What do you think?
Rate this book
The Rim of the Prairie
As part of its program of books for Nebraska’s centennial year, the UNP reprints this best-selling novel by a beloved Nebraska author.
352 pages, Paperback
First published June 1, 1925
7 people are currently reading
276 people want to read
About the author
Bess Streeter Aldrich
36 books143 followersBess Genevra Streeter Aldrich was one of Nebraska's most widely read and enjoyed authors. Her writing career spanned forty-some years, during which she published over 100 short stories and articles, nine novels, one novella, two books of short stories, and one omnibus. In her work, she emphasized family values and recorded accurately Midwest pioneering history.
One of her books, Miss Bishop, was made into the movie, Cheers for Miss Bishop, and her short story, The Silent Stars Go By became the television show, The Gift of Love.
Bess graduated in 1901 from Iowa State Normal School, now known as the University of Northern Iowa, and taught for four years. She returned to Cedar Falls and worked as Assistant Supervisor at her alma mater, receiving an advanced degree in 1906. She married Charles Sweetzer Aldrich the following year.
In 1909 the Aldriches and Bess's sister and brother-in-law, Clara and John Cobb, bought the American Exchange Bank in Elmwood, Nebraska, and moved there with the Aldrich's two-month old daughter, Bess's widowed mother, and the Cobbs. Elmwood would become the locale, by whatever name she called it, of her many short stories, and it would also be the setting for some of her books.
Aldrich had won her first writing prize at fourteen and another at seventeen, having been writing stories since childhood. However, for two years after the family moved to Elmwood, Aldrich was too busy with local activities to write. Then in 1911 she saw a fiction contest announcement in the Ladies Home Journal and wrote a story in a few afternoons while the baby napped. Her story was one of six chosen from among some 2,000 entries. From that time on, Aldrich wrote whenever she could find a moment between caring for her growing family and her household chores. Indeed, she commented that, in the early days, many a story was liberally sprinkled with dishwater as she jotted down words or ideas while she worked. Aldrich's first book, Mother Mason, a compilation of short stories, was published in 1924.
In May 1925, shortly before her second book, Rim of the Prairie was published, Charles Aldrich died of a cerebral hemorrhage, leaving Bess a widow with four children ranging from four to sixteen. Her writing now became the means of family support; with her pen she put all the children through college.
Aldrich's short stories were as eagerly sought and read as her novels, and she became one of the best paid magazine writers of the time. Her work appeared in such magazines as The American, Saturday Evening Post, Ladies Home Journal, Collier's, Cosmopolitan, and McCall's. Aldrich also wrote several pieces on the art of writing, and these were published in The Writer.
In 1934, Aldrich was awarded an Honorary Doctor of Letters from the University of Nebraska, and in 1949 she received the Iowa Authors Outstanding Contributions to Literature Award. She was posthumously inducted into the Nebraska Hall of Fame in 1973.
One of her books, Miss Bishop, was made into the movie, Cheers for Miss Bishop, and her short story, The Silent Stars Go By became the television show, The Gift of Love.
Bess graduated in 1901 from Iowa State Normal School, now known as the University of Northern Iowa, and taught for four years. She returned to Cedar Falls and worked as Assistant Supervisor at her alma mater, receiving an advanced degree in 1906. She married Charles Sweetzer Aldrich the following year.
In 1909 the Aldriches and Bess's sister and brother-in-law, Clara and John Cobb, bought the American Exchange Bank in Elmwood, Nebraska, and moved there with the Aldrich's two-month old daughter, Bess's widowed mother, and the Cobbs. Elmwood would become the locale, by whatever name she called it, of her many short stories, and it would also be the setting for some of her books.
Aldrich had won her first writing prize at fourteen and another at seventeen, having been writing stories since childhood. However, for two years after the family moved to Elmwood, Aldrich was too busy with local activities to write. Then in 1911 she saw a fiction contest announcement in the Ladies Home Journal and wrote a story in a few afternoons while the baby napped. Her story was one of six chosen from among some 2,000 entries. From that time on, Aldrich wrote whenever she could find a moment between caring for her growing family and her household chores. Indeed, she commented that, in the early days, many a story was liberally sprinkled with dishwater as she jotted down words or ideas while she worked. Aldrich's first book, Mother Mason, a compilation of short stories, was published in 1924.
In May 1925, shortly before her second book, Rim of the Prairie was published, Charles Aldrich died of a cerebral hemorrhage, leaving Bess a widow with four children ranging from four to sixteen. Her writing now became the means of family support; with her pen she put all the children through college.
Aldrich's short stories were as eagerly sought and read as her novels, and she became one of the best paid magazine writers of the time. Her work appeared in such magazines as The American, Saturday Evening Post, Ladies Home Journal, Collier's, Cosmopolitan, and McCall's. Aldrich also wrote several pieces on the art of writing, and these were published in The Writer.
In 1934, Aldrich was awarded an Honorary Doctor of Letters from the University of Nebraska, and in 1949 she received the Iowa Authors Outstanding Contributions to Literature Award. She was posthumously inducted into the Nebraska Hall of Fame in 1973.
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 30 of 48 reviews
May 8, 2024
Enjoyable, especially if you are a Bess Streeter Aldrich fan (which I am) but not on the same plane as "Song of Years." Of course, I loved Uncle Jud and Aunt Biny who are solid, stable, good, deep, pioneer stock. And, as usual, the hero is charming and kind, but the heroine can be annoyingly "perky," even though she is supposed to enter the story rather shallow and light-hearted in juxtaposition to everyone around her seeming a bit more quietly "tortured." Even so, her transformation is too quick and never quite deep enough. The ending is comfortable, predictable, and quickly pulled together leaving you just content enough, but with the feeling that many of the characters never learned life's lessons. The writing is occasionally redundant, but is interspersed with those rare, descriptive gems that make Ms. Streeter a pleasure to read. A quick, fun jaunt, but won't stay with me as a dear friend, like Song of Years has.
May 30, 2021
A gentle story that stays with you even after finishing it. I believe this is my favorite of the three novels I’ve read by this author (the others being ‘A Lantern in Her Hand’ and ‘A White Bird Flying’).
Edit: There is one aspect of the ending that irks me the more I think about it. It still is a really good book, and someone else might not be as bothered by it (it has to do with a piece of information being withheld from someone).
Edit: There is one aspect of the ending that irks me the more I think about it. It still is a really good book, and someone else might not be as bothered by it (it has to do with a piece of information being withheld from someone).
May 28, 2024
Beautiful and touching with the soul of the prairie.
Some out dated language but it's gonna happen
Nebraska Library Commission Book Club - May 21st, 2024
Small and midwestern is Maple City when young banker Warner Field retreats to a lonely cabin on the Moore property for a vacation focused on his once great love for writing. While there, he happens upon artifacts of a young girl who once used the cabin. Small journal entries, a china doll, and an old photograph lead him to believe the owner of these items is long passed on. He finds fascination in her lush descriptions of the prairie all around him, her poetic styling and love for her surroundings touch him deeply. Through the journals, he learns of an mysterious tragedy, the girl’s entries abruptly stopping on her 18th birthday as she prepares to run away. Only a day before he departs from the cabin, 22-year-old Nancy Moore steps off the train and arrives home in Maple City for the first time in 4 years after her disappearance.
“There was something about the lunch that was gayer than usual. An atmosphere of fun pervaded it, a sense of exhilaration was upon every one. Nancy Moore seemed in some inexplicable way to be responsible for it. There was something infectious about her approval of life”
- BESS STREETER ALDRICH
This unassuming Nebraskan mystery romance contains a portrait of rural life during the turn of the century. Maple City and its inhabitants coexist in their own peculiar but charming and folksy ways with their own secrets kept close to their chests. In The Rim of the Prairie, Aldrich weaves her thoughts on life, her love for her husband, and the day-to-day foils and perseverance of prairie life. Appropriate for Book Groups of all ages, readers can enjoy the lush descriptions of the prairie in contrast with the bustling small town trying to stretch its wings into the modern day, and the mystery of the brown shawl. Encouraged to read by my mother, (Happy late Mother’s Day!) The Rim of the Prairie was one of the first books I read that took place in Nebraska. It gave me the words to shape my cultural identity and knowledge of our greater social landscape. As Aldrich said herself, “I tried to do my bit in helping preserve a little of the spirit of these pioneers in fiction”.
Some out dated language but it's gonna happen
Nebraska Library Commission Book Club - May 21st, 2024
Small and midwestern is Maple City when young banker Warner Field retreats to a lonely cabin on the Moore property for a vacation focused on his once great love for writing. While there, he happens upon artifacts of a young girl who once used the cabin. Small journal entries, a china doll, and an old photograph lead him to believe the owner of these items is long passed on. He finds fascination in her lush descriptions of the prairie all around him, her poetic styling and love for her surroundings touch him deeply. Through the journals, he learns of an mysterious tragedy, the girl’s entries abruptly stopping on her 18th birthday as she prepares to run away. Only a day before he departs from the cabin, 22-year-old Nancy Moore steps off the train and arrives home in Maple City for the first time in 4 years after her disappearance.
“There was something about the lunch that was gayer than usual. An atmosphere of fun pervaded it, a sense of exhilaration was upon every one. Nancy Moore seemed in some inexplicable way to be responsible for it. There was something infectious about her approval of life”
- BESS STREETER ALDRICH
This unassuming Nebraskan mystery romance contains a portrait of rural life during the turn of the century. Maple City and its inhabitants coexist in their own peculiar but charming and folksy ways with their own secrets kept close to their chests. In The Rim of the Prairie, Aldrich weaves her thoughts on life, her love for her husband, and the day-to-day foils and perseverance of prairie life. Appropriate for Book Groups of all ages, readers can enjoy the lush descriptions of the prairie in contrast with the bustling small town trying to stretch its wings into the modern day, and the mystery of the brown shawl. Encouraged to read by my mother, (Happy late Mother’s Day!) The Rim of the Prairie was one of the first books I read that took place in Nebraska. It gave me the words to shape my cultural identity and knowledge of our greater social landscape. As Aldrich said herself, “I tried to do my bit in helping preserve a little of the spirit of these pioneers in fiction”.
June 5, 2019
Bess Streeter Aldrich never disappoints... and things never go quite like you thought they would. I have fallen in love with each and every one of her books that I have read, and always find myself longing to read more, to know more, and yet, satisfied. She is a master of her craft, and I love every second spent in one of her beautiful stories.
May 20, 2017
A tender, well-written story about a girl growing up on a farm in Nebraska where there is a bit of mystery concerning her birth. Tornadoes, grasshoppers and well-rooted pioneers of the land come alive under Aldrich's competent pen. A worthwhile and gentle read.
June 27, 2017
Another brilliant story by Bess Streeter Aldrich. Her writing is superb as always. The characters are fully formed and real. The story is simple, entertaining, and filled with nuggets of wisdom and the surprises truly surprised me.
September 30, 2024
In my opinion, Aldrich will go down in history as one of the few authors who can truly capture the love, loyalty , and reverence of the pioneers. Not only that, but the language she uses to describe the prairie and all that it houses and shelters is sure to make anyone feel as though it’s where they belong. This book was a little slow to get going, but it’s hard to complain when Aldrich weaves such a beautiful story with a setting so real you could reach out and touch it.
June 27, 2018
This book is just like a quilt. Full of patterns, old-fashioned warmth, sprinkled with every possible emotion and a just a touch of romance. I loved it. Perhaps it is the closest thing to Song of Years that Aldrich has done.
December 31, 2019
A Middelmarch for the prairie. Too bad that Aldrich is not still more widely read.
May 29, 2023
A book with beautiful one liners that makes you absorb the poetic simplicity, rethink the philosophy of life and humanity. It’s a simple tale of a small prairie town and it’s inhabitants that are moving through the shifting of the old who first stuck shovels in to create the towns and the new who are finding their places in modern ways.
Long live the simple life; being one personally who struggles to leave behind face to face business and cars I can fix myself…it felt wonderful to read the hearts of those bitter acquiescence in entering these current digitalization and electrified futures. Written in the 1920’s there is an unspoken struggle in the heroine, between the placement of the flappers and homesteaders.
Long live the simple life; being one personally who struggles to leave behind face to face business and cars I can fix myself…it felt wonderful to read the hearts of those bitter acquiescence in entering these current digitalization and electrified futures. Written in the 1920’s there is an unspoken struggle in the heroine, between the placement of the flappers and homesteaders.
March 16, 2017
Not one of her best, but still worth reading once if you really like her books. In a way, it's almost an ode to herself, in a kind of gloating way. It is trying to show that people from simple midwestern towns are as good as anyone and that there is no higher ideal than living in a rural house or writing about the glory of the prairie. If you can get beyond that, it's not bad. The story is much more about the town people and about setting a mood than it is about either of the main characters. It took me about 2 months to read it on and off, interspersed with other books, to get through it, and I love several of her more popular books.
June 23, 2020
This old-fashioned story from 1925 is set in a fictitious town in Nebraska. You not only fall in love with the characters, but also with the beauty of the prairie and the homeyness of local folks. Of course, there's always a villain or two. A whole boarding house yields various quirky personalities, with their own mysteries. But the biggest mystery of all is within the main characters themselves. I found this to be a very satisfying tale.
August 26, 2021
This was my mom’s favorite author. Having never read her, I decided to try one by her after my mom’s death. I was pleasantly surprised! Although the characters were numerous, the author described them so thoroughly and vividly that I had no trouble keeping them separate. Easy to read and enjoyable, the realistic romantic ending caught me off guard as I expected them both to marry for money, not love.
September 22, 2022
Wonderful story, as always, from Aldrich. I cried, of course, in the last parts of the book, but it wouldn’t be as good if it didn’t make me cry. As a descendant of the very people she writes about, I always feel like I know her characters. And as a native of the prairies, she always writes about the land in such a way that makes me long to be back there, listening to the meadowlarks and watching the waving grasses in the wind, looking out to the rim of the prairie.
January 31, 2023
This is a beautiful and touching tale in 1920's Nebraska (written 1925). It is a love story that has its twists and turns, but even more it is a tribute to the beautiful country "at the rim of the prairie". The descriptions of the seasons, crops, etc. are wonderful. The value of family (biological or encompassing), and the values of ethics and admirable personality traits are presented as far more riches than money. A simple but very pleasant read.
January 23, 2018
Another beautiful gem from Bess Streeter Aldrich. She allows the reader to enter into her characters' lives and emotions -- all the hopes, regrets, joys, mistakes, selfishness, sacrifice. So glad I picked this up. A keeper!
August 21, 2019
Beautifully written book set in the 1920s in Nebraska. Sweet romance, with a Little Mystery woven throughout. Careful and insightful character development. Best of all, a wonderful story, a page-turner, with characters who are so real I thought about them as old friends. Read it!
January 20, 2020
This is the fourth novel, written by Bess Streeter Aldrich, that I have read and it was a delightful read. The characters are realistic and interesting, and the story is well told. It is a pleasant departure from most current day fiction and for that alone I loved it! 💗
June 26, 2020
A lovely book to read in these difficult times.
December 4, 2020
Sweet old fashioned story that I was in the mood for while I was sick. Otherwise I like more thrills and danger.
December 18, 2020
There’s a bit of mystery. A bit of romance. Wonderful character development, joy and sorrow, living and dieting, and a happy ending. My kind of book!
February 6, 2021
A very comfortable read at a time when I most needed a comfy book.
May 23, 2021
Lovely. Need to reread, slower!
February 19, 2023
Beautiful descriptions of the prairie, written by someone who clearly loved it.
March 4, 2023
Wonderful book by a Nebraska author.
Definitely a love letter to the state. Everything rings true.
Definitely a love letter to the state. Everything rings true.
January 9, 2024
4.5 stars
March 17, 2025
Stories such as this remind me why it is a rare thing that modern novels captivate me. It has been a long time since the ending of a book moved me to the most heartwarming tears.
This story is an account of rural life in a Nebraska agricultural community. The author creates robust characters that are like valuable parts of a beautiful grandfather clock, and at the end of the story everyone joins together in unison just when the hour of the tale’s climax strikes.
If you are acquainted with small towns, agricultural communities in America, life’s simpler treasures, sincere and plain people who leave a mark on your character forever, then this story will strike a chord with you.
The heroine, Nancy Moore, is a complex young woman in her early twenties who, celebrates her rich country upbringing yet yearns for ‘more’ in life. While humble and sincere, she is also admittedly, vain.
In the story you will watch Nancy grow and wrestle with her unknown past, her relationships, her mistakes, her undying love for the prairie, and also the discovery of true love within the small and simple community she believes she needs to be freed from.
Get cozy and nostalgic, and make room in your heart for Nancy Moore and the people of Maple City Nebraska.
This story is an account of rural life in a Nebraska agricultural community. The author creates robust characters that are like valuable parts of a beautiful grandfather clock, and at the end of the story everyone joins together in unison just when the hour of the tale’s climax strikes.
If you are acquainted with small towns, agricultural communities in America, life’s simpler treasures, sincere and plain people who leave a mark on your character forever, then this story will strike a chord with you.
The heroine, Nancy Moore, is a complex young woman in her early twenties who, celebrates her rich country upbringing yet yearns for ‘more’ in life. While humble and sincere, she is also admittedly, vain.
In the story you will watch Nancy grow and wrestle with her unknown past, her relationships, her mistakes, her undying love for the prairie, and also the discovery of true love within the small and simple community she believes she needs to be freed from.
Get cozy and nostalgic, and make room in your heart for Nancy Moore and the people of Maple City Nebraska.
June 3, 2012
The edition I own was published in 1966, not 1986. It is a high-quality printing, for the spine is strong and the pages are not discolored. Surprisingly, I did some underlining and wrote notes in the margins.
I enjoyed this book more the first time I read it during high school or college.
I know the country can be quiet, but cars were loud back in the twenties. I'm surprised Warner could hear Alice's piano playing as he drove by her house. It is set on an hill.
"For a long time Warner Field sat on the edge of the orchard and looked across Tinkling Creek to the rolling prairie land overhung by night and its thousand eyes."
I often wonder what occupied the minds of pioneer farmers as they toiled all day in the fields. Weather? Nature? The Bible? Family.
"All about them the long, rolling hills lay like waves of the sea molded into solidity...the mountains hem me in. I don't like them. They're grand and awe-inspiring but I have mental asthma when I'm chucked down among them. The sea fascinates me, but I'm afraid of it. But this...Of course there will be rough winds over it," she went on, "tearing the very dirt from the fields and there will be frightful blizzards and deluging rains, but it seems to me that between these times it's like a jewel burnished to its great beauty by the very ferocity and roughness of these elements." p. 85
Oh, that I were a jewel!
I admire Miss Gunn, the school principal. She is a great mentor to Nancy, and a great example of a compassionate mind that never stops educating itself.
"Remember this: children are not empty buckets that you have to fill with something. You can’t pour knowledge into them. Initiative is everything. They must do what they’re told...yes, not with just blind obedience but with an intelligent obedience that undergstands why they do it. Get every brain to thinking for itself and every hand to doing for itself and you won’t be driving the children at all. They will all be living, as Kipling says, 'Each for the joy of the working.'” It summed up quite neatly many a three-year normal-training course. (in teaching) p. 91
"There was something about the lunch that was gayer than usual. An atmosphere of fun pervaded it, a sense of exhilaration was upon every one. Nancy Moore seemed in some inexplicable way to be responsible for it. There was something infectious about her approval of life." p. 94
I enjoyed this book more the first time I read it during high school or college.
I know the country can be quiet, but cars were loud back in the twenties. I'm surprised Warner could hear Alice's piano playing as he drove by her house. It is set on an hill.
"For a long time Warner Field sat on the edge of the orchard and looked across Tinkling Creek to the rolling prairie land overhung by night and its thousand eyes."
I often wonder what occupied the minds of pioneer farmers as they toiled all day in the fields. Weather? Nature? The Bible? Family.
"All about them the long, rolling hills lay like waves of the sea molded into solidity...the mountains hem me in. I don't like them. They're grand and awe-inspiring but I have mental asthma when I'm chucked down among them. The sea fascinates me, but I'm afraid of it. But this...Of course there will be rough winds over it," she went on, "tearing the very dirt from the fields and there will be frightful blizzards and deluging rains, but it seems to me that between these times it's like a jewel burnished to its great beauty by the very ferocity and roughness of these elements." p. 85
Oh, that I were a jewel!
I admire Miss Gunn, the school principal. She is a great mentor to Nancy, and a great example of a compassionate mind that never stops educating itself.
"Remember this: children are not empty buckets that you have to fill with something. You can’t pour knowledge into them. Initiative is everything. They must do what they’re told...yes, not with just blind obedience but with an intelligent obedience that undergstands why they do it. Get every brain to thinking for itself and every hand to doing for itself and you won’t be driving the children at all. They will all be living, as Kipling says, 'Each for the joy of the working.'” It summed up quite neatly many a three-year normal-training course. (in teaching) p. 91
"There was something about the lunch that was gayer than usual. An atmosphere of fun pervaded it, a sense of exhilaration was upon every one. Nancy Moore seemed in some inexplicable way to be responsible for it. There was something infectious about her approval of life." p. 94
December 27, 2016
What an endearing story, filled with quirky characters and beautiful descriptions of a part of the country that some may have a hard time finding beauty in. I have friends who don't like Nebraska, but I've been spending quite a bit of time there lately, and easily relate to the setting, and some of the small town life, even though this book was written many years ago. It was a very enjoyable read!
October 18, 2023
I found this at an old garage sale. I am familiar with Miss Bishop and there is a definite vibe of that in this book as well.
Written in 1925, it reads very much like a typical book from this Era. The main character, Nancy, really isn't all that loveable but there's a few things I did like about it as a whole. (Nancy is a little overboard with the lightheartness and laughter. It got a little annoying after awhile.)
Nancy returns to her home after being away for years to face her past and see the loving couple that raised her. Something mysterious had driven her away at 18 and the reader is given hints but no definite answers as to what it might be. While at her beloved home she meets Warner Field who is currently stuck in a writers block and has sought inspiration at Uncle Jed and Aunt Biny's farm. The two have met before, that also being a mystery to the reader. The romance is pretty straight forward but the host of characters that surround them are meant to be endearing. There is Alice, the antagonist, Miss Rilla and Miss Ann, twin sisters that run the boarding house, Marty, the jokester, Walt a simple farmer who loves Nancy, Mattie, big hearted as well as big, and the various towns people and other boarders, too many to name. Not to mention Uncle Jed, strong and stubborn, and Aunt Biny, wise and gentle. There are a few plot twists toward the end and a small epilogue to tell you what happened to all the characters. The last mystery is cleared up as well.
I give it 4 stars because Bess Aldrich's obvious love for the prairie spills out all over this book. Uncle Jud's love for the land, the trees, and the native virgin prairie, are very genuine and comfortably relatable. She doesn't glorify the midwest, but she doesn't poke fun of it either. The midwest isn't about action or adventure, rather it's about people, the land, and their love for it and for eachother. I liked how the author jumped from one person to the next, describing how they were experiencing the very same time frame.
Overall this isn't a great book, but if you love the midwest, if you love the prairie, the midwest weather, the midwest people and their simpler time stories, you would like this. I know I did.
Written in 1925, it reads very much like a typical book from this Era. The main character, Nancy, really isn't all that loveable but there's a few things I did like about it as a whole. (Nancy is a little overboard with the lightheartness and laughter. It got a little annoying after awhile.)
Nancy returns to her home after being away for years to face her past and see the loving couple that raised her. Something mysterious had driven her away at 18 and the reader is given hints but no definite answers as to what it might be. While at her beloved home she meets Warner Field who is currently stuck in a writers block and has sought inspiration at Uncle Jed and Aunt Biny's farm. The two have met before, that also being a mystery to the reader. The romance is pretty straight forward but the host of characters that surround them are meant to be endearing. There is Alice, the antagonist, Miss Rilla and Miss Ann, twin sisters that run the boarding house, Marty, the jokester, Walt a simple farmer who loves Nancy, Mattie, big hearted as well as big, and the various towns people and other boarders, too many to name. Not to mention Uncle Jed, strong and stubborn, and Aunt Biny, wise and gentle. There are a few plot twists toward the end and a small epilogue to tell you what happened to all the characters. The last mystery is cleared up as well.
I give it 4 stars because Bess Aldrich's obvious love for the prairie spills out all over this book. Uncle Jud's love for the land, the trees, and the native virgin prairie, are very genuine and comfortably relatable. She doesn't glorify the midwest, but she doesn't poke fun of it either. The midwest isn't about action or adventure, rather it's about people, the land, and their love for it and for eachother. I liked how the author jumped from one person to the next, describing how they were experiencing the very same time frame.
Overall this isn't a great book, but if you love the midwest, if you love the prairie, the midwest weather, the midwest people and their simpler time stories, you would like this. I know I did.
Displaying 1 - 30 of 48 reviews