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Title: Charleston: A Novel by John Jakes ISBN: 0-451-20733-5 Publisher: Signet Pub. Date: 01 July, 2003 Format: Mass Market Paperback Volumes: 1 List Price(USD): $7.99 |
Average Customer Rating: 3.44 (25 reviews)
Rating: 3
Summary: Too much history, not enough novel
Comment: Jakes is the master of the historical fiction genre. The North & South trilogy and the Bicentennial series were outstanding. I had high hopes for Charleston but was left a bit disappointed. If one is looking for a book that is primarily a history of Charleston, then this book is for you. If on the other hand, you are looking for a great story that that just happens to be set in Charleston from the colonial period through the civil war (as I was), then this work by Jakes falls short. The book covers many, many decades with a clear emphasis on historical fact rather than spinning a compelling tale. It is far from a complete washout, but at the same time it is definitely not up there with his best works.
Rating: 1
Summary: A FAILURE
Comment: I have been a Jakes fan since his 1976 series, which were excellent historical novels, and I live in the Charleston area and have studied the history of the city. This book, however, is a ponderous failure. The depiction of an amazon woman, large and masculine, who has sex with two black men during the civil war, who teaches black children to write and read in the open, who escapes death many times because she is so bold, is a fiction that belongs in the trash not on your bookshelf. Not historical, not to his usual writing. He must now be under the influence of the women's movement to depict a Charleston woman of the Civil War in this manner. A major disappointment - do NOT spend your money here.
Rating: 3
Summary: A Good Book But Far From Jakes's Best!
Comment: Let me start off by saying that Charleston is an entertaining book -- provided you don't mind a book that is much more focused on telling history than a compelling story with interesting and well-developed characters. If the reverse is "your cup of tea", Charleston might not be to your taste. I'd suggest his Kent Family Chronicles or his North and South series. Because I have enjoyed all of Jakes's books due to his strong ability to marry historical fact with fiction, Charleston, while good, was somewhat of a letdown for me. In telling the history of Charleston from about 1720 to just past the end of the Civil War, Jakes seems to have gotten off track a bit in regards to what he was trying to do with his story. As a result, I found myself not "knowing" his characters as well as I would have liked and, for the most part, not caring about most of them. Hope this is helpful to you in deciding whether or not to read Charleston. Again, in making your decision please decide carefully if you're okay with a book whose main "character" is the history of a city moreso than the people making up that city.
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Title: The Bold Frontier by John Jakes, Dale L. Walker ISBN: 0451204190 Publisher: Signet Pub. Date: 05 September, 2001 List Price(USD): $7.99 |
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Title: Civil War Ghosts (Civil War Series) by John Jakes, Martin Harry Greenberg, Charles Waugh, Frank McSherry ISBN: 0874831733 Publisher: August House Pub Pub. Date: May, 1991 List Price(USD): $12.95 |
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Title: On Secret Service by John Jakes ISBN: 0451204050 Publisher: Signet Pub. Date: 10 April, 2001 List Price(USD): $7.99 |
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Title: American Dreams by John Jakes ISBN: 0451197011 Publisher: Signet Pub. Date: July, 1999 List Price(USD): $7.99 |
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Title: Arena by John Jakes ISBN: 1587541173 Publisher: Olmstead Press Pub. Date: September, 2001 List Price(USD): $14.95 |
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