I love Thomas Hardy's characters because he allows them to be fallible, allows them to be unduly influenced by the rigid thinking of the time in which they live. They make bad decisions, and suffer for them, and we suffer along with them. How refreshing!

This book is incredibly rich, and there would be much to discuss in a class or book group. I actually think one of the most interesting characters is Alec d'Urbervilles. He is utterly contemptible, of course, but he goes through such changes in the book that he's fascinating to watch. A great bad guy.

Not surprisingly, Tess's and Angel's theme, the Double Standard one, shows up all over the place. I caught 3/4 of Sweet Charity on TV last night, remember that one with Shirley McClaine? Great dance numbers. She confesses her past in a fit of passion, and guess what happens? A scene certainly as heart-wrenching as the one in the crumbling d'Urbervilles mansion.

If you love classics, what are you waiting for? It's worth it, as are Hardy's other novels. If you are new to this sort of thing, reading it for a course or a class, you have a treat in store. Happy reading.

I'm many years out of college and thought I should start reading some more of the classics. Previous favorites of mine have been The Sound and the Fury, Jane Eyre, and Pride and Prejudice. I saw Tess of the D'Urbervilles on my sister's bookshelf and for about a year I considered reading it. Finally, I picked it up and began. Wow! I read it in about three days. I never expected I would feel so much by reading this book. I cried when she baptized Sorrow herself. Her concerns that he be buried in the churchyard and her efforts to ensure he was were touching. I wanted to help Tess Durbeyfield. I thought she was a very complex character--she was sweet and unworldly but she wasn't actually stupid. And she was strong in many ways--for example, her family relied on Tess for so many things--eventually even their support. In fact, I hated her family for not working harder and making their own sacrifices. All the burden was on poor Tess. I also wanted to shake some sense into Angel. He really did wrong by Tess--although he eventually realizes this, it comes too late. The only thing I really did not care for was the sudden inclusion of a minor character (who we met earlier)into the end of the book and the implication that she would play an important role in the future of a major character. I barely knew this minor character and NOBODY could compare to Tess of the D'Urbervilles. If you are reading this to find a good book, ignore the negative reviews by high-school students and buy this book NOW. It's unforgettable.

What a wonderful piece of literature, and quite a liberal (read: feminist) story for the time period it comes from! Not only are the characters well-drawn and utterly flawed (just like real humans) but the main plot reads as timeless.

The heroine (Tess) takes most of her life as it is thrown at her. When she finally decides to take some small measure of control of her fate, it is her very womanhood - and the lack of choice accompanying it - that is slapped back in her face.

A great love story in many respects, in the end the true love here is Tess' love of herself (and the reader's love for her), and her unwillingness to be a victim her entire life.

Thankfully, you'll find no happy endings in this book. What you will find is a story written by an early feminist, and characters that will stay with you forever.

I make it a point to read ZATAOMM every few years, and I also periodically pull my well-worn and page-marked copy off of the bookshelf to reflect on favorite passages. I gain some new insight into the story, and my own life, every time I flip through the pages. This is one of those novels that keeps ending up in my backpack (along with Walden and Blue Highways) when I go on weekend camping and road trips. The philosophical dialogue could be a little intimidating for some readers (especially near the conclusion), but a little slow reading and reflection works wonders. Reviewing the basic philosophies of Kant, Plato, and Decartes would not hurt, but is not really necessary for the first time through. The title has probably turned off many potential readers in fear of buying a book that spiritually explores maintaining a motorcycle. That isn't what the book is about, or is it? Actually, Pirsig uses the motorcycle as an ongoing analogy to the human thought process! . So, no previous knowledge of motorcycles is necessary. In fact, you might learn a thing or two about motorcycles, and yourself.

Despite the book's title, Pirsig's journey is primarily one through the history of Western philosophy, from the pre-Socratics through Plato, Aristotle, the 18th century empricists, and 19th century idealists. On this level alone, the book succeeds in being one of the most accessible and reliable treatments of the field. But the text is also a critique of the whole Western "logocentric" tradition, with its emphasis on reason, or "dialectic." Like Kant ("Critique of Pure Reason") or Kierkegaard ("Concluding Unscientific Postscript"), Pirsig uses reason to expose the limitations of reason. And what does he replace it with? Not Eastern mysticism or Zen riddles but rhetoric. More than the classic rhetoricians that Pirsig exhalts or the 20th-century structuralists and post-structuralists (Barthes, Derrida, Foucault) for which Pirsig's narrative is practically an illustration, "Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance" makes the case for language as the basis for all reality, for all that we think, experience and perceive. It's this conflict between dialectic and rhetoric that drives the narrative, realized in plain yet compelling prose that's capable of staying with the attentive reader for the rest of his or her lifetime. After reading the book twice, I was unable to look at the self, the world, at all things constructed by language in quite the same way. The least successful parts of the book, it seems to me, are the narrator's protracted discussions of the nature of "reality" as a moment inaccessible to human intellect and his somewhat naive, 1960's-style musings on the nature of "quality." Supposedly his English composition students were immediately able to know it when they saw it, thereby making it unnecessary for him as a teacher to talk about "standards" or to establish criteria. (The suspicion arises that Pirsig hasn't had a great deal of experience teaching students how to write.) Nevertheless, even when a cylinder occasionally misfires, this is a book worth reading carefully and more than once. Unfortunately, because of its "cult" status, many people seem to purchase the text but never finish it. Robert Redford owns the screen rights, but a reader would be ill-advised to wait for the movie version. The "visual" elements of the text--the motorcyle odyssey and troubled father-son relationship--are minor metaphors compared to the ambitious and largely successful intellectual quest.

If you are thinking of reading this book there are some things you should know right off. 1. This is not a book about Buddhism, or Zen. It explores the ways in which eastern philosophies can help western thinkers move toward Quality. 2. This book covers a lot of ground, very quickly and is not a philosophical textbook. If you don't know much about philosophy, this book will not change that fact, but it will make you question a lot of the assumptions you have made. 3. This book will change your life! This book is about Quality. If you have read the Tao Te Ching, you have already read a book which attempts to explain Quality. It is the unnamable, the One. Pirsig asks us to question whether science and logic can really bring us closer to the "Truth." Ever since Socrates began using the dialectic to try to discover Truth, humans have been on a quest to find it. The tool we use is known as scientific method. We have been using scientific method for a long time, and it has given us a lot of useful knowledge. It has not, however, brought us any closer to finding an absolute Truth, which is true for everyone everwhere. Quality is undefinable. It comes before thought, and before actions. Any attempt at describing it is useless, because as soon as you attempt to categorize it, you are only talking about one aspect of it. What Pirsig does in this book, is attempt to show us ways that we can use Quality in our lives. He calls his main character Phaedrus. Which comes from Plato's dialogue by the same name. Reading this dialogue will help you immensely in following the arguments he presents. Don't be fooled by this into thinking that Pirsig is a Platonist. Phaedrus was a Sophist, as is the Phaedrus in this book. Neither the historical Sophists, or Pirsig, buy into Plato's concept of absolute "Truth." If you are at all interested in the ideas of subjectivity and the influence of location (in time and space) as it relates to philosophical, religious and scientific claims, this book will greatly interest you. If you're a "post-modernist" you've probably already read this book, and if not, this book will help you to crystallize a lot of your objections to Modernism. If you feel that the world is becoming more and more empty and hollow, and think that part of your basic humanity has been stolen by alarm clocks, concrete, automobiles, and (can I say it?) computers, this book may help you in finding the Quality that resides within technology, yet is so often ignored by those who wield technology like a biological weapon. If you've ever thought that the whole world was crazy, and want to learn more about what really makes a person "insane," you should know that this book is written from the perspective of an insane man. If you are searching for answers, this book will give you a few more questions, and help you realize that life is about the questions, not the answers!

This book bit. I got this book thinking, "hey, Heinlein!" but it appears after reading that I should have been thinking, "hey, shoot me!" There is no plot to this novel--the grand resolution is that super-sexy courier Friday becomes a primitive farmer. At first Friday seems to be on a mission; she seems to matter, but when she's ordered on a vacation she proves herself a true overworker by forgetting that she even has a job and goes gallavanting across future Earth in many boring and trashy escapades. Friday doesn't have a story--though Heinlein tries every once and a while to pretend it's so; it's just one long vague, boring, orgy. There seem to be elements of Heinlein's better books in Friday--the Beanstalk, Luna City, and the mysterious organization that Friday works for (for a little while, at least). But don't read this book for them--read the OTHER books like Stranger in a Strange Land, The Moon is a Harsh Mistress, Starship Troopers, Tunnel in the Sky (the point is that there are others!)...Friday isn't worth your time because it's completely pointless. You care about the character because Heinlein is (to some extent) a master, but when you get right down to it, she doesn't DO anything except fornicate! There are many better books out there, and there are even better Heinlein books out there, so read them instead of yet another addition to the brain-dead pile.

If you've read Heinlein before and liked what you saw, Friday is a fun tale following the path of a genetically engineered courier / secret agent. It's an entertaining read, just the thing for taking a step away from the here and now for a while.

If you're unfamiliar with Heinlein, a warning might be in order. Heinlein has been called a misogynist or a lech by some, and this novel is an example of his work that might prompt such an assessment. At several points the story voices the author's attitudes about sex and gender relations. (A blurb on the back from the New York Times Book Review reads: "... she can think better, fight better and make love better than any of the normal people around her.") A quote from one of the principal characters sums up what seems to be Heinlein's view: "Geniuses and supergeniuses always make their own rules on sex as on everything else; they do not accept the monkey customs of their lessers." To be sure, this element does not dominate the story, but some might find it to be a turn off. I prefer to believe that Heinlein simply refused to constrain his imagination to technological visions of the future.

There are people who proclaim this as their favorite Heinlein book above all others . . . and I can see that simply based on the narrator, spunky Friday. She's earnest, loving, sensitive, just looking for a family and a need to belong. However, it's sure not mine. I liked it sure but after reading several other late period Heinlein novels I just got struck with a feeling that I've seen this before. The good stuff first: Friday is a courier working for an organization where she doesn't know what they do or why they do it . . . she's also an "artifical person" essentially genetically engineered and there's this weird prejudice against APs for some bizarre reason, since you obviously can't tell them apart. Sort of like the X-Men, the nornal looking ones at least. And that's pretty much it. The book starts out with something resembling a plot but quickly dissolves into a meandering, if entertaining mess . . . all showcasing what Heinlein must have thought as the perfect world. And in his perfect world there is sex. Lots of it. And it's obviously a perfect world from the mind of a male because every woman is bisexual (and I mean every!), every male is heterosexual, everyone sleeps with everyone for really no good reason ("Hey, you're hot, let's have sex!" "Okay!"). Friday is gangraped in the beginning and really doesn't seem to care all that much. The plot becomes fairly episodic as Friday careens from one odd situation to the next with only the most tenuous connections linking them . . . the world Heinlein creates predates the rumblings of cyberpunk by a few years but it still feels too antiseptic . . . but plot twists come literally out of nowhere, and impossible coincidences abound, as well as absurdities (come on, every loyal enemy agent instantly switches sides because Friday asks them really nicely?). Somehow Heinlein manages to keep you reading, even as you can't fathom why Friday is doing the things she does, she says she wants to settle down but then goes back to work, and when she goes back to work she claims she wants to settle down. Even worse is Heinlein's obvious to do things simply for the sake of shock value, I'm not talking violence, I'm talking brash societal commentary that comes from literally nowhere, the character just makes his point and moves on, like a good little mouthpiece. Don't get me wrong, this is an entertaining book, except for the digressions into sex and love and why everyone should do it, most of it is at the very least interesting even as it's going nowhere. It's like watching a car just riding around a very small circular track, fun to watch for a while but eventually you want something to happen. The fact that he manages to make all of this coherent and readable attests to his genius, even if this isn't the best example of it. New readers might find some new stuff here but those of us who have been through Stranger in a Strange Land, The Moon is a Harsh Mistress, Time Enough for Love, and I Will Fear No Evil (especially that one!) will find that we've been here before and there's only so much you can say about a one note concept (free love) anyway before it gets tedious. But don't fret, new readers, the man has done better than this. Far better.

I agree with a previous reviewer that this book starts out great and seems to "bog down" about midway through. I think the reason is that at the time it was written, the ideas expressed in the book were much more controversial and, well, new. Today I think we reach a point in the book where it just feels the author is making a big deal about nothing. ooooh free love, clothes disappearing, refusal to play by the "rules of society", these ideas have been beaten to death by this point. I'm not sure if I'd call this sci-fi so much as social commentary.

Much has been written about Heinlein's ideological purpose but for this review, I am going to ignore it and focus solely on the book, on merits. A caveat: keep in mind this book was published in the 1960s so adjust your time context accordingly.

The vanilla science fiction tool is to stage human encounters with aliens and then play out the interaction. In a twist, Heinlein has a pseudo-alien look at humans. Valentine Michael Smith (VMS), though human, has grown to adulthood in such alien circumstances as to be effectively an outsider with no experience of human beings or Earth. The circumstances of his growing up on Mars and learning his unusual abilities are glossed over in the book as they are but a device: the focus is humans as they appear to this star-child.

And childlike he is indeed, in the best sense of the word as he tries his level best to understand the human systems of religion, superstition, social customs and so on. You do not need to agree with Heinlein's views (some of which are pretty dated and annoying) to appreciate this look in the mirror. Just as a child's favorite question is "why?", so too VMS encounters human relationships, the seamier side of organized religion, the numerous taboos and fears of humanity and asks "why?". The enchanting part of this is that the "why?" is not judgmental but only an attempt to understand.

Sure, the book can be annoying at times when Heinlein gets carried away and the ending is in many ways a contradiction to the rest of the book. For all that, this is not a book to be missed. The best way to approach this book is neither as science fiction nor philosophy. Enjoy the story without reading between the lines, but do learn to ask "why?" yourself, just as VMS does.

If you have read Frank Herbert's "Dune," you will probably find that this novel by Robert Heinlein is very similar. Both revolve around Messiantic characters who upheave the societites they live in. However, Heinlein's novel is more lighthearted and humanizing than the often cold and aloof style of "Dune." Many people have commented on the odd medley of beliefs in Heinlein's novel: he espouses open sexuality, communism, nudism, and religious tolerance, but compares women to "cherished housepets," and rails against the "wrongness" and "tragic inbetweenness" of homosexuality. His views may seem contradictory, but after all, it was written in 1961, when America was breaking away from old beliefs and struggling for a new identity - a time, in other words, of many contradictions. "Stranger in a Strange Land" simply reflects this transition from the family values and Red Scares of the Fifties to the Flower Power of the Sixties. Everybody, conservative or liberal, will find something in this book that is personally offensive. Read it anyway. It is a fascinating tale and an inciteful allegory.

A timeless classic, written by Robert Louis Stevenson was a great book for those of us who like adventure. The book begins at the Admiral Benbow Inn, which Jim Hawkins, the main character works. Suddenly, from out of the blue a rough sea faring man appears named Billy. That is when the real adventure begins!! Jim and his mother find a treasure map in a dead customers sea trunk. Jim got a couple of respectable people together and they bought a ship named the Hispaniola and set of sail for Treasure Island, not knowing the problems that lay before them. I think the author wanted the them to be, be careful whom you trust. I fully enjoyed this book and I think you will too. To find out the rest read, Treasure Island by Robert Louis Stevenson.

"Treasure Island," written by the 19th century novelist, Robert Louis Stevenson, is the timeless story about life on the high seas with pirates, treasure, murder, and treachery.

When young and naive Jim Hawkins is given a treasure map from the mysterious old pirate, Billy Bones, adventure and trouble are not far behind. Soon Jim finds himself aboard a ship with a villainous crew led by the cunning and mendacious pirate, Long John Silver. Greed and the lust for gold driving the pirates, they have murder in mind when they reach the dubious Treasure Island.

Skillfully yet simply written, Robert Louis Stevenson gives us an alluring tale that sparks the imagination. With its dastardly plot and mothly crew of rogues and villains, it entrances the reader, and keeps them wanting more. "Treausure Island" is the perfect read for anyone just wanting a good, exciting story.

Treasure Island by Robert Louis Stevenson is by far one of the best adventure stories I have ever read. This book deserves all five stars, it has everything you could ask for such as, suspense, comedy, action, drama and a great plot line. R.L. Stevenson puts a lot of detail into his main characters such as Long John Silver and Jim Hawkins just to name a few. He describes the scenes with such great detail that at times I had to remind myself that it is only a book. I spent more than 2 months reading this book and I enjoyed every part of it. I could RARELY find a paragraph that was dull, the book was very exciting overall. This book is fairly easy to read and I would recommend it to adults and children of all ages. The book moves at a very good pace, not too fast, not too slow. This book is anything but boring, something new happens in every chapter for instance, when Jim witnesses a murder and when he gets into bar fights, those are just some of the many things that happened. I was very surprised myself when I read this book because it seems a little childish but in fact it's quite the contrary. I highly recommend that you go out and read this book!

***3.5 stars***

Just when it looked as if the Wheel of Time series was going nowhere and no longer worth reading, Jordan comes back with the entertaining Lord of Chaos. Plenty of problems persist -- Jordan's not much of a writer, it's too long, and some of the characters are caricatures -- but enough things are improved over the previous two volumes to make the book recommendable. One of the best changes is that Jordan brings back the bad guys. A problem with recent books, IMO, was that Jordan didn't spend nearly enough time on the activities of the evil powers in the world that he created, and little of their plotting was revealed. SciFi/fantasy books need good villains to succeed, and considering how unlikeable or boring most of the good guys are most of the time, Jordan needs to keep the evil-doers present in order to generate interest, and he does it here. Furthermore, Rand has finally emerged here as an interesting character. He's nothing like the Rand of the first two books, and I guess that's the point. Anyway, Jordan has found a way to make Rand a sort of haunted, complex anti-hero type, and this measurably improves all of the chapters in which he appears. Also, unlike the previous two books, this one gets back to good plotting, good pacing and creating a sense of unity. In other words, after reading Lord of Chaos, you actually feel like you read a book instead of 1000 pages containing randomglimpses of something much bigger. Sure, ther was a 200-250 page section of bloat in the middle of the book where things started to bog down and began to lose my interest, but everything picked up again and moved toward a very exciting climax.
I do wish that Jordan wouldn't be so obvious in his "twists" and be subtle about such things. I mean, the whole idea of Mazrim Taim and the Ashaman is a really good one, but the prologue gives away what is actually going on, and this is really too bad. Jordan does this all the time, and you wonder if he is either really underestimating his audience, or just doesn't know how allow such things to develop naturally and without undue clues. (In case you haven't figured out one of his techniques, 90% of the time that a character vehemently denies something, you know it will actually happen later on).
Still, this is a pretty good book, and is good enough to be considered on the same level as books 2 and 3, IMO.

I am thoroughly impressed by the Wheel of Time series that Robert Jordan has written. His characters are round and full, his plot is thick and covers thousands of years of events. He conclusively proves his story with events in history. He makes it clear that what is happening to Rand, Mat, and Perrin has happened hundreds of time over and will always continue to happen is their reality. I wish this series would cover twenty books because I can't get enough. I wanted to scream when I finished the fourth book and didn't have the fifth book to read. And curse Amazon for not making it easier to ship books to APOs from their online order form. Robert Jordan is truly a master!

The Wheel of Time in general isn't an easy read. On the contrary, the length of this saga and its complexity often intimidates and repels people. However, I have never read anything nearly as engrossing and absolute as the Wheel of Time books: it is the complete reading experience. In a world where it often seems that nothing of interest ever happens to us, one may find in these books friends for life, and actually feel as if he is sharing their experiences, their strife and their innermost thoughts. Lord of Chaos, the six in the series, very much epitomizes this element. Though it's almost a thousand pages long (on paperback, at least), not much actually happens in this book, but it builds a wider base to understand the characters, their world, their enemies and the dangers they face, including those they are oblivious of. Furthermore, this book sheds light on the foundations of future eventualities in later books. The reader finds himself even more attached to the characters and the world they inhabit. He is also subjected to great stress, as this book builds a lot of tension. And then, at the last three hundred pages or so, all hell breaks loose. All in all, this book is long and relatively noncommunicative, at least at the beginning, and I wouldn't recomend it to anyone who hasn't read the previous five books of the series, but the bottom line is, it's a fabulous book, and I couldn't lay my hands off it once I started reading it.

I have not read any other books by Nora Roberts. Reaching for a book to read while I was trapped in a car on a roadtrip, I remembered a favorable blurb in the newspaper and grabbed Carolina Moon. Soon I was engrosed in the story of Tory Bodeen and her quest to return to her hometown to confront the ghosts from her past. The white trash Bodeens had been tenents of the Lavelle family and young Tory's friendship with Hope Lavelle was a source of joy for both children. a brutal act cuts short the life of Hope and sends Tory into hiding from her self and her feelings. Eventually, Tory realizes that she must confront the past in order to heal. She returns to Progress, the town of her childhood to delve out the secrets of the past. Once there she renews contact with the remaining Lavelle family and family members who still live in Progress. She also begins to trust and rely on a special gift that has always been a part of her. In the process of setting out to start a new life, she discovers love and a very real danger from her past which can destroy her. As the story caomes to an end,it almost seems too pat...be prepared. This was a really well paced book and I plan to look into other books by this writer.

I have read Nora Robert's books for the past 8 years or so, and am happy to report that I loved this book. Her characters were well developed, the plot very interesting and the ending was a little out of left field, I mean it kept me guessing. I really enjoyed the characters of Tory, Cade, Wade, Faith, and Iris. Hannibal was really scary as Tory's father. Those of you who haven't read it yet, please stop here. I thought the end was anticlimatic at first but then the real ending was a bit of a surprise. This book reminds me of Nora's earlier masterpieces such as Carnal Innocence, Divine Evil and True Lies. Of her series romances I enjoyed the "Born in..." series. However, I haven't had the urge to read the others. I tend to enjoy her novels that stand alone rather than those in a series. Overall this book was quite engaging and I really enjoyed it. Neither diehard Nora fans nor new readers will be disappointed in this book.

I've always been able to depend on Nora Roberts for an entertaining story, but her latest works have been top of the line storytelling at it's best. Carolina Moon is a bit more gritty and earthy than some of her prior novels. It's a well rounded read, filled with complex characters and intense plot lines. Tory, the heroine, is quite engaging, not a simpering southern belle, but a deep individual coming to terms with her past as well as looking towards her future. Cade, as the understanding hero of the book, is not just a spoiled rich boy, but a man who tries his best to be a fair person in a climate where right isn't always the most popular course to follow. With supporting characters that are just as interesting as the leads, this book is a can't-put-down kind of story, with nail-biting intensity. It's Nora Roberts at her best!

This novel is about a young girl named Isobelle Lingard, "Izzy", who must pay consequences for a choice she makes. Izzy is a cheerleader and very popular amongst her school. However, her life changes after she suffers severe injuries in a car crash caused by a drunk driver. It takes a girl, Rosamunde, to make Izzy accept what has happened to her. Rosamunde will not let Izzy feel different from anyone else and will not let her be pitied. Izzy comes to know what her real friends are like and she makes a great friend. Because of Rosamunde, Izzy was given the courage to return to school and face her friends and peers that she was once afraid and embarrassed to be seen by. She was afraid of being different and not looking as pretty as everyone pictures her to be. The author wrote this book sending out a message of what can happen with drinking and driving. It is a great message that should be sent out especially to teen-agers. We are forced to pay consequences of our own actions. The author uses literary devices such as foreshadowing and symbolism. The author's overall theme is to be careful of the decisions we make. Our actions can not only affect ourselves, but also the people we are surrounded by. Drinking and driving is a major problem that people are faced with today. Hopefully reading this book will make teenagers, as well as adults, realize that our stupidity can hurt the ones we love most.

Izzy, Willy-Nilly is a good, thought-provoking book directed to high school students. It deals with issues that teenagers face everyday, including drunk-driving, friendship, and indifference. Izzy, Willy-Nilly is about a sophomore in high school, Izzy, who accepts a date with a senior, Marco. They go to a party and Marco drinks too much. On the drive home, they crash into a tree. Although Marco recieves minor injuries, Izzy loses a leg, and her life is changed forever. At 15, Izzy was the pretty, popular cheerleader from a rich family, but the accident changes everything. Her friends and family start treating her differently, and everywhere she goes people stare at her. She is no longer the once popular cheerleader, but the object of everyone's pity. Through hard work and perseverence, Izzy learns to cope and adjust to her disability. This book is definitely for every high school student to read. I could relate to many of the issues discussed in this book. This book totally made me think about how lucky I am to be healthy and fit.

Like other books of author Cynthia Voigt, is directed at teenage readers. I read it for the first time at the age of 15, but having just revisited it at the age of 25, I found it just as enchanting as the first time I read it. The main character of the story is 15 year-old, high school sophomore Isobel, or Izzy. One night, against her better judgement, Izzy accepts a ride after a party from a senior named Marco, who has been drinking. Marco loses control of the car, and Izzy loses her leg above the knee as a result. The rest of the novel is the story of how Izzy deals with the loss of her leg, status, and friends. It is also the story of how Izzy learns new ways to relate to her family, learns more about herself, and makes a new friend who supports her. is an inspirational book in so many ways. It carries a potent message about the dangers of irresponsible driving. It is also among the few books that portrays a disabled person as a complete person, and not just as a stereotype. Voigt's writing is expressive, insightful, and comprehensive. I highly recommend this book to anyone who is interested in stories about personal growth and transformation, or in stories that feature a disabled protagonist. It is a wonderful book.

This story takes place in Harlem ,New York in the slums of the
projects. A young black male named Alfred Brooks faces peer
pressure, trust, and the desire to win. Alfred dropped out of high
school and start to work at the Epstiens. The Epstiens store is a
family business of a white, Jewish, and rich family. Alfred has
been best friends with James who is starting to hang around with
the wrong crowd. James is into drugs and alcohol. Alfred Brooks
has an aunt who took him in after his father left and his mother
died. He calls her Aunt Pearl. His friend Henry told him about a
gym called Donatelli's Gym. Alfred decided to see what he could
do to become a boxer. Once in the gym, Alfred meets Mr.
Donatelli who is the owner of the gym. Mr. Donatelli is a white
and experienced trainer in boxing. Mr. Donatelli helped Alfred to
discover his goal in life. Alfred will have to get up and run each
morning and eat healthy meals. Even though he knew it would be
tough he was up for the sacrifice and hard work. Alfred didn't
explain to Aunt Pearl his decision to become a boxer. Each
morning when she asked where he was going he just said 'I'm
going running.' Even after she found out that he was boxing she
didn't get mad because she remembered when her parents wouldn't
allow her to follow her dream. Major on the other hand bullied
Alfred and others around. Major has two sidekicks named Sonny
and Hollis. In the middle of the book Sonny and Hollis, along with
Major, jumped and beat Alfred. Major talked Sonny, Hollis, and
James into robbing the Epstiens store. The police came but only
one of them got caught in the robbery. Later on in the book the
suspense ends and we find out that James is the one that got
caught. Major haunts Alfred for the rest of the book. After three
ametuer fights in the ring Donatelli suggested that Alfred stop
boxing. Alfred took his advice and contemplated on what to do.
After talking to his cousin Jeff, Alfred decided to quit boxing and
go back to school and work with the children in the community.

The Contender, even though it didn't seem like a book meant for a girl, caught my attention. The style of Robert Lipsytes Writing makes you feel like you are actually there in the story and interacting with the characters. You can visualize the Robbery at the Epsteins' store. You can smell the musty air in Donatelli's gym. I would reccomend this book to teenagers. I don't think that adults would enjoy it as much, because I don't think that it would be as easy for them to relate to what the main character, Alfred Brooks, is feeling. Under the age of 11 or 12 probally wouldn't understand the meaning of the book, or maybe they would but wouldn't be able to get the full experience of the reading because they can't feel what Robert Lipsyte was expressing. Overall, The Contender was full of fun suprises, and dreary times. I suggest you read this book!

Do you like books with action? Gangsters? How about a book where good people go bad? A book packed with crime and temptation? Well, then this is the book for you. This book is about a kid who quits school, parents die, and his best friend joins a gang. When he is asked to help break into a store that he works for, he realizes that his friend and his gang are not for him. So the main character, Alfred tries to find a purpose to his life. He hears that his best friend James used to box. Alfred decides to give it a shot, and meets the manager. And Alfred finds that there's something special about this person, this Donatelli (Donatelli is the manager of the gym). He tells Alfred to become a contender, and leaves Alfred to figure out what that means. On Alfred's journey, he encounters James' gang, as well as temptation of popcorn, fries, and soda. When Alfred finally becomes a contender, he finds a purpose to his life, and helps James become good again. To find out the details and what a contender is, read Robert Lipsyte's book, The Contender. Six stars out of five! Two thumbs and one finger up!

I Am the Cheese is a psychotic thriller placed in the late 1900's in New England. The story is about a teenager named Adam Farmer who leads the reader on a journey to uncover his own hidden past. Cormier transitions well between the views of the story. In one view, Adam is riding his old bike from Monument, Massachusetts to Ruttenburg, Vermont to visit his father in the hospital and give him a secret gift he had brought with him. The other view is that of Adam doing interviews with a psychiatrist who is trying to help him remember what happened in his shady past. Another unusual part of the story is that Cormier often leaves the reader unsure of the events transpiring because the story is told from a backwards point of view. This means that the readers must use their intelligence to try to sort the events out. This can also be a negative because it isn't a book that should be taken up for pleasure reading because the confusion may be too much to handle along with the story's often depressing plot. Another downside is the story's setting. Cormier has Adam riding his bike on his way to Vermont for almost the entire book. In conclusion, despite the negatives, I Am the Cheese still may appeal to the kind of reader who likes to figure things out for themselves.

Robert Cormier's I Am the Cheese is a story about the literal and figurative journey of 14-year-old Adam Farmer to discover his true identity. I Am the Cheese is complicated in structure and plot; the reader must infer the truth behind Adam's journey to discover his past as well as his bike trip to Rutterburg, Vermont. As his journey (and the book) progress, Adam (and the reader) try to piece together the fragments of a traumatic past that Adam cannot recall and a present he does not understand. The story is told in way that parallels Adam's mind in that the past and present are woven together through multiple story lines, with some details being true and other parts being fantasy. This makes the text complicated and confusing. Adding to the complexity of the text is Cormier's use of metaphores and foreshadowing and the fact that little bits of reality are sometimes mingled with fantasy. Also, the story line is hard to follow because the blanks in Adam's memory create corresponding gaps in the story for the reader. I highly recommend this book to anyone who enjoys a complicated and mysterious plot.

Visualize yourself uncovering the startling truth that your life has been a series of deceptions, fueled by the very people you thought were your allies. Your real identity has been a lie, kept a secret for fourteen years. Suddenly your way of life is filled with contempt and there is no one in whom you can put your trust, perhaps not even yourself. These are the thoughts that dwell in Adam Farmer's mind.

Adam Farmer is the main character on a bicycle with the urgent objective of reaching the hospital where his father seemingly is residing. Chapters alternate between Adam on his bike, and puzzling taped conversations between what appear to be a doctor and a confused man or boy.

The tape conversations are conducted in a curious manner, with the doctor-like character searching for something in his interrogations, and the mystery person constantly being agonized by headaches and weariness. The person is lost, can't remember any of his past, and doesn't know why he is being questioned. He doesn't know who to trust, or who not to trust, including the enigmatic doctor.

On his bike, Adam meets with a large variety of people, from a gas station attendant to a very troublesome boy and his gang. However, Adam is consistently intent on getting to his father, and seems to be blind to all other happenings. His only goal is to reach the hospital.

The two worlds of Adam's bicycle travel and mysterious conversations come together at the end of the book and clash violently. The sad secret of Adam Farmer's life is revealed, and the mysterious doctor's identity and intentions are unveiled.

I Am the Cheese is a shocking story of the barbarism of modern-day government, espionage, lies, and concealed identities. A thrill is waiting around every corner for the adventurer who dares to read this book. A New York Times Outstanding Book of the Year, Winner of the 1997 Phoenix Award and a School Library Best Book of the Year, I Am the Cheese undoubtedly will be remembered by its reader.