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Title: Independence Day (Vintage Contemporaries) by Richard Ford ISBN: 0-679-73518-6 Publisher: Vintage Books USA Pub. Date: 01 April, 1996 Format: Paperback Volumes: 1 List Price(USD): $14.95 |
Average Customer Rating: 3.54 (92 reviews)
Rating: 2
Summary: A struggle to read!
Comment: I have no doubt that Richard Ford is a writer of talent, indeed the skill of the storyteller emerges at intervals throughout this novel, but that was not enough to either engage me as a reader or ultimately to convince me to like the book, it's characters or it's plot. Independence Day won the 1995 Pultizer Prize for fiction and although most of the reviews listed on Amazon would suggest that the award is justified, I do struggle to agree with that analysis.
The plot, although I would contest that definition, is contained within three days of the life of Frank Bascombe, a forty something, divorced real estate agent as he attempts to take his son on a holiday. To fill in some of the spaces Ford gives us a great many philosophical ramblings. Herein lies my problem with Independence Day. I have no objection to philosophy, indeed I was confused by it on a regular basis while at University. However, my main motivation for reading a novel, any novel is to be entertained. That can be through sheer enjoyment, through struggling with the challenge of the ideas (including philosophical ideas) through humour, through frustration and anger and so on. Independence Day provided no trigger at all to stimulate an emotion on any level barring that of boredom.
Consequently the book for me, and I'm aware that here I am in the minority, is contrived, repetitive, at times shallow with the pretence of a deep and meaningful statement. I was unable to invest in any of the characters and thus did not care what happened to them during the course of the novel.
Ford has the reputation of a good writer but I feel with this novel he goes to great lengths to convince us that he deserves that title.
Rating: 5
Summary: The Art of Being O.K.
Comment: In Independence Day, Richard Ford chronicles with consummate
skill a few days in the life of a New Jersey sportswriter
turned real estate agent, Frank Bascombe.
With keen observations, outstanding descriptive
power and dialogue more real than "The Real World," Ford
pulls the strings of this great book masterfully.
Frank is in the midst of what he calls "The Existence
Period," a time when he has come to terms with his life
to date and moved on to the more uncharted waters of vaguely
contented middle-agedom. He has arrived at a crossroads
where he has plenty of past but still a lot of future left
ahead.
The novel's narrative flows like life itself - forward,
back, sideways - in a way that is so natural and consuming
that you would swear the character is you and his thoughts
are yours.
There is not a book that I have read that does better
justice to the realities of being human and adult in
today's world.
At its heart, Independence Day is the recording of two
worlds- the one we sense through our bodies and the one
that exists in our heads - and how these two interact in
a way that is sometimes painful, sometimes beautiful, and
most times just O.K.
To read it is to see yourself, and in many ways, all of us.
A must.
Rating: 1
Summary: Booooorrrrrring!
Comment: I can't believe I put myself through 450 pages. I don't care how many awards it won--it's one of the most boring things I've ever read. Contrary to the description on the back cover, there is no "sudden bewildering engagement with life." Nothing ever happens in this story, so don't read this novel expecting adventure or really any excitement at all.
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Title: The Sportswriter (Vintage Contemporaries) by Richard Ford ISBN: 0679762108 Publisher: Vintage Books USA Pub. Date: 01 June, 1995 List Price(USD): $13.00 |
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Title: Martin Dressler: The Tale of an American Dreamer (Vintage Contemporaries) by Steven Millhauser ISBN: 0679781277 Publisher: Vintage Books USA Pub. Date: 01 April, 1997 List Price(USD): $13.00 |
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Title: American Pastoral by Philip Roth ISBN: 0375701427 Publisher: Vintage Books USA Pub. Date: 01 February, 1998 List Price(USD): $14.95 |
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Title: Empire Falls by Richard Russo ISBN: 0375726403 Publisher: Vintage Books USA Pub. Date: 12 April, 2002 List Price(USD): $14.95 |
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Title: The Stone Diaries by Carol Shields ISBN: 014023313X Publisher: Penguin Books Pub. Date: 01 April, 1995 List Price(USD): $14.00 |
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