The Milagro Beanfield War

Well hello to everyone. I hope everybody is having a good summer. Well I just wanted to know if anybody that is reading the book knows during what time period this book is taking place. I am really enjoying the book. I especailly like the way the writer sets up the scene and introduces all the the characters with a description. For example, the part where he descibes the relationship beteen Flossie and Shorty ( I think that was an example of what Viet had posted earlier about it having very descriptive sences). Well thats it for now. Bye.....

Oh well . . .

I should have read all the comments made since I left for vacation. I assumed they were mostly Harry Potter. Sonya already make Mr. Kundera's point. Sorry.

HP?

I haven't read Harry Potter, so I can't really comment there. I'll ask my wife who read it immediately.

I am enjoying Milagro Beanfield War. I hadn't read it before, nor have I seen the movie version. Like Song of Solomon, the book is obviously political and a bit preachy but not simplistic. A novelist I admire, Milan Kundera, says that literary novels are the place where every significant character has the right to be understood no matter what anyone, even the author, thinks of their behavior. Both of these books pass this test.

I'm not tearing through the book, but the writer knows some stuff, the characters are increasingly interesting, and the situation and events aren't completely obvious.

I doubt that contemporary high school students will read this without threats or rewards or some mix of both. Is anybody trying this one?

HP 7...

I hope this is okay to talk about.. harry potter is indeed a book, and a great story, so I'm going to continue on with this post.. The ending was so lame! I hated the whole long conversation, but I suppose it was nescessary. I just wish it happened differently. The whole memory was weird and made me see many plot holes and majorly drew my attention to how crafty JK really is. The epilogue was crap. Only it had to be that way I guess this way nothing is left unsaid or dealt and can't be changed if someone or even JK wanted to continue and fudge up the whole theory of 7 books to represent the lucky wizard number and for the years you attend hogwarts... Next post I should talk about Milagro Beanfield War, it's an okay book. Is anyone else reading it?

Harry Potter

I agree it was pretty cheezy and anticlimactic in the epilogue, but she ended it the way she had to. i would have been dissappointed otherwise, although i wish we heard more about the other characters.

Um okay...

So I have read about three really interesting books this summer (harry potter included) and started to read The Milagro Beanfield War and unfortunatly haven't started Song of Solomon, which is what everyone is talking about. I was wondering if we are supposed to read just one or both or only Song of Solomon. Also if we can talk about the other books we have read this summer, like the cheesy ending to harry potter and stuff like that... ?

SORRY i HADN'T POSTED ANYTHING

WELL HELLO HELLO i HOPE EVERYBODY'S SUMMMER IS GOOD...i'M SORRY i HADN'T WRITTEN BUT I DIDN'T HAVE ACCESS TO THE COMPUTER....BUT NOW I DO.....
i FINISHED READING SONG OF SOLEMON....i REALLY DID LIKE IT....AT FIRST IT WAS REALLY WEIRD AND ALL WITH THE LIL' MILKMAN AND THE MOM....BUT i DON'T NO I LIKED THE DESCRIPTION OF THE SCENES IT SEEMED THAT THE WRITER GOT REALLY INTO IT....
WELL i STARTED READING tHE MILAGRO BEANFIELD WAR AND ITS WIERD TOO.....
YUP BUT I CAN RELATE A LIL MORE BECAUSE OF THE NAMES IN SPANISH AND THE CHARACTERS WAYS....
BUT i STILL DON'T UNDERSTAND WHY jOSE MONDRAGON STARTED THE WAR MAYBE I JUST HVEN'T READ ENOUGH BUT I'LL KEEP ON READING....
mR. SHEEHY MY BOOK IS MISSING PAGES.....YUP SOMEBODY RIPPED THE PAGES OUT....

Finally done with one

Okay, so first off Mr. Sheehy is a complete liar and don't believe anything he says about the last Harry Potter book which everyone needs to read. Anyways, I just finished Song of Solomon and while I think it was a good book, it was really slow until the last seventy or so pages when it got really interesting. Definitely a character driven book. The one thing that really jumped out at me was Morrison's objectivity toward her characters. I feel like that's the wrong word because it makes it sound like she's indifferent toward them, but it's the closest I can think of. Characters arent portrayed as good or bad and both sides are always shown. The closest you get to a "bad" person would be Macon Dead Jr., but his miserliness is quazi-justified by his love of his father. Pilate, Ruth, Macon, Milkman, Guitar could easily be criticized or disliked for things that they do, but Morrison doesn't give her opinion. I think she's the first author I've ever read who left me with a feeling like that. Like the characters aren't meant to be judged, but accepted for who they are, faults and all; just displayed for the reader's enjoyment. I'm still milling over the ending though and the way guitar turned out.

p.s.

oh and sheehy.. i think you posted it.. but that "favorite paragraph" post... that was the best, I love Sweet!

Finally got on...

hi! sorry this took me so long to get on. I finished Song of Solomon a while ago and i loved it. I actually was at the gym the other day and a woman next to me was reading it... so i decided to have a conversation about it and it was nice. She said Toni Morrison's book "Beloved" is great and even more twisted. Anyway, i started the other book and I'm having a hard time getting into it so far.... i think my mind is stuck on Pilate, Milkman, Guitar and if Milkman died...?

The Milagro Beanfield War

I finally finished reading the Milagro Beanfield War, I can say its an interesting book but for some reason it didnt capture me. Within the subsection there are multiple jumps from one situation to another. I didn't like this particular aspect of the book's structure because at parts the book becomes very interesting and it makes me want to read more and more, but when it hits a new section i started to loose interests. On the back of my mind I still wonder what will happen next but it takes a few scene to come back to the interesting scene. When i read the part of Ruby, Eliu, and Claudio attacking Montana in the mountains i was really interested but after the section finished it jumped into a whole new situation and i was pretty annoyed. This book also reminds me of Lysistra becuase of the strong sexual contents. I enjoyed reading this book but at times it becomes very boring. I am going to start reading Songs of Soloman next. I guesss i did the reverse, when I started to read this book before I realized the class was going to reading Songs of Soloman first.