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Feb 22, 2008

Kathleen rated it:

I was just reminded of this book by my friend Susan. Now here was a hilarious read. Never was there a more true back picture of academia. They are all NUTS!!! Even the ones who aren't will agree they are a bit around the edges. Please read this, and laugh.

0 comments like (6 people liked it)

Apr 21, 2008

Erik rated it:

Jane Smiley, a former academic, is pitch perfect in this subtle yet scathing account of academic life in a small Midwestern town. As a former graduate student who had more than his fill of graduate school, this book was both wonderful and horrifying to read. I recommend this book to anyone thinking of attending graduate school, or as a medicine for those still recovering from the absurdity of it.

1 comment like (4 people liked it)

Mar 13, 2010

Sherri rated it:

Wow, can I give less than 1 star? This is going in to that rare list of "books I cannot even get through." It makes me very sad that this woman can get published (and apparently won an award at some point in her life!) and I have friends who can actually WRITE who cannot. Imagine if the author of "Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil" had written his 150 pages of character development, but hadn't actually been able to make you care about any of the characters. Or, in f More...

0 comments like (2 people liked it)

Dec 06, 2009

Gail added it

this was a bit too episodic for my liking. but very funny in parts. and insightful. from my favourite chapter:

"It was well known among the citizens of the state that the university had pots of money and that there were highly paid faculty members in every department who had once taught Marxism and now taught something called deconstructionism which was only Marxism gone underground in preparation for emergence at a time of national weakness.

It was well known among the le More...

0 comments like (1 person liked it)

Nov 01, 2009

Fiona rated it:

The description "Dickensian" is often given to Smiley's books and in the case of MOO, I think it is merited. MOO is the abbreviated name of a Midwestern State University, where Animal Husbandry and Horticulture have equal status with Maths or Modern Languages. The book demands concentration as, chapter by chapter you are introduced to perhaps a hundred significant separate characters, with new ones appearing until you are a third of the way through - and such characters - idiosyncratic More...

0 comments like (1 person liked it)

May 12, 2009

Patrick rated it:

This book has been around long enough to show up in the really, really, really used bookstores, which is exactly where I found it the other day. I love Jane Smiley’s writing and since this is one I missed whenever it came out a decade or so ago, I forked over my dollar and settled in for a delightful read. Having plowed my way though A Thousand Acres (sorry) and a couple other heavy tomes, I was prepared for . . . wait a minute . . . with a title like “Moo” how serious can it be? Jane skewers ac More...

3 comments like

Sep 30, 2011

Morgan rated it:

Overall,I found Moo to be an enjoyable but ultimately forgettable read. Smiley approaches life at a Midwestern university through the eye of faculty and a few students. She take a critical and humorous look at the bitter rivalries that exist in the world of academia, a reminder that sometimes the lives of educators are even more tumultuous than those of their students (a hard concept for a recent college grad to wrap their head around sometimes). Smiley's prose is smooth and she writes some beau More...

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Mar 30, 2011

Spotsalots added it

I tend to have mixed feelings about novels about academia. On the one hand, I think academia is a rich subject for fiction, including satire. On the other hand, many novels about academia are so heavily satirical that the reader feels the authors must utterly hate academia and that there is evidently no redeeming it from its foibles and sins. As someone who has had almost entirely positive experiences with academia both as a student and, recently, as a professor, I find this thin and tiresome mo More...

4 comments like (1 person liked it)

Feb 22, 2009

Esme Pie rated it:

After reading 'Straight Man' I was in the mood for another satire of academic life, so I can't help but compare Russo's book to Smiley's. Moo was funny enough, enjoyable enough but so inferior to 'Straight Man' I never could get into it. It's very satirical, above the fray, ironic--you just never come to care about any of the characters. Whereas 'Straight Man' has heart, as all good comedies should.

2 comments like (1 person liked it)

Nov 16, 2011

Vicky rated it:

This is not your typical Jane Smiley, but it one that shouldn't be missed. I have read this book I think 3 times now and each time I find myself laughing out loud and noticing things I had not before. Having gone to graduate school at a land grant university and been employed by another one for most of my career, I can attest to the accuracy of her descriptions of the egos,campus romances,political machinations, gamesmanship, and constant chase after funds.
There are so many memorable ch More...

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Nov 18, 2007

Sandy rated it:

Anyone who has worked or taught in a university will appreciate this satirical novel set in an unnamed land-grant university in a Midwestern state with a strong resemblance to Iowa. Smiley, who manages to find the entire world in the cornfields of her native region, gets the personalities, idiosyncracies and bizarre internal politics of American academe exactly right in this book.

0 comments like (4 people liked it)

Oct 19, 2011

Ann rated it:

Recommended by my sister, because I am in academia and my daughter is studying pre-veterinary science. It's a smart, funny book; Smiley skewers all sorts of people and entities (universities, corporations) and nails the details on her many characters, providing a wide range of points-of-view for consideration.

There is no main character--unless you count the university itself-- which makes sense given the subject matter, which is all the machinations, literal and figurative, and the p More...

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Jan 02, 2011

Joseph rated it:

My response to Smiley's novel was contradictory. On the one hand, I liked her ambitious attempt at depicting the entirety of a college campus, covering students, faculty, and administration. On the other hand, there were just too many characters for any of them to be sufficiently developed. I could never keep straight the four female students sharing the dorm, in part due to the cutesy rhyming-names thing, but mostly due to the fact that Smiley didn't do a great job of distinguishing them from o More...

0 comments like (1 person liked it)

May 19, 2010

Julie rated it:

First, let me confess I'm a Jane Smiley fan, and Moo is my favorite of her novels I've read, those being most of them (which I intend to hopefully document on GoodReads, but good intentions tend to pave certain roads, etc.) Moo is a vastly entertaining example of an ensemble character novel (is that a genre or did I just make that up?) and gets its setting at a midwest agricultural university pitch-perfect. One of my favorite things Smiley does better than maybe anyone is immerse me in a very pa More...

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Apr 14, 2011

Blaine rated it:

First read this book about 15 years ago, and decided to reread now. Amazing how time has changed my views on the book. It starts off very promisingly with some very astute observations and sly commentary on the university system. Smiley gives us professors, deans, students, secretaries and so much keen insight into the system in those first 150 pages that you cannot wait for things to actually unfold.

Unfortunately it does not unfold. Two thirds of the book gets us to the end of the fir More...

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Nov 27, 2007

Vanessa rated it:

A great parody/documentary of life at a big Mid-West ag school. Particularly good look at university life, with Smiley weaving together many different story's into one brilliant ending.

0 comments like (1 person liked it)

Jul 02, 2008

Brandy rated it:

You know you're an academic when... great book--totally hits upon the notion of a university as a place of business...

0 comments like (1 person liked it)

Aug 07, 2007

Kate rated it:

Cheap therapy for anyone in academia. A funny and refreshing look at life on campus from a faculty/staff perspective.

0 comments like (1 person liked it)

Jul 09, 2007

Leticia rated it:

Loved it. Quite witty. And if you work anywhere in higher education, you will relate in some way or other.

0 comments like (1 person liked it)

Nov 16, 2010

Stephanie "Jedigal" rated it:

My third Smiley title. I almost gave it only two stars. It was well crafted certainly, and very quirky. The characters were VERY real to me, however, they are not lovingly portrayed. Rather, Smiley seems to reveal the foibles of motivation and character in each individual, pulling out and exposing the parts of our minds and hearts that are at the core of human weakness. Yet she also shows how the same weaknesses are often what draw us together. The university environment is portrayed as al More...

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Jan 02, 2010

Debbie rated it:

This was my first Jane Smiley book and I enjoyed it as a lights, very fast paced read. MOO is the abbreviated name of a Midwestern State University, where Animal Husbandry and Horticulture have equal status with Maths or Modern Languages. The book demands concentration as, chapter by chapter you are introduced to perhaps a hundred significant separate characters, with new ones appearing until you are a third of the way through. Keeping the idiosyncrasies of each individual character straight was More...

0 comments like

Dec 18, 2008

Rich rated it:

As an Extension guy, I loved this book. Jane Smiley is an exceptional author.

0 comments like (1 person liked it)

Nov 28, 2011

Lisa rated it:

I tried to read this years ago, and I wasn't in the right place in my life and was too young and I didn't care for it at all! Now, however, because I work in the world of academia, I kept recognizing types in this book, and truisms about the, well, insanity of the some of the people who reside in this life. And in those parts, I liked this book. I laughed, i needed in recognition, I especially identified with Provost Harstad's ruminations on all the aspects of college life.

Then the More...

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Mar 16, 2010

Melissa rated it:

Moo was given to me by a friend/professor of mine from my college days. He was a professor and I was a student in a mid-west college, a college neither of us really clicked with 100%. This book is PERFECT for anyone in the field of academia, as it shows all of the dysfunction of student life, staff/faculty life, sexual exploits that you don't want to think about your teachers having, and of course, a pig named Earl Buttz.

The pig and equestrians in this school make this book touch a b More...

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Aug 18, 2010

Tom rated it:

Set on the campus of an Iowa University. When the university has to undergo massive budget cuts, Arlen Martin, a man who resembles H. Ross Perot both physically and fiscally, sets out to "buy" the university through the use of grants and consultant fees. He hires Dr. Lional Gift, the university's fabled economist, to write a report endorsing one of Martin's company's plans to put a gold mine in Costa Rica, glossing over the fact that it will destroy the world's last remaining cloud for More...

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Jul 30, 2010

Sarah rated it:

A fun and funny read -- you almost need a flow-chart to keep track of all of the characters -- but if you read it quickly, all of the characters and their relationships will stick with you. Anyone with contact with academia will get a kick out of the ridiculous insular nature of Moo U, and Jane Smiley nails the feeling of being a new student, all the hope, excitement & insecurity... I Love the cover of the version I read -- with the giant pig Earl Butz, even as symbol of the bloated university s More...

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Dec 19, 2009

Kedric is currently reading it

It's interesting too far, but too many damn characters to keep track of. Seriously, there are like 10 students and 12 faculty of Moo University. 4 of the students who live together are named Mary, Sheri, Terry and Diane and there are 2 Harstads and at least 1 person is a Dean of the University and another is a professor named Dean. ARGH! I'm wondering if the confusion was intentional? It's starting to get good though. I'm enjoying the intrigue of the gold mine in Costa Rica and the universi More...

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May 16, 2010

Kristin rated it:

First heard about this book from a friend a year ahead of me in college who had to read it for one of the classes I would be taking. It was more of a warning because apparently he didn't enjoy it and found it to be irrelevant for the class, calling it a book about 'cow college'. Apparently it was irrelevant because the syllabus of this class for my semester was changed to include books on philosophy. I would have preferred 'Moo' because I found the book interesting, albeit a slow read.
The More...

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Aug 06, 2010

Katy rated it:

One word to describe this book: dense. I was overwhelmed by the number of characters that were introduced at the beginning of the book, but figured I would get used to them all and become familiar with them. But new characters continued to be introduced and I had trouble keeping track of them. I felt like I needed to write them all on a note card - who they were, relationships to other characters, etc. - like I did when reading Shakespeare in college. I kept flipping back to the beginning of More...

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Sep 14, 2007

Tracey rated it:

crankyasanoldman recommended this book sometime last year & so when I saw it as a used book store a few weeks ago I picked it up. My reading was interrupted by vacation (forgot to tuck it into my carryon) so I just now wrapped it up.

The novel follows the lives of about a dozen characters associated with Moo U - an agricultural university somewhere in the Corn Belt. Nils and Ivar Harstad, bachelor twins, are involved in the administration aspect (with a secretary who really runs the More...

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