Them is a great book. Don't get my wrong. I enjoyed it very much and was fascinated by even the characters that didn't arouse much sympathy. But it also took me by surprise. As a fan of Joyce Carol Oates, this book was not what I expected. It's very down-to-earth without many of the gothic elements that can be found in her other novels, short stories, and plays. But that doesn't mean it isn't very dark in places as well. The story starts out in the early part of this century with Loretta - a teenage girl living in the inner city with her carousing brother and alcoholic, widower father. She is concerned mostly with having fun and meeting boys until her brother committs a murder that will change her life and the lives of her future family dramatically. The bulk of the story is centered around Loretta's son, Jules, who struggles with his family and the harsh environment of the city. The pace got a little slow in the middle, but it was appropriate for the lives of the characters. Real life doens't happen at a whirlwind pace for many, and one of the striking things about Them is how Oates captures the mundane nature of daily living even as life-changing events occur around the characters. So if you want to read Joyce Carol Oates save this book for another day and pick up Zombie or Foxfire instead. But come back to it

This book was somewhat of a struggle for me, though I am a giant Joyce Carol Oates fan. I thought it wasn't possible, but "Them" is more of a brooding, dark, and realistic novel than Oates has pulled off anywhere else in her career. Here is a lot of characters that are in constant danger of falling to pieces, of escaping one another, of realizing their limits as individuals and as a family unit. If you are not a reader who can take a kick in the stomach, don't read this book. However, if you are willing to realize there is a hard edge to life which goes unrecognized each day, pick this book up as soon as you can - Oates creates a world fatalism and human conditions that are at once terrifying, yet beautiful: it is hard to look away. I was held breathless and scared until the last word dropped like a boulder.

When I read this book it takes a hold of me and doesn't let me go. I've read it twice and both times I couldn't put it down. Makes for late nights when I have to get up early for work the next morning, but well worth it. Joyce Carol Oates is my favorite author, everytime I pick up a new book of hers I'm so thankful that I found her. Her style of writting is a joy to read. The world of literature is a much better place with her in it.

This was a very popular novel of 1896, and is considered by many to be a literary classic. Theron Ware enters the scene as a small town Methodist Minister. He and his wife seem to be humble folk and settle into a small house near his church. Soon he meets a Catholic priest, an atheist physician, and a beautiful Irish lass. They make quite an impression on him. They are sophisticated, well educated, and quite worldly. Alas, they are such a strong influence on him that he starts playing the worldly role, and begins to look down on his job and his religion. He also finds himself strongly attracted to the lovely Celia Madden. I should mention that in those days the Irish were assigned to the caste of untouchables.

Theron acts as if he is now a man of the world, although he knows nothing of the literature, music, and philosophy discussed by others. He becomes a boring, mean minded buffoon. The book continues with his steady degradation, a preacher who has become a victim of that secular humanism that our current day fundamentalists complain so much about.

The novel provides an interesting view of religion and culture of the late 1800s. It was somewhat difficult for me to understand how such a seemingly pious man could turn into such a churlish fellow. Perhaps his upbringing was quite religiously strict, and he developed a strong reaction formation to it all.

I found this book on my father's bookshelf and brought it home to read. I'm not sure why I picked it--nothing about the title or description excited me too much, so it sat on my own bookshelf forgotten for several months. Finally, hurriedly getting ready for a vacation I needed a book to read and found Theron Ware. I loved it so much that I went right out and bought my own copy. I recommended it to my 21 year old son and he loved it too. One caution though, do NOT read the introduction first--it gives the entire plot away. Save it for after when you can savor the analysis.

IMHO, this novel can and should be included with the other American novels that we cram down the throats of high-schoolers: Moby Dick, Scarlet Letter, Huckleberry Finn, etc. This is the almost painfully realistic story of a preacher who discovers that there is another world outside his previously sheltered existence. For many of us, this sort of discovery is a happy and broadening experience. But in Ware's case, his new discoveries cause him to reject all the good things about his old life, and to build fantasy castles in the air of his imagination. In his increasingly desperate attempt to escape into a fantasy life, he leaves behind many of his values and ethical standards - not least his responsibilities to those he loves.

This book will hit a nerve for many readers - it did for me. It is easy for the reader to identify with Ware and realize only too late, as Ware did, that he is embarking on an illusory and self-destructive quest. Frederick constructed both the plot and the character of Ware perfectly, and this novel is worth everyone's time to read. You will keep thinking about it long after you have closed the book for the last time.

With authors such as Poe, King, Bradbury and many other well known authors we can be nothing less than pleased with this genre. Joyce Carol Oates chose many wonderful short stories to combine together to make up American Gothic Tales. In rereading Ray Bradbury's "The Veldt" I found there to be more insight to the story than I remember before; such as the childrens names and the computer taking the role of humans. In "The Yellow Wallpaper" and "The Lovely House" we see the effects of the confining roles put on women. We see how it changed their lives and who they were. In John Cheever's "The Enormous Radio" a woman learns about her neighbors through her radio. Later she finds that she is just like them and is left with a not so happily ever after. With stories set in the past and up to the future the book has a varity of stories. In Bruce McAllister's "The Gril Who Loved Animals" we are introduced to a picture of the future. We see a young woman who is carrying a gorilla baby, and that the new fad is to be of both genders. To complete the gothic tales genre you must have your usual serial killer and blood and guts. In Breece D'J Pancake's "Time and Again" we hear a story told by the serial killer himself. Although the man has no motivation to kill, except to keep his pigs fed, he has killed many people who were passing through the town. Now in his older age he has lost the will and energy to kill anyone else. He comes back home to his pigs and wonders what to do with his life now; continue on or offer himself to the pigs. With some happy endings, others sad and some leaving you to wonder you get a wide range of gothic tales that leaves you satisfied with investing in a wonderful book.

American Gothic Tales is a masterpiece of collected short stories edited by Joyce Carol Oates. You find a diverse variety of authors from Poe, who is very well known for conveying a message with spine tingling chills, to Ray Bradbury, who also writes children's books. Amongst these writers are many others who make this book so much fun to read. One of my favorite stories in American Gothic Tales was The Veldt, by Ray Bradbury. A mother and father, and their two children are spoiled and over dependent on this house of electronics, leading to murderous betrayal. Wow, this story and all its toiling events grapple with illusions of ferocious beasts, and the smell of blood left to linger in the air. The Lovely House is another terrific story about a house, and its consequential importance to a family. Shirley Jackson does a wonderful job of unfolding a fabulous mystery, which will leave you pondering your thoughts. John Cheever's The Enormous Radio is different in its unique style and ironic conclusion. The Westcott family is respectably average people, and the parents of two young children. Irene, the wife, is at first repulsed by the new radio her husband has bought in replace of the old one. Throughout the course of a few days, she engrosses herself with the gumwood cabinet and reveals a side of her only comparable to melancholy. This story of substitution takes a twist revealing acts of selfishness, and inhumanity. The simple lives of this ordinary family are no longer the same, truths are told, and secrets are uncovered. Lisa Tuttle's Replacements deals with a different find of substitution, a kind that derogates the existence of mankind. An awkward creature makes its way into the lives of women, fulfilling the man figure of vitality. This story is very strange and creative, using an analogy that is very real in the lives of many women.

American Gothic Tales, edited by Joyce Carol Oats, is a wonderful compilation of short stories from the bizzare and twisted to the utterly grotesque. This book includes authors known for their horrific tales like Edgar Allen Poe and Anne Rice, to others such as Charolette Perkins Gilman and Mark Twain, who I would not expect to be included in this anthology of gothic tales. "Freniere" by Anne Rice (one of my favorite storytellers) takes your imagination to the mysterious and historical city of New Orleans.In some hotel room in the French Quarter, a vampire named Louis tells the agonizing story of his life as the undead. Shirly Jackson's perplexing story "The Lovely House" will keep you guessing the entire time you are reading this haunted tale. The most thought provoking story I read was "The Yellow Wallpaper" by Charolette Perkins Gilman. This is a tale of a woman who's greatest enjoyment comes from writing, but due to the repression by her husband and the times she lives in, she is denied her greatest pleasure. As you turn each page, you will find yourself joining in her downward spiral to insanity. Of coarse a collection of gothic tales would not be complete without a story from Poe. Oats pick, "The Black Cat" explores the maddness of a man addicted to alcohol and the cruelties he inflicts upon his beloved cat Pluto, and wife.

I was incredibly disappointed with Man Crazy when I read it. But a friend of mine insisted that I give Oates another chance, so I picked up Foxfire. It was work of pure genius! It is a fast-paced story about a strong group of young girls trying to make their way through what appears to be a male-dominant world. However, the girl-gang that was created, Foxfire, is sadly destroyed. I will not spoil the end, but it is a deliciously curious tragedy. The situation of the Dwarf-Woman (you will understand when you read it) was just plain horrifying and wretched. I nearly cried. But, trust me, you will not be disappointed with this book. It puts an interesting spin on "criminal feminism" without glorifying it. I suggest you read it.

First of all, I absolutely loved the book. It was one that once I picked it up it was hard to quit reading. There is constantly some type of action, and never a dull moment. It was interesting to see how the dynamic of the relationships changed among the characters and how Legs maintained physical unity among the girls as they started to lack a spiritual unification.

Joyce Carol Oates is very descriptive and does a good job at character development. She sets it up so you end up developing some type of attachment to her characters. The book at times gets a bit extreme, but it still makes for refreshing entertainment. It demonstrates a form of recklessness that brings out benefits as well as new problems.

The story basically focuses on the growth of what starts to be a small group of girls into a full out gang. The girls' hatred for men builds and they progressively get more dangerous. Soon, Foxfire becomes a force to be reckoned with in their New York town. It's a really good book for those who are entertained by stories that deal with a type of progressive self-destruction.

I'd like to add that I saw the movie first. After reading the book, I must say that the movie doesn't even compare. The book puts the movie to shame. The book is far more eventful, and a lot of events that made the story stick out were left out of the movie. Where the movie did touch on the empowerment of women, it failed to capture the issues brought up in the book like pregnancy, racism, economical prejudice, drug abuse, and inter-family struggle. If you haven't seen the movie yet, I would watch it first. Otherwise you will be let down big time.

"Foxfire" is a great read for many reasons, and works on many levels. The book portrays in vivid detail what its like to be a girl, in the male dominated society of the 50s.

Instead of conforming to the social norms of the day, Legs leads a band of intelligent, free spirited girls to form their OWN world, with their own rules.

The characters are well drawn, believable, and loveable.

This book is brilliant also, in its depiction of good intentions gone bad, and how easily things can be taken too far. The horrible crime the girls end up committing is almost more horrific and shocking than their own ill treatment.

The girls will become farmiliar to you, and join your landscape. Oates's style here is not readily accessible, but worth untangling.

The book is passionate and near mythical, a must own.

It was a book my Grandmother told me I should read. I just decided to buy it on impulse really, not knowing what I was getting myself into. I opened the book and was immedeately swept into Jane Eyre's world. My mind played out all of the scenes as I read, only a truly masterful piece of work could create images so strongly right from the start. Charlotte Bronte creates a masterful work of art on the pages of this book.

When the book begins, you are taken into Jane's childhood, and given a sense of what it's like to have no love, and no hope of the future. You can actually see the pain on Jane's face. Then at Lowood, you learn with her, and grow with her. Finally, on the night she arrives at Thornfield Hall you are overcome with anticipation for Jane. What is this life going to be like? Then when Edward Rochester appears, you hate him. You can't believe that he talks to her that way. After a while though, things soften, and Miss Bronte introduces a new feeling. Love. The painting seems complete when Jane and Mr. Rochester confess their feelings, and you wonder, what could possibly be better than this? The ending,(which I won't give away)is absolutely breathtaking. I cried for a half an hour when I read it. It was at four in the morning mind you,(the book was so good I could not put it down.)

The characters in the novel are whole, they seem like real people. Charlotte Bronte uses her pen to paint a wonderful picture, one can not help but be engulfed in the color. The book has lasted almost 200 years, I see no reason why it could not last forever. If you ever want to read a classic love story that defines the power of women in literature, then Charlotte Bronte's Jane Eyre is it. I'm 16 years old, and if a teenager can be moved to tears while reading, it must be quite a piece of literature. I walked away feeling like I had taken an amazing journey, and found a new friend in Jane Eyre.

Just imagine. You're reading along, you come to a place in the bok that captures your attention. You're completely engulfed by the story, you're not reading it, you're living it! The "real" world is gone. You hear neither phone nor voice. You feel neither hunger nor thirst. You feel only what the author's pen tells you to feel. You are eager to read on. Your eyes cannot read the enthralling story fast enough. In your frenzied haste to know more, you grip the book tighter and bend it back, cracking the binding.
Years later when you pick the very same book up again, you can tell the scary, happy, or sad parts of the book by the location of the creases. Jane Eyre is such a book. It is one of three or four books who contentend for the multiple-crack champion.

I was assigned to read this book for an AP English class. Although I love to read, class-assigned books had a dubious history with me. Most, I felt, were boring or too pessimistic to find favor with me. I had heard many people talk about the book favorably after having read it in middle school. I put my hope in their past experiences and began to read. Although the first pages did not entirely confirm the praises the book had recieved, the book so far surrpassed my expectations that I finished the book in only a few days time! I would have read non-stop if it had been within my means to do so. When I did get the chance to read, I read as much as I could to the exclusion of food and family sometimes!

You may be wondering what about this book could make me such a fanatic. Well, I could give you deep literary criticism about the symbolism, the metaphors, or the imagery, but that doesn't really help you enjoy the story more, it only rounds out the meaning. Instead, let me tell you why you want to read this book.

This book combines passion and logic. An odd combination that don't often go together. Jane Eyre starts out in life full of passion and emotions, through torture and schooling, she learns to control her feelings and be ruled by logic. As she moves through life she struggles to find a balance between what her emotions tell her and what logic demands. Logic helps her through times when she feels abandoned and emotions guide her back to love when the tables are turned.
This book skillfully combines elements from nearly all genre and is sure to please anyone. It has action, romance, comedy, suspence, even the supernatural! This book is sure to put cracks in YOUR binding

I just finished reading "Jane Eyre" for my grade twelve English class. I borrowed the book from my school library. About four chapters into the book, I returned the novel to the library, and went out that night to get my own copy.

I cannot express in words how this novel has touched my heart. The musical nor the movie will never ever return the stirring of emotion that I felt for Jane's character while reading it from the creative and romantic mind of Charlotte Brontë. I did cry when Jane witnessed the death of her very best friend, Helen Burns, in Lowood School. I felt bitter and angry when Mr. Rochester did not tell Jane about his first wife, but I also felt relieved when Jane and Mr. Rochester rekindled their love to face a new life together.

If there is one novel that will ever touch my heart, look at my life as a woman, and respect the heroics that women of past ages have undergone, this is the novel.

Jane Eyre: this will be a novel respected for ages to come.

The first time I read the Yellow Wallpaper I was struck by the sheer force the words have on the reader. Perkins Gillman plays a mind game with her words, and the reader is made to join her sense of imagination. I first read it for a literature class, and each of the students in the class had a different interpretation of the story. This seemed extremely effective - it had made all of us think, and imagine. It had made is not just analyze the words, but it made us become a part of the story.I myself felt that the woman in the story was quite amazing - there were two men in her life, her husband and her brother both doctors by profession who were most incensitive to her needs. As can be expected of that time period, they were more interested in the norms of society, and were not going to allow the woman to act contrary to the norm. She however, was not about to give up on behalf of the norm. She was going to fight to the very end, and it felt almost as though she had liberated her own mind when she stopped seeing another woman in the wallpaper, but herself became one with it. Those of you who read this should also go ahead and read something on the author. It is a truely amazing story, and leaves plenty of room for the imagination. or. In one of her essays she talks of why she wrote this story.

This short story, based upon the author's own experiences, is a powerful tale of one intelligent woman's struggle with madness, the role of (married) women in society and family in the late 1800s, and how she copes with well-meaning but misguided relatives and their ideas of a woman's nature and abilities. Many consider it an early feminist novel, and I agree, although I would extend the author's message to any group that finds itself severely restricted by society's notions of appropriate behavior, goals, and the nature of the group.
The narrator of the story is, from a modern point of view, a normal, young, married woman who also has a desire to write. However, bound by Victorian mores and restrictions, this desire to write is deemed inappropriate at best and casts questions about her not fulfilling her (only) role as wife (and mother). She was only to focus her attention on "domestic" concerns (house, husband, children) and anything remotely intellectual was considered a threat to her sanity and her physical health. When she refuses to bow to society's (and her husband's) ideas of womanhood, she is confined to a room for COMPLETE rest (meaning NO mental stimulation of any kind, no reading, no writing). What makes matters worse is that her husband (a doctor) is also her jailer, and instead of truly understanding his wife as a human being, opts to follow society's standards instead of doing what is in the best interest of his wife (and her health, both physical and mental). Not surprisingly, she rebels a bit, and continues to write her thoughts in a journal, hiding the journal and pencil from her husband. When her deception is discovered, she is even more strictly confined than before, and denied contact with her children.
It is at this point that she begins her descent into madness--not from the desire to write and express her creativity, but from being denied an outlet for that creativity. She was not mad before she was prescribed complete rest, but rather the complete rest which caused her madness. She begins to imagine things (shapes, objects, animals, people) in the yellow wallpaper which covers the walls of the room to which she is confined. As more restrictions and controls are placed upon her, her imagination grows, until finally she strips the wallpaper to reach the figures, and is found by her husband, surely and completely mad.
I liked this story very much because the author conveyed the kind of dead lives many talented, creative women must have been forced to lead due to society's ideas of women and their abilities while fully backed by the medical profession. She clearly illustrates that in this instance, doctors and husbands do not know best, and that their very best intentions had the precise effect of bringing about the madness that they sought to cure. As I read the story, I wondered why her husband (and the doctor) were so blind as to the causes of her "nervous condition". It obviously was not working, and rather than demonstrating their intelligence by trying something else or, God forbid, asking her what she needed (a couple hours per day to devote to writing, a small thing indeed), continued along the same methods of treatment, only with more restrictions! The social commentary and the commentary on the status of women in society and in their own families is handled in an effective way by the author, not only in her prose but in the development of the characters and the storyline. It is a most persuasive plea of the basic idea of feminism--that women are people too, with talents and abilities outside of their roles as wives and mothers that deserve an opportunity to be developed. In reading this story, I am amazed by how far we as a society have come in changing our views of women, and yet by how much further we have to go. I highly recommend this book.
This book was also made into a show that aired on PBS' Masterpiece Theatre in the late 1980s. I have not been able to find a copy of the program, but remember that it was well-produced and faithful to the story.

This book truly captures the constraints felt by so many women, both in Perkins' time and in our own. She is able to touch on a very sensitive subject with amazing poetic prose. The fact that this book was written in the nineteenth century makes it all the more remarkable!

This book was about an abusive relatiosnhip. This abusive friendship did not have enough boundaries and nothing was clear. They never had sex however they become angry if the other one does with someone else. The jealousies, possessiveness and obsessions continue into a downward spiral with an incomplete ending. I think many people have met people like both of the characters and can relate. Sheila is someone I would stay far away from an emotional leach. Monica is begging to be abused and manipulated.

I first read this book in 1986 and have read it twice more since then. Joyce Carol Oates is the first contemporary American author I remember impressing me enough to linger with me long after I'd read her work. "Solstice," like other works by Joyce Carol Oates, does not paint a pretty picture. Great fiction is often about complex, sad, scary, bitter relationships. Happy relationships are better left to the Harlequins of this world. Sometimes when you're in a weird, complex mood you want weird, complex reading...catharsis and all that...

"Solstice" lingers like someone's presence after she's left the room. If you look at some reviews written about this book, there is mention of everything from stormy psyches to lesbian subtext. Whatever the motivation behind Monica and Sheila's relationship, fascination and even some kind of subtle hatred works into it. Monica is transfixed by Sheila and Sheila seems to need Monica as some kind of dumping ground. They'd probably just as soon want to walk away from each other with a clean break, but they can't. As Shelia says, "we'll be for friends for a long, long time...unless one of us dies." Probably a normal thing to say, but still sort of creepy.

They behave more like people in love than friends; what they have is not exactly chemistry, but it has drawing power. I always thought this novel was more about hatred than love, but sometimes hatred is love in confusion.

This is an intriguing look at an almost obsessive friendship between two women. It's also an interesting commentary on academia, the art world. Contemporary issues such as class and rape are also explored. However, it was the story of the chilling relationship between the two women that hooked me and wouldn't let me put the book down. I think that this book can be read on many levels. I enjoyed reading it for pleasure, but it is dense enough for all kinds of literary analysis.

Starr Bright... is one of Joyce Carol Oates' shorter novels. This prolific writer, who penned this thriller under the name of Rosamund Smith, has once again succeeded in keeping the reader in constant suspense, even though we know who the killer is from page one. It is the killer's fate - as opposed to those of her victims - that we are so anxious to learn about. I recently attended a reading and book signing by JCO which was held at Robert Morris College in Chicago. She also spent considerable time in a question and answer session with RMC honors English students who read two of her novels for their class. She is a very fragile looking individual who intrigues everyone with her command of the story, the characters and the direction each piece of work takes. An extremely prolific writer, she has written poetry, plays and critical articles for numerous publications - in addition to over 60 novels and her work as a professor at Princeton University. She did not elaborate about the pseudonym she has frequently used - only that she wishes she had chosen another name. Because Starr Bright... is a shorter work, one does wonder if she has relegated certain efforts to Rosamund to distance them from Joyce Carol Oates. While I was thoroughly engrossed by Starr Bright - and it does utilize one of JCO's favorite underlying themes of twins - I felt I needed more at the end. We are fairly certain of the killer's fate, but what of her twin sister? The far-reaching effects of the murders to her family and community would, no doubt, be devastating. Perhaps it is fodder for another novel or perhaps tying up loose ends into neat little conclusions is not in the JCO style. Also, Oates does not hold back in the gruesome details of each attack - not necessarily a criticism, just a point of fact. Oates has just completed another novel (she writes constantly) and this one is a 1400 page opus titled Blonde, inspired by the life of Marilyn Monroe. She says she was moved to write it when she saw a photo of the pretty, fresh-looking and former Norma Jean - before the blonde hair, sexy clothing and voluptuous attitude she had perfected toward the camera. Seems like an interesting turn for JCO and her fans.

Hard to tell why Oates published this one under her fakename--I can see that the opening scenes owe a phrase or seven to themystery (thriller?) genre and that she's skimping a bit on character development. Compare this to, say, "Them" or "You Must Remember This" and, yes, we're not talking the woman's best, but this is still superb writing, especially in the second half... As the NY Times review proclaims this IS virtuoso stuff, particularly in the way that Oates/Smith delineates the attraction of the good sister and the bad sister for the hapless husband--Not only was he confused, I was confused. I find this suspenseful, elegantly written and a good bit better than some of Oates's "serious" efforts such as "Man Crazy" or "The Assasins." Indeed, the book's final page, brief and tantalizing as it is, suggests that her effort all along was far more provocative than she lets on. We're talking the delineation of personality here, in all its profundity and difficulty--a typical Oates obsession, and almost as well-handled here as in "Marya: A Life" and "Do With Me What You Will" if not "Because it is Bitter..." or "Wonderland". Enjoyable reading that, if you will let it, provokes a thought or two as well.

Starr Bright. She's a twin. She's a stripper. She's an exotic dancer. She's a grifter. And she is a full blown serial killer in this deep dark novel. Starr Bright a/k/a Sharon is now aging for a future on the jiggle circuit and her exhaustive search for someone who can take care of her leads her to building rage and eventual violence to sooth her feelings of hurt and disappointment she blames on a series of hapless lowlife paramours. Starr begins a journey to take her out of the seedy empty Vegas life to the sanctity of her twin sister Lily and Lily's family in New York while leaving Vegas in the grip of her bloody wake. Lily, the "good" side of Starr's mirror welcomes her sister with open arms but has no idea what Starr has in store for those she believes set her on the road to ruin. Nor does Lily full understand what her own personality could reveal. This book is one of my very favorites, each word has been chosen soley for its effect on the reader and the story ebbs and flows as naturally as the tide. I tore through it the first time. It left such an impression on me I have picked it up a second time, this time to read much more slowly so I can enjoy each detail.

The Young Adult book field is not one that comes to mind when I think of the body of Joyce Carol Oates'work. Yet here it is from the prolific Oates, "Big Mouth and Ugly Girl."
BMUG chronicles the high school and family life of Ursula Riggs(known to herself as "Ugly Girl") and Matt Donaghy (Big Mouth).
The plot is very simple and up-to-date newspaper headline-wise as Matt is accused of plotting to blow up his high school and Ursula, though heretofore not a friend of Matt's, comes to his rescue out of a sterling sense of "what is right."
Both Ursula and Matt suffer from what most of us suffered in high school: self-esteem problems, not feeling part of any group, hating our parents and siblings, etc.
Oates,being the master craftswman that she is, takes this rather tepid plot and fills it with telling details of both Matt's and Ursula's life after the accusation which sets the plot in motion:"It was like Matt had been wounded somwhere on his body he couldn't see, and the wound was visible to others, raw and ugly. When they looked at him, they saw just the wound. They weren't seeing Matt Donaghy any longer."
Under normal high school clique circumstances Matt and Ursula would have never made a connection. But through Ursula's sense of what is right and her acting upon it; and despite her parents objections, Ursula and Matt become a couple.
The moral of the story is simple but definitely needs restating to teenagers, but not only to teenagers, especially when it is restated in the glorious, tight and controlled prose of Joyce Carol Oates.
What Oates has done is pare down her gorgeous style to the bare minimum of words necessary to convey a mood, a thought or an emotion. What lessons and morals are to be learned can be easily picked off like so many berries off a tree. But in no way whatsoever does the storytelling seem didactic or obvious or over-simplified.
Joyce Carol Oates has fashioned a novel for teenagers brimming over with morality and resposibilty but has done it in a way that does not talk down to her specific audience. All of we Oates fans need not be wary of this book as it is wriiten on the highest level of craftsmanship and deserves a special place in the oeuvre of one of our finest contemporary writers.

Big Mouth Ugly Girl, written by Joyce Carol Oates, is an excellent book for high school students to read. In post-Columbine America, Matt Donoghy has been pulled out of class by police due to accusations of making remarks that he will blow up the school. Ursula Riggs, Ugly Girl as she calls herself, is the only person who does not believe the rumors and she ignores her parents strict instructions to not get involved. She comes forward and talks to the principal about what really happened. The story alternates between Ursula and Matt, who do not even know each other at school. Ursula is large framed and more interested in sports than most girls her age. She is having a tough time figuring out who she is. Matt is dealing with losing his friends and reputation. Throughout the book, Ursula and Matt work out their problems despite what others think.

The book Big Mouth and Ugly Girl is about two kids Matt Donaghy (big mouth) and Ursala Riggs (ugly girl). The whole story starts when Matt is taken out of study hall and finds out that someone has accused him of a bomb threat. Well he trys to tell them that it was not true but they don;t believe him so he is suspended from school for three days. Then Ursala Riggs heard the whole thing and told the principal and so the principal starts to beleive well then he get back to school nobody will talk to hi and his parents start a law suit. Then they start hanging out together ursala and Matt. Then there is another bomb threat but at this time Matt is in class and so they find out who it was but you have to read it to find out who.

An avid reader I have glanced at Joyce Carol Oates books in the past and something about the writing style has turned me away...The write up on Middle Age got my attention and though I started it hesitantly once it's 500+ grabbed me (which only took a chapter or two) I didn't want it to end. Each character was so deftly created and had some trait that set them completely apart from all the others - the woman with all the dogs which ended up being a bit of a disaster at the end...the relationships depicted between the children and their parents...All the characters went through major life quests and changes in this story which gives such a hopeful note to the human condition...and what about the mystery which still surrounded Adam at the end. One question I was left with at the end of the novel concerned Adam's sexuality - all the women were entranced/in love with him yet it seemed that he did not have a sexual relationship with any of them - was he gay? Because of my enjoyment of this novel I am jumping on the bandwagon and have We Were the Mulvaneys waiting in my pile to read.

Middle Age, as in all Joyce Carol Oates stories and novels, operates on many levels. I will, therefore, try to give an overall sense without overwhelming. For those who like their classic Oates, it is all here in a big sprawling novel, a moral tale that combines realism, with fable, fantasy, humor, and horror, and set in an upstate New York village. The central character, the much beloved Adam Berendt, dies in the first chapter, and the rest of the novel is consumed by getting at the mystery of who he really was and what he meant to his bereaved friends and neighbors.

The trick was to discover Adam by letting other characters speak for him. Since most, if not all, were almost irrationally taken with him, they may not be the most objective revealers, so finally I had a hard time taking their word that he was really that mesmerizing. However, as always, the writing is so brilliant and so original, so revelatory in other ways about human nature, about a tight claustrophobic community, the inspirational and the dark side of the human character, that it almost doesn't matter. One is willing to take it on faith.

Oates always love to surprise and she does so expertly as she weaves her spell with each of the characters. Ultimately, Adam Berendt must remain at least a partial mystery because he can't speak for himself, but it is his friends on whom he had this mysterious impact who will all confront life-challenging changes, or middle age crises as the case may be, before the novel's end, and about whom we really want to know more.

I worship Joyce Carol Oates. I am amazed by her insightfulness, by the complexity of her characters, and by the sheer quantity of her work. Her subjects range in class and income from the disgruntled marginal (FOXFIRE) to the seemingly contented middle class (WE WERE THE MULVANEYS) to the wealthy. MIDDLE AGE takes on the wealthy, excluding as she says in her preface, "(her) Princeton friends, who are nowhere in these pages."

Salthill-on-Hudson is a picturesque suburban village half an hour from Manhattan. It's residents are all beautiful, rich, and middle-aged. The only obvious misfit -- the mysterious sculptor Adam Berendt -- is a breath of fresh air in a stifling environment. His sudden half-heroic death while attempting to save a child from an overturned boat is a shock wave that reverberates through the community.

Those affected include sleek lawyer Adam Cavanagh who lies to save Adam's reputation, sculptress and book store owner Marina Troy to whom Adam bequests a second chance for an artistic life, smug Lionel Hoffmann bent on reclaiming his youthful vibrancy, fragile Camille whose life seems empty without the wandering Lionel, and crazed Augusta Cutler who is determined to make a new start.

Be prepared to laugh and reflect.