White Horses

Rating:
Summary: Don't Even Bother
Review: I loved "Here on Earth", but I was just disgusted with "White Horses"... The fact that an incestuous relationship is treated as 'normal' really bothered me... so much so that I stopped reading half-way through the book, and just skimmed to see what happened. I'm glad I didn't waste any more time on it.

Rating:
Summary: This one is confusing...
Review: I'm a big fan of Hoffman's and in my haste to read everything she's written, I picked up "White Horses." Unlike her other books, I was not immediately captivated by this; it took me awhile to get into. The characters in this are interesting, but also confounding. It is almost as if they exist in a void, and the rest of the world floats on by. They don't seem to have any real motivation for anything that they do, so it's hard to work up sympathy for them. This book was certainly interesting, and an enjoyable read, but it's not Hoffman's best.

Rating:
Summary: A haunting story of survival
Review: I'm glad I read this book even though the life of the main character, Teresa, is so troublesome and painful. Her physical/mental ailment and her family's breakup tear her life apart. She keeps looking for the ideal man (on a white horse), but finds only abusive males, including her own brother. Although some readers may be repulsed, as I was, by the incest in the book, it's a reality many people face. Alice Hoffman is so diverse in her writing. I enjoyed this book more than her Here On Earth. The book does, I think, end on a positive note, and I keep thinking about Teresa's endurance.

Rating:
Summary: Her Best Work
Review: My eleven year old grand-daughter loves horses so "White Horses" was among the books she chose for me to order for her online. She took it to school one day, came home with it, cut it to shreds, and threw them in the garbage....

Make no mistake about it, THIS BOOK IS NOT FOR CHILDREN!

Rating:
Summary: A book about relationships
Review: So many elements of this book rang true for me. Teresa is a young girl who suffers through traumatic losses, and in response develops a destructive love obsession for her brother. She sees him through a veil of illusions about inaccessible men which she learned from her mother, who in turn learned them from her father. Teresa idealizes her brother Silver and denies his cruelty, and tries to fill up the emptiness of her life with her obsession.

Alice Hoffman manages to simultaneously evoke the beauty of romantic fantasy worlds and the tragedy of spending years living in them.

Rating:
Summary: Her Best Work
Review: This book is by far Alice Hoffman's work of art-and that might be an understatement. This was a brilliant piece of writing that takes you deep into a girls soul making you laugh, cry and most importantly understand love, family and redemption. I'm amazed that WHITE HORSES has not gotten the same recognition as some of Hoffman's other books.

Rating:
Summary: White Horses
Review: This was one of Hoffman's earlier works, and I don't recommend it as an introduction to her many beautiful books. The magic and colors of a Hoffman fairy tale are all in place here, but the storyline is, well, creepy. Silver and his sister have a romantic relationship which is strange and a bit disturbing, and the only really likable character is Bergen, a middle aged Private investigator. It's an okay read, but try Practical Magic, Here On Earth, or At Risk instead to see Hoffmans real art of enchanting storytelling.

Rating:
Summary: A compelling, mystical book
Review: Unlike most of the reviews I have read, I found White Horses to be one of Hoffman's most poignant works. I think the incest theme puts a lot of people off this beautiful book. It would have been much better had Silver been a step-brother, because the book isn't about incest at all, but about romantic love. What happened to Teresa happens to many women: what she saw was an illusion, she didn't see Silver the way he really was. She saw only what she wanted to see--a knight on a white horse, a rescuer. I think to fully enjoy this book a person would have to have a romantic heart and a feeling for romantic fantasy. Personally, I liked it better than "The River King" and some of her newer books. Some of the images stick in the mind. The way she incorporated myth and reality worked together in this book. In some of her others it gets in the way. In "The River King" the images of roses, etc got downright sickening. In this book there is just enough hint of the supernatural to add a deeper dimesion. Perhaps this book wouldn't be everyone's cup of tea, but it was the first book of hers I read and I continue to think it is still her best.

Rating:
Summary: A Dark Fairytale
Review: White Horses has the otherworldly quality of a fairy or folktale. Although the book was compelling in the sense that I kept reading to see how it would end, most of the characters were unsympathetic. Teresa, the heroine, seems totally uninvolved in any relationship except for the incestuous one with her brother. It is as thought she is unable to feel for anyone except herself and him. Her relationship with her mother is cool and distant, although she seems to miss her. Her relationship with the one sympathetic character who genuinely cares for her, her stepfather-in-all-but-name, Arnie Bergen, is cruel and indifferent. The object of her affection, her brother Silver, has no redeeming social qualities and thinks of himself and his needs before all else. It is difficult to see what attraction he would have for even a sister, let alone any woman. On the other hand he and Teresa both seem to use people without regard to the feelings of the people they use. They bite the hands that feed them. They are cut from the same piece of cloth. Perhaps their attraction for each other is based in seeing each other as their other selves, but in each case neither self is very attractive. Theresa just drifts around letting things happen to her. She takes no control over her life. Silver is little more than a slimy character. I kept reading because Ms. Hoffman is a master storyteller and the story has the quality of a fairy tale, i.e., it uses archetypes such as the Aria, background information is kept purposefully vague, (is Dina's family Spanish? It seems possible, but is never specified through hints like Spanish words) lending the story a universal quality. She was able to keep me interested even though the characters themselves were uninvolving, I wanted to see where she would take them. Unlike her book Turtle Moon, which I have reread several times, I would probably not reread this book.