising his faith and vibrancy) and a young orphan girl, whose impact on Kate changes her entire perspective. This is a book delicately written with such lush images that found myself reading certain passages over and over again. Couple that with human insights so bald, raw, and true that they still haunt me, and there's a beginning of an understanding of just how powerful a book this is. I loved the book when I read it, and as time passed after finishing it, the story stayed with me. I kept remembering it -- kept revisiting it -- kept seeing it. The story itself is wonderful wonderful and complex on its own... it has beauty and horror, love and hate, sense and incredulity, passion and war... its a love story as well as a crusade for humanity -- a story of a cause and an individual fighting to stay on top of the world long enough to make a difference -- a fight for self knowledge and understanding... and underneath it all is a masterwork of language, which lifts this book out of a story and into an experience. Henley's writing is so ripe in language there are phrases you can almost taste when read -- there is so much power in her choice of words that it will haunt you only moments after you've read them. She's created a beautiful experience for a reader -- one overflowing in humanity and haunting in language -- stay with the initial confusion, the reward is an experience that will stay with one for a long, long time.
Rating:
Summary: supremely haunting
Review: Patricia Henley has woven a most spectacular story in this book. It was difficult at first to find a way into the story -- I was confused and lost for a bit, but I managed to find my way in and unearth the triangle of lives that she builds the story around. Kate Banner is a noble and flawed woman -- and beautiful all the more in dealing with her struggles personally as well as in the treacherous world she choooses to live in. Into her world come a myriad of people -- most notably a priest with questions about his path in life (without compromising his faith and vibrancy) and a young orphan girl, whose impact on Kate changes her entire perspective. This is a book delicately written with such lush images that found myself reading certain passages over and over again. Couple that with human insights so bald, raw, and true that they still haunt me, and there's a beginning of an understanding of just how powerful a book this is. I loved the book when I read it, and as time passed after finishing it, the story stayed with me. I kept remembering it -- kept revisiting it -- kept seeing it. The story itself is wonderful wonderful and complex on its own... it has beauty and horror, love and hate, sense and incredulity, passion and war... its a love story as well as a crusade for humanity -- a story of a cause and an individual fighting to stay on top of the world long enough to make a difference -- a fight for self knowledge and understanding... and underneath it all is a masterwork of language, which lifts this book out of a story and into an experience. Henley's writing is so ripe in language there are phrases you can almost taste when read -- there is so much power in her choice of words that it will haunt you only moments after you've read them. She's created a beautiful experience for a reader -- one overflowing in humanity and haunting in language -- stay with the initial confusion, the reward is an experience that will stay with one for a long, long time.
Rating:
Summary: A POWERFUL NOVEL ABOUT JUSTICE AND INJUSTICE
Review: Patricia Henley's first novel reflects a bit of recent history that should not be forgotten. It is a deeply moving plea for justice, a cry to wake us from our middle-class stupor, a novel that talks to our souls. The book is beautifully written; images and characters will stay with me for a very long time. I usually dispose of novels when I have finished them, but this one will stay on my bookshelf beside CRY THE BELOVED COUNTRY, THE GRAPES OF WRATH, THE COLOR PURPLE, and other masterpieces that focus on the travesties that occur when justice is denied.
Rating:
Summary: Earns a Close Read
Review: This novel both demands and deserves a close read. The language the author uses is complex, evocative, and at times even poetic. We get to spend some time with Kate Banner, not longer than a year, but she lives her life in the past and future throughout, measuring her life in total. Most interesting are her relationships with the men in her life, with all the accompanying complexities. This is a great novel, well-worth the price. I thouroughly enjoyed Kate's journey.
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