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26th out of 131 books
—
58 voters
Cage of Stars
The author of "The Deep End of the Ocean" delivers a compelling, emotionally charged tale of tragedy, revenge, and redemption. Twelve-year-old Veronica Swan's idyllic life in a close-knit Mormon community is shattered when her two younger sisters are brutally murdered. Although her parents find the strength to forgive the deranged killer, Scott Early, Veronica cannot do th...more
Hardcover, 289 pages
Published
August 1st 2009
by Warner Books
(first published May 1st 2006)
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Mar 29, 2008
Ryan
rated it
3 of 5 stars
Recommends it for:
Mormons & non
Recommended to Ryan by:
HCPL
So I only read this book b/c it was available at our public library on Audio CD. And it was about Mormons. Well, the protagonist is Mormon, and it's fairly obvious that, unlike Jack Weyland books, this one is not intended for an LDS audience, b/c Jacquelyn Mitchard goes to great lengths to explain the Mormon church.
And she does an okay job, though there are some funny things that she gets wrong:
(1) There is a temple in Cedar City.
(2) The home teachers are a married couple.
(3) When the temple-mar...more
And she does an okay job, though there are some funny things that she gets wrong:
(1) There is a temple in Cedar City.
(2) The home teachers are a married couple.
(3) When the temple-mar...more
5 likes · like · see review
view all 3 comments
Aug 11, 2008
Alexandra
rated it
4 of 5 stars
Recommends it for:
anyone whose not afraid to cry while reading a book
I bought this book completely unaware it had anything to do with my faith and fell pray to judging a book by its cover (we've all done it) but it looks like I picked a good one. When I read the first page I almost shut it and took it back to the bookstore but I'm happy I gave it a chance and kept reading. This is not an Anti-mormon book and the author surprised me by actually writing a moving story about an lds girl that is actually almost realistic. She took time to understand the lds faith and...more
Twelve-year-old Ronnie Swan’s life, as she knew it, came to an end when her two younger sisters were brutally murdered by deranged killer Scott Early. Instead of the judge sentencing him to life in prison, he sentences Early to three years letting psychiatrists and psychologists learn from Early’s schizophrenia. Though Ronnie’s parents come to forgive Early, Ronnie doesn’t. She remains in her own prison plotting revenge. Cage of Stars is an excellent read on learning to let go and how to forgive...more
1 like · like · see review
Unrealistic, repetitive, and very uneven. The build-up takes forever and then the climax and dénoumént pass in a flash, and none of it leaves much of an impact. The plot, characters, and details are not at all believable. I guess it might make for a nice, frothy, feel-good read if you like that kind of thing, but it's a literary lightweight.
I did feel a little browbeaten by the repeated references to Mormonism, although maybe not as much as some people. I'm a Quaker; people have all sorts of wei...more
I did feel a little browbeaten by the repeated references to Mormonism, although maybe not as much as some people. I'm a Quaker; people have all sorts of wei...more
3 likes · like · see review
I enjoyed this book. The main characters in it are Mormon, it's set in a small southern Utah town, and it's written by a non-Mormon author, so that was interesting. She got a lot of things about LDS beliefs right, though not everything. The story itself starts out being kind of tough to read with a terribly sad crime committed, and the ensuing tale is about the main character's quest for either revenge or forgiveness (she really wants revenge). So even though it was hard to read at first, it got...more
I read all the time (and don't even put a portion of the books I read on here), but mostly it's silly YA books that are fast paced and short. That's often my preferred kind of book because I can read it quickly and just enjoy it. However, every so often I like to read something more serious and thought-provoking. My wife brought this book home from a book fair at her school. What attracted me to it was that it is about an LDS family, but it is not written by an LDS author. It is about a girl who...more
This book begins in a small Mormon community in southern Utah with the murder of two young girls. Their older sister travels through her grief in a way that involves the reader to the point where it is almost unbearable, though mercifully softened by incidents with friends and family that sustain the character and the reader. Jacquelyn Mitchard's great gift is portraying the emotions of people in situations few of us think we could survive. There are points in the plot where I can't quite see wh...more
The Swans are Mormons, living a simple, fulfilling life in rural Utah. Twelve year old Ronnie is playing hide and seek with her two younger sisters, but when they fail to search for her, Ronnie faces a horrific scene; the little girls have been brutally murdered. Cage of Stars is narrated throughout from her perspective. The first half recounts the family's plunge into a year bottomless grief. With the passage of time, her parent decide they must forgive the killer before they can move on, but R...more
Cage of Stars by Jacquelyn Mitchard was an average book. I chose to read this book because my English Comp. instructor assigned it to me and it seemed like a good book. The book takes place in a small close-knit community in Utah. Veronica, the main character, lives with her family in the country. Veronica is a dynamic character.She is very caring and she always helps her family. However, Veronica is faced with the hardship of her two sisters being murdered.
Her incandescent attitude has a posi...more
Her incandescent attitude has a posi...more
I read Cage of Stars. I was assigned this book in a reading class in high school.
This book takes place in an idyllic close knit community in the Utah mountains. The main character is Veronica, or Ronnie, she is Mormon. She is very smart and an amazing basketball player and obliterated every other team at the beginning of the book. Throughout the book many things about her change and her outlook on life. In the book she is faced with many obstacles. It all starts when she finds her two little si...more
This book takes place in an idyllic close knit community in the Utah mountains. The main character is Veronica, or Ronnie, she is Mormon. She is very smart and an amazing basketball player and obliterated every other team at the beginning of the book. Throughout the book many things about her change and her outlook on life. In the book she is faced with many obstacles. It all starts when she finds her two little si...more
I think the author did a fantastic job with the story line. She handles a horrifying subject without gratuitous gore or sensationalism. She does a magnificent job showing emotional aftermath of a horrible crime. You really believe you are in the mind of the main character. That said there was one big problem that seriously detracted from my enjoyment of and wholesale immersion in the book.
I am a member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Days Saints (Mormons). I hardly recognized my religio...more
I am a member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Days Saints (Mormons). I hardly recognized my religio...more
This is the second book I 'checked out' from the library on my Kindle. So much better than the first but that is another story. I would have given this one 3 stars for the humor factor but I am so stingy about stars and feel the only reason I would recommend this book would be because it is so hillariously inaccurate.
The author, not LDS, writes about an LDS family who goes through a terrible tradgedy where two of their children are killed. The parents eventually decide they need to forgive the...more
The author, not LDS, writes about an LDS family who goes through a terrible tradgedy where two of their children are killed. The parents eventually decide they need to forgive the...more
Nov 24, 2010
Diane Ferbrache
rated it
3 of 5 stars
·
review of another edition
Shelves:
family-stories,
religious-theme
Ronnie lives in rural Utah with her family -- Mom, Dad, and sisters Becky and Ruthie. They have an idyllic life, loyal in their LDS (Mormon) faith, until the unthinkable happens. Mentally ill Scott Early shows up one day and brutally murders Becky and Ruthie while 15-year old Ronnie is babysitting. There was nothing she could have done to stop him and no one blames Ronnie. In fact, following the tenents of their faith, her parents even forgive Scott, but that doesn't console Ronnie. After a coup...more
I thought this was a well written book. I enjoyed reading it. But it made me angry. Really angry that two little girls lives were taken away by a man who managed to get like a 5 year sentence and then go on to live his life and have his own children just becuase he had an illness. It wasn't his fault apprently, he didn't know what he was doing. It wasn't the fault of those little girls tho or their family either but they have to live with that for the rest of their lives and suffer a life senten...more
This is an interesting book to review. The story line is based on a young Mormon girl, Ronnie, living in Southern Utah. She is a witness to the murders of her two younger sisters and struggles with her feelings as her parents find it in their hearts to forgive. It is a mystery to many reviewers as to why the writer didn't have a Mormon from Southern Utah actually do some editing. Through the first two-thirds of the book the many pesky little errors become distracting. Although in another way, it...more
Type: {Airplane Read: makes time fly}
Rating: {I’m Lovin’ It: Very Entertaining!}
Why You’re Reading It:
You like reading about different kinds of people
Not knowing exactly what will happen keeps you on the edge of your seat
Unique plots keep you reading
You’re already a fan of Jacquelyn Mitchard’s
What I Thought:
Cage of Stars is one of those books that I tell everyone to read, and that no one listens to me about. Sorry are they to miss this entertaining story. Do I feel a little bad saying that a sto...more
Rating: {I’m Lovin’ It: Very Entertaining!}
Why You’re Reading It:
You like reading about different kinds of people
Not knowing exactly what will happen keeps you on the edge of your seat
Unique plots keep you reading
You’re already a fan of Jacquelyn Mitchard’s
What I Thought:
Cage of Stars is one of those books that I tell everyone to read, and that no one listens to me about. Sorry are they to miss this entertaining story. Do I feel a little bad saying that a sto...more
Jacquelyn Mitchard is one of my favorite authors. Her rise to fame after her first novel was featured as one of Oprah's early book club picks is almost as great a story as are each of the titles by her I've read. Another reason I like her is she is so down-to-earth. She seems like an ordinary person who hasn't allowed her fame to change her. I also feel an affinity because we were both once newspaper reporters.
Initially I wasn't excited about reading her latest book as it involved a gruesome mur...more
Initially I wasn't excited about reading her latest book as it involved a gruesome mur...more
Very beautiful, haunting story which explores the line between forgiveness/revenge, mental illness/sanity,caution/serendipity,and hope/despair. Set in the palatable communities of orange southern Utah and the sea foam of coastal California, I fell in love with each character who became 3+ dimensional to me , from the major to the most minor of characters.
Ironically, the gorgeous tone of the story begins with a parental/familial nightmare--the murder of two sisters while in the care of the thir...more
Ironically, the gorgeous tone of the story begins with a parental/familial nightmare--the murder of two sisters while in the care of the thir...more
Since I had read two other novels by Jacquelyn Mitchard, I had a good idea of what I would find in Cage of Stars: a good plot, and interesting, convincing characters who are confronted with a traumatic family crisis. What surprised me, though, was how strongly I related to the main character, Veronica (“Ronnie”) Swan, a home-schooled teenaged Mormon from rural Utah who carries out an elaborate plan to get revenge on a mentally ill man who murdered her two younger sisters. (Yes, you read that cor...more
Oct 09, 2008
☮Karen
rated it
3 of 5 stars
Recommends it for:
cindy
Recommended to ☮Karen by:
It was a b'day present from Dennis.
A young Mormon girl finds her 2 sisters in the process of being murdered, and spends her younger years trying to understand the man who commited the murder and how her parents could eventually forgive him. I have Mormon relatives but know very little about the religion, so was glad to get some insight on it. As the girl grew up, I empathised with her and her family. In the end, her faith helps her to come to terms, and she achieves happiness in her life.
Jan 15, 2010
Rosina Lippi
rated it
4 of 5 stars
·
review of another edition
Shelves:
fiction,
reviewed-here
There's a fiction subgenre that doesn't really have a name. The kind of novel I'm talking about isn't about romance or romantic love in the first line, though that may be one of the subplots. These are novels that examine the way families work, or fail to work, in the face of crisis. And I mean crisis in the bigger sense of the word. Divorce would be the least of the problems in this kind of book. We're talking accidental deaths, fatal illness, rape, murder, permanent disability, kidnapping, fel...more
It is hard to determine how I really felt about this book. I wanted to keep reading, but when I was finished felt unsatisfied. Cage of Stars is the story of a young Mormon girl, Veronica, who lives in a small town outside of Cedar City. After finding her little sisters brutally murdered, Veronicas world is turned upside down. Haunted by images of her sisters and their murderer leaves Veronica stuggling to resume her old life. Even more distressing, the girls parents choose to forgive the attacke...more
Veronica "Ronnie" Swan is 12 years old when she witnesses the murder of her two younger sisters. Her idealistic, picture perfect childhood is destroyed completely in that moment, for not only has she lost her sisters, she suddenly has to become the adult in the house. Her mother gives birth to baby brother Rafe just weeks after the death of the sisters and Ronnie has to spend the next year, until her mother can once again function through the grief, raising the baby.
This story of a child growing...more
This story of a child growing...more
I can’t decide what I feel about this book. I think I liked it. I think. The beginning was very slow for me. It felt very choppy in the way she was setting up the story. Mitchard did research the LDS religion enough to put the setting of the book in a Mormon community, but there were so many things that she got wrong or were just so-so in explaining that, as a Mormon myself, I found it kind of hard to read. Once she got into the actually telling of the story it got so much better. Half way in I...more
I liked reading this book. I really liked it for 3/4 of the book. True emotions around a horrific story. Did not get overly melodramtic. I had sympathy for all the sides and viewpoints. Thought- provoking and provcative.
(the following will give away the ending)
Then, suddenly, I remember feeling like I found the worm hole in a really good apple when Ronnie left home, and the jarring curve in the story line. Even the newly introduced characters seemed half baked and rushing toward some contrived...more
(the following will give away the ending)
Then, suddenly, I remember feeling like I found the worm hole in a really good apple when Ronnie left home, and the jarring curve in the story line. Even the newly introduced characters seemed half baked and rushing toward some contrived...more
I've gone back and forth between 4 and 5 stars on this book. It really was a good read. I enjoyed it immensely. It delves into the repercussions of faith, repentance and redemption of individuals and families after a tragedy. A twelve year old witnesses the murders of her two younger sisters and lives with the fallout with a plan of revenge. An interesting point is that this family is Mormon. Mitchard does a great job of portraying a normal Mormon family and does a good job of describing the fai...more
Este livro foi uma completa surpresa para mim. Não esperava tanto dele.
Para quem lê o resumo da história, esta parece muito trágica. E de facto é. Mas é também um livro sobre a revolta de Ronnie Swan com o assassinato das irmãs, ao mesmo tempo que tenta lidar com todas as emoções típicas de uma rapariga adolescente. É, simultaneamente, um livro sobre a procura da justiça e sobre o significado do perdão. Este livro mostra-nos os dois lados da questão: a mágoa, o sofrimento e a injustiça que Ronni...more
Para quem lê o resumo da história, esta parece muito trágica. E de facto é. Mas é também um livro sobre a revolta de Ronnie Swan com o assassinato das irmãs, ao mesmo tempo que tenta lidar com todas as emoções típicas de uma rapariga adolescente. É, simultaneamente, um livro sobre a procura da justiça e sobre o significado do perdão. Este livro mostra-nos os dois lados da questão: a mágoa, o sofrimento e a injustiça que Ronni...more
This book has been sitting on my shelf for some time. I received this book as a gift, and I didn't read it right away because the story summary didn't grab my attention.
However, once I started reading, I was taken with the story. A twelve year old girl witnesses the murders of her two younger sisters while she is babysitting them. In my opinion, I felt the book moved at exactly the right pace. I thought the descriptions and images of the grief were pretty accurate. There were many times through...more
However, once I started reading, I was taken with the story. A twelve year old girl witnesses the murders of her two younger sisters while she is babysitting them. In my opinion, I felt the book moved at exactly the right pace. I thought the descriptions and images of the grief were pretty accurate. There were many times through...more
I really didn't have the highest of expectations going into this book. I had read a couple of books by this author and really liked one and really disliked the other, so I wasn't totally sold that this was going to be great.
I ended up really liking it.
This is a story of a Mormon girl who is there when her two little sisters are murdered. A majority of the story takes place in her small town and explores how her family and her community deal with these horrible losses. This part of the book was...more
I ended up really liking it.
This is a story of a Mormon girl who is there when her two little sisters are murdered. A majority of the story takes place in her small town and explores how her family and her community deal with these horrible losses. This part of the book was...more
Ronnie, a twelve-year old living in a Mormon community, finds her two sisters brutally murdered during one of their hide and seek games. The murder itself is an act of madness, as the one who committed it lays immobile and unaware afterwards.
While part of Ronnie grows normally after the tragedy, with hormones awakening, and a heart ready to unfold to romantic feelings, specifically toward Miko, the son of a wealthy and non-Mormon family, there is that piece of her that is not only raw and wounde...more
While part of Ronnie grows normally after the tragedy, with hormones awakening, and a heart ready to unfold to romantic feelings, specifically toward Miko, the son of a wealthy and non-Mormon family, there is that piece of her that is not only raw and wounde...more
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Jacquelyn Mitchard’s first novel, The Deep End of the Ocean, was named by USA Today as one of the ten most influential books of the past 25 years – second only to the Harry Potter series by J.K. Rowling (but second by a long shot, it must be said.)
The Deep End of the Ocean was chosen as the first novel in the book club made famous by the TV host Oprah Winfrey, and transformed into a feature film p...more
More about Jacquelyn Mitchard...
The Deep End of the Ocean was chosen as the first novel in the book club made famous by the TV host Oprah Winfrey, and transformed into a feature film p...more
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“It was like a lucky pebble kept in my pocket that got so shined up from rubbing against the denim that no one could tell it had ever been an ordinary stone.”
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“Already there was black rain inside me.”
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