McColley succeeds in making us like some pretty unloveable characters by most standards, and creates a really cool ghost. The problem that I had with this story of a young man who joins Quantrill's Raiders is that I found the characters' reactions to be mostly unrealistic. Jacob, the main character, acts and feels in ways that makes no sense. Also, the end of the book was unnecessarily depressing -- I don't always object to sad endings but this was just sort of... flat. The Other Side certainly has its good points but I can't wholeheartedly recommend it.

Mr. McColley has written an interesting story about the Civil War. A much different point of view then most books on this subject. At times it becomes tedious but he always brings you back to a good solid story.

I found this book to be dark, gritty and provocative. It accurately depicts the western front during the Civil War. McColley does a stupendous job in creating believable, if not disturbing, characters that make you question the darker side of human nature. One of the best books I have read in a long time!

This was a really good book, and I highly recommend it to anyone and everyone (Tho, it's prolly harder to understanf gor younger kids...) I've read this book about 10 times in the amount of time I've owneded, and it still suprises me what happens to Randy. If you don't read this book for anyother reason: Read it for the ending!

This book keeps the readers interest throughout the story , but it seems like something will get better for the epileptic hero of the book , when in the end nothing gets better. I think he acctually has it worse off with no friends, and a brother who has betrayed him. It is a suppenseful mystery , but for Ken it's a depressing tale.

Seventeen year old Ken Corbin lives in a small town in Minnesota with his mother, Leo (his half brother), and Max (his dog). Ken and Leo never get along and Leo seems to always get his way. One day a homeless man named Ricky moves into an abandoned lot. Ken and Ricky instantly befriend each other because they have the same feelings toward the kind of person that Leo is, and since Ken and Leo were always fighting, it helped Ken to talk about it. One day Ken realizes that Ricky had mysteriously changed. He doesn't look any different and he remembers what they talked about the day before, but it just wasn't Ricky. Ken knows that something is up and wants to get to the bottom of it. Ken investigates and doesn't believe what he learns. He learns many things he never knew about the people he felt closest to, and he realizes that secrets are very powerful things. Who would kidnap a homeless bum and switch it for another? This book has a lot of mystery and suspense. It really makes you think about whom you can and cannot trust, even when they are the closest people to you.

-Allison's BMS Literary Corner

Scary and mysterious. A little bit weird, and catchy to read. The book had all the elements, and author is an excellent mystery writer. I would reccomend the book to anyone

I thought this book might be a paean to aging, but it isn't. It is an extended and tedious look at what happens to a man when his testosterone supply diminishes. The hero of the story moves through a fairly uneventful life in a small Minnesota town. He must face the fact that he is aging, his wife is dying, and his son is a failure. But sex is the real subject; every conversation moves to sex, every observation is tinged with sexual particulars, every reverie eventually ends in a backseat or a bedroom. The story is told with palpable distaste for its characters, with particularly unforgiving eye turned to their physical flaws. There is a murder subplot and a romance, but these are expressed in images of masturbating priests and wrinkled, aging thighs. Eventually, we learn whodunit. We also learn that the ebbing of testosterone is a GOOD thing, since men are so horrible when acting under its influence. This is an especially disappointing book because the quality of the writing is excellent.

At the end of the book, it didn't matter anymore who committed the crime - you had finally reached the end of a long, drawn out story about a murder.

As a 32-year-old woman, at first I had a hard time getting into the main character (a 72-year-old man), but I kept going. The problem then became that the first half of this book was un-remittingly bleak. The writing is good and the plot becomes interesting or I would not have hung in there. A little light is introduced...but (I don't want to spoil the plot) it ends up being undeserved and that is the greatest frustration of all. Perhaps the author thought the point was that anyone can change but the ending seems to show that they haven't changed, or at least not enough.