Time of Our Singing
by Richard Powers
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I read the first 100 or something pags of this yesterday and decided not to continue.
*does not panic*
*breathes*
Yes, I can start a book and not finish it! It hasn't happened very often, in fact, I can't remember that it ever happened, but I'm convinced I can do it. It also helps that this is my mothers book, so I can give it back to her and not be tempted.
Why don't I finish it?
Well, it's a very very long book. And in the first 100 pages, the im...more
I read the first 100 or something pags of this yesterday and decided not to continue.
*does not panic*
*breathes*
Yes, I can start a book and not finish it! It hasn't happened very often, in fact, I can't remember that it ever happened, but I'm convinced I can do it. It also helps that this is my mothers book, so I can give it back to her and not be tempted.
Why don't I finish it?
Well, it's a very very long book. And in the first 100 pages, the im...more
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Read in January, 2006
Every once in a while you'll get into one of those conversations with an acquaintance who thinks he or she is smarter than you in which you list a string of books you've read recently and authors you particularly enjoy. Invariably Michael Chabon's last name (shay-bawn) is mispronounced in these conversations.
If you want to win the next conversation like this you have, I highly recommend delving quickly and deeply into the urvruh of Richard Powers, who, despite never fully penetrating the u...more
If you want to win the next conversation like this you have, I highly recommend delving quickly and deeply into the urvruh of Richard Powers, who, despite never fully penetrating the u...more
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Read in May, 2008
Un Pavé! J'avais demandé à maman de m'amener de gros livres (vu la vitesse à laquelle je lis en ce moment) et ben celui là il est gros! Et bien!
Difficile d'expliquer l'histoire parcequ'elle n'est pas chronologique. Mais on découvre la vie d'une famille sur plusieurs génération. Une famille mixte, ya du blanc, du noir, du café au lait, du juif.
Une famille se démenant dans un contexte de ségrégation raciale et de lutte des noirs américains pour leurs droits.
Une famille qui est e...more
Difficile d'expliquer l'histoire parcequ'elle n'est pas chronologique. Mais on découvre la vie d'une famille sur plusieurs génération. Une famille mixte, ya du blanc, du noir, du café au lait, du juif.
Une famille se démenant dans un contexte de ségrégation raciale et de lutte des noirs américains pour leurs droits.
Une famille qui est e...more
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Read in April, 2006
anyone who loves music will appreciate this book. I found it a little difficult to get into at first, but really enjoyed it. it starts with the unlikely love story between a priviledged young black woman (whose father expects her to be a doctor) and a german inventor who meet at the washington monument the night marian anderson sang. they marry and have children, born in the 60s, who constantly struggle for acceptance. one has an incredibly beautiful voice, and would be the darling of any pro...more
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Read in June, 2007
The Time of Our Singing follows the musical career of one brother as told by another. It's a family drama spread over many decades from the marriage of the boy's parents (a German Jew and a black women who met while singing) and goes up to present day.
I liked the premise of the story and Richard Powers has a masterful control over his prose. Unfortunately, his chosen motif, music, is drawn out as an all-encompassing metaphor for all the problems and triumphs of the characters in the b...more
I liked the premise of the story and Richard Powers has a masterful control over his prose. Unfortunately, his chosen motif, music, is drawn out as an all-encompassing metaphor for all the problems and triumphs of the characters in the b...more
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Read in January, 2002
This is an amazing novel by Richard Powers. an ambitious generational tale of an American family with a mixed heritage of African-American and German Jew, and covers the travails, triumphs and tragedies of this family. There are three children, one with a beautiful singing voice who opts for a classical music career, a daughter who becomes involved with the civil rights struggle,and a second brother who, though gifted as well, buries his ambition to bridge the gap between his siblings. Not a per...more
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Read in April, 2008
I thought I would never finish this book. It has over 600 pages but beyond that it is not a "fast read." The storyline and ideas in the book are interesting, but the book moves along slowly, and each sentence seems over written. A good portion of the book is devoted to music terms and references, but with no reference for the layperson. With this kind of writing, the author assumes it's readers know and can understand a great deal, yet there are several instances where foreshadowing...more
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Read in November, 2007
recommends it for:
firds and bishes, birds and fishes.
I loved this-- it took over me for about a month.
This book is terrific on many levels-- family, success, difference, mediocrity, love, science, betrayal, power, death, secrets-- I felt I had to read it slowly, remembering every detail, internalizing the characters, and trying to imagine their songs.
This is coming from someone who knows nothing about classical music, one of the foundations of this book, and who probably wouldn't hear the purity of the voice described, beautifully, in s...more
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Read in February, 2008
More to say on this later after some more thought, hopefully. For now: it's totally consumed me. I read the last 100 pages or so until 3 in the morning despite being dead tired. Having just read Powers's The Echo Maker, I'd say this one seems to me more whole and absorbed me more fully, or the other way around. Like a vast timeless poem, it has me not knowing where to begin putting to words what it has done so well in its themes of race, music, and time. I do feel like it achieved the timelessne...more
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vom Buchrücken:
Richard Powers erzählt eine Geschichte voll Anmut und Schönheit über eine Familie mit zwei Hautfarben und einer Leidenschaft: Ein cinematographischer Roman über Amerikas jüngste Vergangenheit, über die Lüge, auf der seine Gegenwart baut, und eine einzigartige Liebeserklärung an die Musik.
...
Ich hab zwar daran gelesen ("ewig" heißt in meinem Wörterbuch 2-3 Wochen), was hauptsächlich daran lag, dass ich immer lang gearbeitet habe und nur spät abends ...more
Richard Powers erzählt eine Geschichte voll Anmut und Schönheit über eine Familie mit zwei Hautfarben und einer Leidenschaft: Ein cinematographischer Roman über Amerikas jüngste Vergangenheit, über die Lüge, auf der seine Gegenwart baut, und eine einzigartige Liebeserklärung an die Musik.
...
Ich hab zwar daran gelesen ("ewig" heißt in meinem Wörterbuch 2-3 Wochen), was hauptsächlich daran lag, dass ich immer lang gearbeitet habe und nur spät abends ...more
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This is a thick book that brought tears to my eyes repeatedly. When I was reading it I would stop to read sections out loud to whoever was with me and willing to listen. It is beautiful. But some friends have reported to me they thought it a bit dark. I found it moving, although a commitment to complete. I tend to abandon books if they don't keep my interest (so you'll probably never see me enter a rating lower than three stars - I simply don't finish books if I don't like them. A sign of my age...more
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Read in March, 2007
recommends it for:
my boss
I had a hard time finishing this book, because the ending was so good that I couldn't stop crying. Not because it was sad, but because it was so unbelievably good, and because I'd never before read a long book with an ending that lived up to its heft.
Seriously, it took me like half an hour to read the last few pages, because I kept flinging down the book and pacing around my apartment, sobbing hysterically.
Don't get me wrong, this book is not perfect, and it definitely falters in places....more
Seriously, it took me like half an hour to read the last few pages, because I kept flinging down the book and pacing around my apartment, sobbing hysterically.
Don't get me wrong, this book is not perfect, and it definitely falters in places....more
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First, to be honest, I didn't finish it. Not yet. It was my summer read, but I found it wasn't a good match for the type of summer I was having. It is/was an intense book, so much depth to the characters and story. Sometimes too much? I got halfway and felt like it just might have gotten more engaging around the corner - like maybe spending more time on a new(er) character (i.e. the sister). It was becoming too self-centered for me, centered on both J's. It is on the shelf to finish when I retur...more
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Read in August, 2008
recommends it for:
Vocal Music Buffs
If you are vocal music buff, and also are interested in physics, family dynamics, and race relations this book has it all. The story involves 3 generations of a mixed race family, and centers on 3 siblings. The characters are intense and passionate about every aspect of life.
The book is too long for the content, and Powers drifts into preaching and showing off his own musical knowledge, which makes the story feel melodramatic.
It will hold your interest if you see music and racial identi...more
The book is too long for the content, and Powers drifts into preaching and showing off his own musical knowledge, which makes the story feel melodramatic.
It will hold your interest if you see music and racial identi...more
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Read in June, 2008
This book, at 660 pages long is about 600 pages long. The author takes the music theme way too far. Each chapter being a variant on all the chapters before it is way too much repetition. Granted, I can't stand epic stories that cover entire lifetimes from different viewpoints (I also hated the Brothers K), but this was really too much. I got to about page 400 a few weeks ago, and can't bear the thought of trying to get back on that horse again.
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Read in January, 2006
Richard Powers is one of the smartest and most ambitious contemporary novelists out there (maybe I'd put David Mitchell up there as the British representative for the same distinction), and his prose is often downright dazzling. This novel is sometimes flawed as a study of race in America, but it's captivating from start to finish and features some of the most transcendent writing about the power of music I've ever encountered.
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What an amazing book. It's totally dense and lulls in and out of mind-numbing boredom and yet, I was totally enthralled the entire time. I remember reading it and thinking, "I should be banging my head against the wall right now. This book seems so intensely boring!" and yet I'd keep flipping the pages and loving every second of it. What a great book.
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Read in January, 2007
Powers takes us into the lives of a musical, mixed-race family from the 40s to the present. It is epic and yet tightly focused on the life of one family.
Highly recommended for music lovers, people with families, and anyone who has struggled to come to terms with the U.S.'s troubled history of race and founding ideals. Amazing.
Highly recommended for music lovers, people with families, and anyone who has struggled to come to terms with the U.S.'s troubled history of race and founding ideals. Amazing.
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Read in January, 2007
This book has a fun premise and lots of good kid-like moments. And then it descends into hyperbole and "adult" stupidity. Lack of love, lack of sense, lack of... lacks aren't so fun to read about. Plus, lively kids are turned into thoroughly boring adults.
If you want to read, stick with the first half. The language is beautiful.
If you want to read, stick with the first half. The language is beautiful.
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Powers is a hard writer to love but an easy writer to like. I think that this is his best novel. It is a great novel about race in America, and music, focused on the children of an unlikely interracial couple that comes together in the 1930s and tries to raise a family sheltered by music and somehow beyond race.
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