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Dec 17, 2009

Forrest rated it:

I like to read Anita Shreve when I am tired out on "literary" novels but am not quite at the point where something by, say, Sophie Kinesella sounds appealing. Shreve's novels are usually romances of two kinds; ones that build to a tragic emotional climax, or ones that are centered around lost love or an event in the protagonist's past that gets revealed over the course of the novel. I like to call them "trashy reads," but in truth, I think Shreve usually brings quite a bit of More...

0 comments like (4 people liked it)

Dec 16, 2009

Tonya rated it:

Ok friends, I know Shreve's books can be a little questionable which is why I've only read one other, but this one is the winner. She got it together this time.
I love this book...a reluctant admittance. The story of forbidden love is wrong, right, sad, joyful, and just utterly romantic even in its sheer destruction. I think my feelings for this book may also be biased by things in my personal life around the time that really made me feel and understand all of the characters quite deeply More...

1 comment like (4 people liked it)

May 23, 2008

Claire rated it:

I have read and re-read this book literally dozens of times. Every time I take away from it something new. It's a coming-of-age story in the loosest sense of the word, because it's so much more than that.
Shreve's writing just sings in this book. The opening scene, in which the 15-year-old main character makes her way across a beach as men gawk at her, is simply stunning. I can hear lines from this book in my head, they're so well written. Perhaps this book resonates particularly str More...

0 comments like (6 people liked it)

Aug 05, 2008

Ronni rated it:

Anita Shreve is one of my favorite authors, and this is an older book of hers that I've just now gotten around to reading. I usually like her books because they are very romantic, but also very literate. FORTUNE'S ROCKS may be my absolute favorite. I LOVED it. I read it in less than two days. Of course, the whole idea of a 15 year old girl and a 40+ man is pretty repulsive, but Shreve somehow makes it all work. You end up rooting for Olympia and Haskell even though you know you shouldn't. Ol More...

3 comments like (5 people liked it)

Dec 17, 2009

Christina rated it:

It's been a while since I read this book, but I recall carrying it around constantly hoping for the chance to read a page or two. The characters are so well developed that you feel you are living their experiences, and the scandalous drama that occurs throughout the book makes it even harder to put down. This isn't any kind of literary masterpiece, but it's highly entertaining. Isn't that what books are supposed to be anyway :)

0 comments like (2 people liked it)

Dec 17, 2009

Christine rated it:

An unbelievable tale of love and lose. I couldn't put this book down! I was up until 3am reading. My husband thought I was nuts. It is a tear jerker for any mother.

0 comments like (3 people liked it)

Sep 19, 2008

Shanda rated it:

I'm not sure how to review this book. First of all, I didn't like it being written from the third person view. The author missed an amazing opportunity to delve into the intense feelings that must have been going on inside or Olympia. Maybe she couldn't write about them because she's never experienced them to the level Olympia did. I have been there,so I know what the writer couldn't express.
Let's see, what else? Haskell and Olympia are two people who experience that "connection" More...

0 comments like (1 person liked it)

Jul 13, 2008

Kathleen rated it:

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0 comments like (2 people liked it)

Jul 06, 2008

Amanda rated it:

I can't really say that I liked this book, but I was interested enough in what happens to Olympia to finish. The story seemed to spend to much time on one period in Olympias life and felt jumpy when it skipped to the next. The setting and storyline was intriging enough right off the bat but it soon began to feel like a dime store romance. Had I ever read a dime store romance, I would guess that the authors use of language was somewhat better, but the smutiness was the same. I think that Olymp More...

0 comments like (2 people liked it)

Nov 05, 2008

Misfit rated it:

I think I'm one of the ones in the minority here. I had a difficult time getting into the book at first -- perhaps if Olympia had been a couple of years older at least. A 40+ year old man and a 15 year old girl. Ew. That said, I just didn't see any real chemistry between the two, outside of the sexual attraction for this life long supposed great love. I almost gave up when they started writing those long letters to each other, then it picked up around page 200 into her exile and attempt to regai More...

0 comments like (3 people liked it)

Oct 10, 2007

Janet rated it:

I loved this book - definitely my favorite Shreve book to date. I loved the setting and the characters. It is a wonderful love story - maybe a bit over the edge romance novelish in the details but the story saved it. In today's world Olympia wouldn't be so believable but for a turn-of-the-century female, only child, raised in a world of wealth and educated by her adoring father, I believed her character and her actions. Olympia & Haskell understood the consequences & they truly loved the peo More...

0 comments like (1 person liked it)

Nov 19, 2008

Jackie rated it:

This is one of Anita Shreve's best books. I loved the setting (NH coastline), the time period (turn of the 20th century) and the characters. Shreve gave Olympia strength and courage not typically showcased in women during that time. Her struggles are real and you can feel her thoughts and desires as if you are living life within her. The writing is flowerly and formal, which was a refreshing change from other books I have recently read. The only negative was that it took 75-100 pages to rea More...

0 comments like (1 person liked it)

Dec 07, 2010

Kirsty added it

In the beginning this book is almost everything I least like reading. It's a historical love story set in 1899. If I hadn't read any of Shreve's books before I'd have given up then and there. I carried on reading about the affair between fifteen year old Olympia Biddeford and forty one year old married with four children John Haskell because I thought that Shreve must have something in mind other than a pure romance (or not-so-pure depending on which sense you apply pure in, I suppose).

And of

More...

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Feb 25, 2009

Leisha rated it:

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Apr 15, 2011

Yvann rated it:

I had to give this two ratings – one for each half! I had no patience whatsoever with the first half, which is the tale of how an affair develops between a fifteen-year-old girl and a married forty-one-year-old doctor/political author, at the exclusive summer resort of wealthy families around the turn of the twentieth century. The second half, in which Olivia deals with the aftermath of the affair, is much more interesting and also has a high quality of writing.

Everything I read at the More...

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Oct 04, 2010

Monique rated it:

I had never read Anita Shreve before and I had no preconceptions about the style of author she represents. I was gifted this book years ago and when I picked it up off my shelf recently, I was arrested by the opening line of the novel which I found quite beautiful.

There is enough information on here regarding the storyline of the novel. I have to say I found the style of writing original and haunting. I particularly liked the emotional distance offered by the third person narration. More...

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Sep 27, 2010

David rated it:

Open the pages of Fortune’s Rocks by Anita Shreve and you’ll think you’ve stepped into the world of Edith Wharton, Kate Chopin or any number of other turn-of-the-century women writers whose novels were set in refined, confining Victorian society.

Do not be fooled for an instant. Shreve’s novel is a pale imitation of those Grande Dames of Literature.

Oh sure, Fortune’s Rocks—much like Wharton’s The Age of Innocence—is filled with scenes that would startle modern readers with More...

1 comment like (1 person liked it)

Aug 13, 2010

La rated it:

Guess what happens when a 15-year-old girl "falls in love" with a 41-year-old married man who can't keep his "passion" in his pants ? Hmmm. Basically, this is a nicely written Victorian-era romance novel, telling the age-old story of a grown man who can't control his impulses and desires, and a teenage girl who feels that she's a grown woman. Bad choices all around, but hey, I guess we've all either seen or heard it before, or done it ourselves. It's a good "beach book" More...

0 comments like (1 person liked it)

Jun 20, 2010

Mary rated it:

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Dec 07, 2009

Fredsky rated it:

I got a lot of sleep reading this novel. It is written in the historic present and takes place during the time that carriages were becoming horseless. The heroine, Olympia, is described as a beautiful, original and powerful girl of 15 through girl of about 20 years old. She has an affair and various other things happen because she has been ruined. Her lover is a man on paper and very little else. The affair is described in some detail, with one great scene, but none of this seems real to me More...

2 comments like

Oct 16, 2009

Stephanie rated it:

Words can barely describe how much I despise this book. It's grown from a mild annoyance to an admittedly irrational hatred. I know there's nothing so horrible within this book to make me feel this way, but at least if it were a truly hideous book in all manners, I could appreciate its consistency. Instead, it teases readers into thinking maybe, possibly it has the potential to redeem itself up to the very end, when you hope, you're almost the sure the main character has to grow a brain and r More...

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Jul 07, 2009

Susan added it

Hester Prynne never had it so good! The year is 1899, and Olympia Biddeford, the headstrong daughter of a Boston Brahmin family, has decided to test the limits of her cloistered world. Spending the summer at her father's New Hampshire estate, the teenage heroine of Fortune's Rocks is entranced with the visiting salon of artists, writers, and lawyers. She's especially captivated, however, by John Haskell, a charismatic physician who ministers to the blue-collar community in the nearby mill towns. More...

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Dec 13, 2008

Katie rated it:

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Feb 23, 2011

Julie rated it:

When upper-class Olympia Biddeford and her family relocate to their house on the New Hampshire coastline in the summer of 1899, she expects another uneventful holiday. But then she meets the handsome Dr. Haskell, a friend of her father's, and her sexual awakening begins. The two enter into a whirlwind love affair, even though he is much older and married, never realizing that their decision to pursue passion and happiness will have lasting consequences.

This book made me an Anita Shreve More...

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Aug 22, 2009

Lois rated it:

I found the first half of this book to be slow reading, perhaps because so much of it happens in Olympia's head. And I never really suspended my disbelief in a 15-year-old girl being as mature in her thoughts and her social abilities as Olympia was, although I wonder if a girl raised for a life in society would perhaps have that greater maturity.

Still, it's a well-written and easy-to-read book, and gives a person something to think about in the process. I found Olympia to be govern More...

1 comment like

Oct 24, 2011

Célia rated it:

Um dos melhores romances que alguma vez li. É imprevisível, historicamente fiel, sensível e um daqueles livros que parecem cheirar bem, sabem? Desde o primeiro capítulo, desde as primeiras linhas, quando a Olímpia caminha à beira mar, até ao derradeiro final, impensável até aí... Vão amá-lo se querem explorar a possibilidade real de um amor impossível...

Não sei se estão a ver... é que o John Haskell é um médico de 41 anos com 4 crianças e uma mulher simpática, e a privilegiada Olímpia More...

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Jul 15, 2011

Suzie rated it:

I had really enjoyed Anita Shreve's 'Light on Snow', so I thought I'd give one of her other novels a chance. I was somewhat disappointed that the author had a huge deficit with the ability to actually give the main characters any type of content. It seemed she was more apt to describe architectural details, the latest fashions, and the manner in which beach roses are cultivated. The 'Lolita-ish' theme was a bit tawdry and I continued to cringe every time Olympia referred to her relationship with More...

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Jul 21, 2009

Janet rated it:

While I was waiting for another audio title to make its way to the library, I grabbed this one simply because it was short in length (5 CDs) and because it was the only short one whose author I had heard of. I had always heard good things about The Pilot's Wife. I was very pleasantly surprised because I ended up really enjoying this book a lot. For me, the narrator of an audiobook can really be the deciding factor for me. For instance, I took out another author's audio CD this same day, put i More...

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Sep 04, 2009

Sandra rated it:

15-year-old Olympia, at the cusp of womanhood, has an affair with a 41-year-old married man (who by the way already has 4 children) in the name of love.

This was the first Anita Shreve book I've read since "The Last Time They Met" from about 6 years ago which was gorgeously written, and I had hopes that despite my slight aversion to plots centered around affairs, this plot, if well-composed, could be acceptable...

...but by the end of the novel, I was still convi More...

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Aug 03, 2011

Lynda added it

This is such a beautiful book that really explores the complications of love and how it affects individuals. It also approaches stigmas of society, not just in the period in which it was set, it translates and relates to our modern times as well. This is what I think of it anyway, feel free to read and then argue if you feel differently about the matter. I really related to this book and felt for the characters who are on the most part developed upon throughout the book, enough to build a rounde More...

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