Product Description
A masterful psychological thriller, from the author of The Church of Dead Girls.

Another bucolic fall in northern New Hampshire, and the semester is under way at Bishop's Hill Academy. But this year the start of school has been less than tranquil. The new headmaster, Jim Hawthorne, has liberal ideas that the staff find far from welcome. He's also determined to do something about the long "tradition" of permanent loans to faculty of shovels, saws, even cars, from the school's supplies. Eloquent as he is on the subject of honor, rumor has it he's only taken this job to escape his past. And Hawthorne isn't the only uneasy newcomer. There's Jessica, a former stripper at fifteen, and Frank LeBrun, a replacement cook who's a bit too quick with a dirty joke. All three have secrets to conceal, memories to suppress.

Serene on the surface, the ivy-clad, tree-lined campus gives few clues to the school's history of special privileges, petty corruptions, and hidden allegiances. But as autumn advances, the affable smiles and pretenses of virtue wear thin. And as winter closes in, students, teachers, and staff get an education in savagery and murder. With hiscustomary uncanny awareness of the intricacies of human nature, the acclaimed author of The Church of Dead Girls once again probes the daily life of an ordinary community to reveal the depths of good and evil.Amazon.com Review
Although not as complex or as haunting as his 1997 novel Church of Dead Girls,Stephen Dobyns has produced a first-rate psychological thriller withBoy in the Water.

Bishop's Hill Academy in rural New Hampshire is a school in crisis. Once ahighly regarded preparatory school for the rich and elite, it is now adumping ground for troubled teens. The teachers are unqualified,unenthusiastic, and spend more time hitting the students than educatingthem. A new headmaster, JimHawthorne, enters the chaotic scene, but is immediately outcast from the tight-knitfaculty. Hawthorne is obsessed with the idea of turning the schoolaround--and we soon find out why. His family died in a firepurportedly set by a disturbed teenager back in San Diego. Mentally andphysically scarred, Hawthorne sees Bishop's Hill as an opportunity to getback to "physical reality," and save some adolescent psyches. But it is hisown mental state that is soon put to the test as he becomes the nucleus ofa hate campaign and is forced to relive the terrible memories of thefire.

It seems that everyone in the school has a secret to hide--from the cookFrank LeBrun who enjoys placing sharp tacks in his recipes to ChipCampbell, a history teacher who has taken one too many liberties with theschool's funds.

Dobyns paints a foreboding landscape of dilapidated buildings and neglectedchildren--a place where a 15-year-old girl plots to kill her father, aplace where teachers abuse students, a place where a young boy is founddead in a swimming pool. As a snowstorm cuts off the isolated community,the exiled headmaster is forced into a final showdown with the school'somnipotent evil.

Boy in the Water is an entertaining but ultimately disturbing read.--Naomi Gesinger ... Read more

Customer Reviews (44)

very well written. keep you on the toe
i like the ending and the characters. i wont say much to kill the suspense. it is a good book. i recommend it

An Average Thriller
Set in rural New Hampshire, Boy In The Water centers around Jim Hawthorne, a respected psychologist with a tragic past, and his attempt to save Bishop's Hill, a rundown private school filled with troubled kids and an even more troubling faculty and staff.The result of Hawthorne's hard work and effort turns out to be murder, mystery, and frustration.Personally, I found the pace of the book to be a little slow, and it took me about 100 pages to really get involved with the characters and the story. By the middle of the book, however, I found myself emotionally drawn into the drama and curious about how the story would end.The outcome, while not bad, was somewhat predictible, and I didn't encounter any sections of the book that I thought were particularly edgy, creepy, or frightening.My biggest complaint was with the epilogue.It concentrated more on one of the minor characters in the story and left you hanging about what happens with several of the main characters.Overall, this was not a bad book, but not one of my favorites either.

A thriller that leaves the rest of the thrillers in the waiting room
Dobyns manages to write a thriller that engages the reader in ways that put most thrillers to shame. From the first moment you see the villain, you know he's bad news but he isn't the only villain and the fact that he's working for someone else makes the whole thing that much more sinister. The teacher is virtuous and he's a little flat, but you still worry about him. Dobyns manages to make the commonplace strange and the strange overly sinister.

Great prose. Intriguing story and well rounded characters make for some very enjoyable reading.

A Good Thriller
It doesn't quite come up to "The Church of Dead Girls," but Stephen Dobyns has a knack for giving us characterization, description and plot. There's plenty of all three in this novel.

Jim Hawthorne, a famed psychologist who blames himself for the deaths of his wife and daughter in a fire started by an obsessed student, takes the job of headmaster at a failing New England preparatory school that has become the dumping ground for troubled kids. Hawthorne hopes to save the school and students as a redemption for his past failure.

The job isn't made easy when his efforts are met with suspicion and a campaign to undermine his success. The serene, ivy-clad campus conceals a world of secrets, corruption and murderous plots. In addition to Hawthorne, there are some equally intriguing characters including a 15-year-old student who previously was a stripper, a fewdevious staff members, a cook with a penchant for dirty stories and an old-time Boston cop I felt should have been given more space.

Floater
I wonder why people who really want to write screenplays try to disguise them as novels."Boy in the Water" is a "novel" to be read by airplane passengers who have already seen the emasculated in-flight entertainment.

I was attracted to Dobyns by the NEW YORK TIMES review blurb on his novel "The Wrestler's Cruel Study."The reviewer commented that the book "stirs together Nietzschean philosophy, professional wrestling, fairy-tale scenarios and Gnostic speculation to produce what is at once a darkly humorous and gravely unsettling work of imagination."At the same time, I ordered "Boy in the Water," and it arrived first.Now I am very apprehensive about reading "The Wrestler's Cruel Study," because "Boy in the Water" stirs together many different varieties of schlock to produce one of the most moronic things I have ever read.If the NYT review is at all accurate, perhaps Mr. Dobyns decided sometime in the 1990s to abandon art for garbage.He does, after all, have three children to send to college.

Let me turn from general commentary to some specific remarks on the "plot," such as it is.Dobyns depends on the stupidity of his readers.(Of course, the fact that the albino in "The Da Vinci Code" could fight off the French police and carry his dying mentor to the hospital with no further police intervention counts heavily on reader stupidity, and that book sold millions.Maybe stupidity is a trend?)Much of the "Boy in the Water" plot is based on the one bad guy (#1) paying another bad guy (#2) to commit a heinous act.Now it stands to reason that, by paying #2 to do the deed, #1 would be interested in staying as far away from #2 and the scene of the crime as possible and in keeping his relationship to #1 tenuous at best.Yet, in advance of a raging snowstorm, #21 comes to a town near the scene of the crime and walks out in public with #2, AND, in the middle of the raging snowstorm, he subsequently rides out to the actual scene of the crime to deliver the rest of the money to #2.In fact, #2 even confides to another character that he was going to be able to use #1's SUV as a getaway car.Where's the logic here?It doesn't exist.Unless you're stupid.

Another amazon.com reviewer commented on Mr. Dobyns' "Church of Dead Girls," and his or her objections can be overlaid almost exactly on "Boy in the Water."This sorry excuse for a novel, whose title does not even resonate in the rest of the book, is just another in a long list of examples of screenwriting gone bad or bad screenwriting gone worse.Still, Mr. Dobyns' children should be able to go to the universities of their choice.Just hope that they don't enroll in his creative writing classes.
... Read more

Product Description
A haunting psychological journey of a child through his delightful antics in Catholic school, his rebellious angst in adolescence, and the echoes of his revenge in late maturity, all in a short amusing narrative. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (3)

New Author
This is very well written by an author who is new to me. The title intrigued me so i decided to find out what it was about. I liked the way it flowed and kept my attention. Sounds like he had an interesting life and looking forward to more of his works.

Attended Catholic school way back when?Read this.
This short story recollected me to the Sisters who managed and taught at my Catholic elementary school--some loving and kind; others not so. By telling his story of resultant internal struggle for revenge against Brother Euclid, it helped to place my own anger toward controlling and psychologically damaging Sisters into perspective.

Catholic School Experience
This short story is a must read for anyone who grew up attending a Catholic school governed by Brothers or Sisters!The story took me back to my elementary school years with the Sisters of the Holy Cross which were not always happy times. It's a trip into the mind of a young man abused by the system who survived to tell his tale of misery caused to a child by some of the hypocrites of our society masquerading as "good" people. ... Read more

Product Description
In the uneasy peace after World War II, the senior year at Devan School for Boys in New Hampshire changes from a time of fiendships into a stunning drama of tragic betrayal. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (14)

Not even worth it if its free!
I noticed this book had not been given one star yet so I had to be the first. It is just as terrible and boring as A Separate Peace. If you did not like it you will not like this book. Peace Breaks Out and a Separate Peace should be ritualistically burned and then have their ashes put in a vault and dropped in the deepest part of the ocean or perhaps launched into the sun so no student will every have to bear the burden of being forced to read them.

The WASP Voldemort
Wexford, the aloof, manipulative newspaper editor at a postwar Devon school, is startlingly similar to young Tom Riddle, of Harry Potter fame (they are even the same age) although Mr. Wexford is definitely a more determined sociopath.

His adversary is an noisy and aggressive Nazi sympathizer, and it's hard to say which of the two of them is more repellant. Not that they're boring -- I was completely interested in them the whole time.

The book explores questions about what it's "okay" to think and express, how patriotism plays out in an atmosphere of disillusionment, how well-meaning or even brave impulses can be perverted when there's no good place to act them out.

So, it's interesting, but it's...a real come down from A Separate Peace, where the characters, no matter how awful their mistakes were, were always striving to be good people. Knowles makes it clear there's no such thing as Finny in his postwar world.

The characters were not as engaging and vivid as Knowles was capable of -- disappointing really, but only because we know he's done better.

The structure could have been better as well. You'll notice places where key plot information is given only a few paragraphs befor it becomes relevant. Some of the information could have been placed better.

Also, Knowles may or may not have crossed the line between making subtle points about social class and downright snobbery.

The dialogue is fantastic, though. The classroom scenes are the best. Of course, if you think that prep school is even slightly tiresome as a setting, you should just avoid this one.

Great novel!
I loved A Separate Peace, and I loved this follow-up just as much, if not more. It captures the true impulsive nature of young men. Set in post World War Two America, it is a story about ego and revenge. It has the same tone as Salinger's Catcher in the Rye. I loved every page of it.

Peace Breaks Out
Peace Breaks Out by John Knowles, is a novel about life after WWII. The first two chapters were about the days in the war for Pete Hallam and how hard it was after the war was over. After he gets out of the war, he goes back to school and becomes a teacher for High School American History. I liked this book because it shows how much people care for their country and others. Other people that would like this book are ones who would fight for what they believe in and people who like learning about how life was before their time, when people found it more difficult to get back on their feet. This book is about a small-town boy going to serve his country, and react to it after his job was done. I like this book because it includes something different every chapter. I recommend this book to people who like learning about history and how different point of views give you mixed feelings about the war.

Definately Not a Separate Peace
Going in, I knew this book had to be different than Separate Peace, it of course can not be a clone of it. But to be blunt, it wasn't as good as a separate peace. the plot was simple, like a separate peace, but that book had a much more emotional impact on me. i halfwished the story was about Gene and what he did after he left Devon. There were two small references to Phineas, that I enjoyed. It's a decent read and we get to visit Devon one more time. ... Read more

Product Description

On the eve of World War II, America's newest submarine plunged helplessly to the North Atlantic bottom during a test dive.Miraculously, thirty-three crew members still survived.While their wives and girlfriends waited in nearly unbearable tension on shore, their ultimate fate would depend on one man.

In this thrilling true narrative of terror, heroism and courage in the depths of a malevolent ocean, prizewinning author Peter Maas brings us in vivid detail a blow-by-blow account of the disaster and its uncertain outcome.The sub was the Squalus.The man was a U.S. Navy officer, Charles "Swede" Momsen, an extraordinary combination of visionary, scientist and man of action.Until his advent, it was accepted that if a submarine went down, her crew was doomed.But Momsen, in the face of an indifferent, often sneering naval bureaucracy, battling red tape and disbelieving naysayers every step of the way, risked his own life again and again against the unknown in his efforts to invent and pioneer every escape and rescue device, every deep-sea diving technique, to save an entombed crew.With the crippled, partially flooded Squalus lost on the North Atlantic floor, Momsen faced his personal moment of truth: Could he actually pluck those men from a watery grave? Had all his work been in vain?

The legacy of his death-defying probes into our inner space remains with us today, and in this depiction of the perseverance and triumph of the human spirit, Swede Momsen is given his rightful place in the pantheon of true American heroes.

InThe Terrible Hours, Maas reconstructs the harrowing 39 hoursbetween the disappearance of the submarine Squalus during a test diveoff the New England coast and the eventual rescue of 33 crew memberstrapped in the vessel 250 feet beneath the sea. It's also the story ofMomsen's triumph. Under the worst possible circumstances, Momsen led asuccessful mission and helped change the future of undersealifesaving. Not only has Maas written a carefully researched andsuspenseful tribute to a true hero, in the process he has salvaged along-forgotten, riveting piece of American history. --SvenjaSoldovieri ... Read more

Customer Reviews (133)

"...a true hero."
"...a true hero" are the final words of Peter Maas' book about Charles Momsen, Annapolis graduate whose inventiveness in a military system that valued conformity pulled off the first deep water submarine rescue in history.

At the time (1939), US Naval culture considered submarine service to be for losers.But Momsen had the foresight and personal courage to not only volunter to serve in submarines, but also the ingenuity to get the Navy to approve experiments in deep water diving.When on the cusp of WW II the submarine Squalus sank for unknown reasons in 250 feet of the Atlantic on a shakedown cruise and dive with a crew of 57, Momsen was assigned the task of saving the crew and salvaging the state of the art submarine.

Maas puts us in the middle of the challenges, frustrations, obstacles...human, technical and those of nature.We learn the story of the crew trapped inside and of their families.Maas describes the limited history of deep water diving and our own human limits. Fighting against time, Momsen and his team lived "what can go wrong, did go wrong..." Although we know from the book's cover there was a rescue, we don't know until completed the score of lives saved and how obstacles were resolved.

Maas also tells us how he first learned of the story and his challenge in getting it written.

This book is a wonderful discovery.In a contemporary age when our icons
fail to live up to their images, Charles Momsen and his story remind us that there are unsung heroes for us to "keep the faith".

Remarkable story of disaster at sea
This book is expertly written by a very popular author and contains every emotion you can imagine.It's a true life story of a dangerous rescue at sea set off the New England coast.It's hard to put this book down.It's as exciting as the most well written mystery.It's truly one you will remember.

Writer in need of an editor?
I was interested to learn about this true story but couldn't make it past the third chapter.The writing was terrible, or perhaps it was the editing that was at fault.Regardless, this was very poorly done. I'm sorry to say it, but it's so.

Book thrown together with little effort
This book appears to be thrown together without a lot of effort, i.e., it has no photographs, no illustrations, no maps, no index, and no bibliography.

Anyone with a strong interest in the subject should try to find a copy of the older book by Nat Barrows, "Blow All Ballast".

Courage and dedication
The Terrible Hours: The Greatest Submarine Rescue in History
Absolutely the best non-fiction book I have ever read. ... Read more

Product Description
After Cole's mother dies, he and his father go to live with his mother's parents in tiny Albion, New Hampshire. The Emersons make it easier for Cole to cope -- but he is helpless in the face of his father's depression. So Cole turns to Albion itself, and its history. Can the old stories help him handle the present? "Infused with feeling, and shot through with sobering, hilarious, startling, lovely, always well-told incidents...A haunting, thoroughly admirable debut."-- School Library Journal ... Read more

Customer Reviews (7)

Sin Eater - Loved the story
"Sin Eater" was a delightful yet semi-depressing story. The protagonist (Cole) is a young boy who lost his mother to cancer and lost his father to depression.
You just want to shake the father and tell him to get a grip! Grieving comes in all forms though and Cole ends up being the stronger of the two. The father and Cole move to New Hampshire to live with Cole's grandparents. The relationship between the two grandparents is heartwarming and comical. It makes you wonder...would the grandfather have acted the same as the father if he lost his wife?
The story revolves around death and family. Cole moves to New Hampshire after his mother's death, he bonds with his grandparents who seem to meet his needs and he makes new friends (good friends). In the midst of all this, Cole stumbles onto the history of the Sin Eater. As he learns more about the sin eater, he learns more about his ancestry.
Anyway, the end will leave you wondering and questioning, what would make a man want to give up on life? Obviously he loved his wife tremendously. His actions could be considered very romantic instead of depressing. Is love really that deep?
The grandparents are wonderful. I love the relationship they share with each other. The cantankerous ole fool! lol. They're funny and bring a sense of groundedness to the story.
Gary Schmidt has a way of writing that makes you feel like you're there. You can almost smell the meadows and the hayfields and the manure! He's very descriptive! He has a very pretty way of writing. The words he choses and the way he describes things...it's just very pretty!

Sin Eater
Overall I was very pleased with this book.Being familiar with the myth of the "Sin Eater", I was very excited about the topic of what I thought the book would present.After reading about one third of the way through however, I found it slightly odd and frankly disappointing that there had been only a brief sentence or two about a sin eater which appeared within the first chapter of the book.Not to be swayed, however, the book up to that point was filled with emotion and heartache.A young boy and his father return to the family farm after his mother's funeral to start a new life with his grandparents.There is an emptiness that rings through that pages that anyone can take to heart.Cole, the now motherless boy, narrates the text filled with daydreamed memories and a mournful spirit.
Cole is not the only the reader routes for throughout the book.The grandparents are overflowing with a familiarity to my own family that is difficult to overlook.The language that Schmidt uses in anything from dialogue to description is precise and easy to relate to.The images that he paints with words almost pop in the head without purposeful thought.
I did find the plot to move quite slowly for the first 100 pages or so.Although the background and daily observations were necessary to tie the whole story together, I did find myself aching for action.Although the title of the book leads one to believe Schmidt will tell a glorified tale of a real and local sin eater, that is not the case.That may leave some disappointment, but the book adds the myth just enough to flavor the true plot.The novel also brings in minor plots about making friends, being compassionate and trying to make the best out of heartache and sorrow.
Throughout the novel Cole discovers a story about a sin eater who in fact lived on the very same farm he was living on generations ago.The tale of the sin eater leads Cole through a search on his own ancestors.He discovers a generation full of guilt and grudges.He is able to personalize his own feelings of guilt and pain in the memory and stories of his ancestors.Just when the reader has felt enough pain on the behalf of Cole, Schmidt adds a suicide of Cole's father that brings the reader to tears.Schmidt sets the stage and story in such a way that the reader feels the same anger and confusion as Cole.The reader is left in shock and asking why, although they should have seen it coming.
Although the story is woven in pain, it gives the reader a boy reveling in his own family history to find a way to release his own guilt and anger.In the end, Cole uses the story of the sin eater who loosed the guilt of an ancestor and his adopted son to rid Cole of his own guilt and anger toward the loss of his parents.

Scmidt and the Sin Eater
After reading these past reviews as compared to the booklist review, I cannot see how a critic can compare to the real people this book was written for--the regular reader. though it took me but a day to read thisbook, I found it invigorating, insightful and meaningful. I must admit, Iam quite biased, Schmidt is one of my professors and mentors. Yet,regardless of this fact, this story is one that should be told. If not forthe story itself, then for the moral and the message behind it--that oneshouldn't let the hardships of life bring them down, that life goes on..weshould charish life.

Utterly depresing
I read this book and found it, frankly, depresing. If you would like to know, it is about a 15 year old boy who's mother passed away the year before. Now his father and himself have seemed to drift apart. So much thathis father seems like a stranger. At the beginning of the book he reminisesof the so-called Old Days when his mother was still alive, and when theywent on car trips, and how they would play road games, which I hate to saymade me feel ultimitly depressed. Then on about the second chapter, hereaches his grandparents house where he sulks and reminisses some more,while cleaning his grandmother's small family graveyard. At about 2/4through the book, he notices a small picture of a man in a basic flannelshirt and blue jeans. After asking a family friend, he realizes it's atin-type of the legendary Sin Eater. After this dreary period, he finallymakes some local friends who take him to the Sin Eater's former house wherehe finds a treasure. Then Christmas time comes, and his father spends allhis time upstairs in the attic, looking at old pictures, while he refusesto put up a tree, because of the memories of past Christmas's when his wifewas still alive. I won't tell you the rest, in case you would like to readit yourself, but it ends in a somewhat happy ending. I would not recommedthis book, but I suppose some people might like it, if your the type ofperson who enjoys some-what depressing lituature.

This is one of the best young-adult books I've ever read.
This book is a true gem. It is beautifully written and constructed. The reviewer from Booklist seems to have misunderstood the book when she said that the Sin Eater element was not well integrated -- all of the elementsof this book are perfectly integrated. It is, in fact, the Sin Eater"character"(as well as Cole's grandparents, friends andcommunity) that allow Cole to cope with and understand his loss. This is atruly beautiful book with many layers of meaning. It is about the value offamily history and experience, the past, community, faith... It's a bookthat will make you think. It's a book you will want to reread. Don't takeit lightly and don't miss it! ... Read more

Product Description
FOR USE IN SCHOOLS AND LIBRARIES ONLY. Naturalist and author, Sy Montgomery, learns lessons of friendship, family, and community when she and her husband take in a runt pig who becomes a 750-pound celebrity and ""great big Buddha master. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (71)

Disappointing
This book was very disappointing.The only thing extraordinary about Sy Montgomery's pig was that he was allowed to live a full life and not sent to the butcher before his first birthday.I would suspect that he was actually pretty average as pet pigs go.Ms. Montgomery apparently is unaware that the fact that she has to write an entire memoir of her own life during the time that she had the pig as a pet and her interactions with him relative to what was happening in her life is indicative of the fact that her pet was not so very fascinating or extraordinary.As other reviewers have said, reading this book is like being with super-indulgent parents who thinks everything their little tyke does is just the most incredible, extraordinary, wonderful and prodigiously clever actions of all time when other children do exactly the same thing. Most pet owners could write exactly the same kind of book about their dogs and cats or Vietnamese pot bellied pigs and they wouldn't be published.The pig does nothing that even strikes the reader as unusual whatsoever, except for being kept as a pet.

I was hoping there would be more information about the behavior of pigs and their abilities. Instead I learned far too much about Ms. Montgomery's personal life, including her childhood(!!!), her marriage, other books she has written, most of her neighbors and her relationships with them and every trip she's taken to do research for her writing.

It seems that she fed her pet way too much for his own physical well-being.I don't understand why it was lost on her that responsible owners do not allow their chowhound dogs to eat as much as they want at will but she was happy to let her pet pig eat himself sick.

I found Ms. Montgomery's comments about human babies and children to be pretty offensive and ironic, coming from someone who partially makes a living out of writing books for children.Referring to human babies as resembling insect larvae did not warm this mother's heart.

It took a village to raise this pig.
The title of this book is a bit of a misnomer, since it's not just about the life of Christopher Hogwood, but is also a memoir by science writer Sy Montgomery about her own life.Some of her personal story intersects with the story of the pig in question, and some does not.However, since in this book the pig's place within her family clearly functions as a "center of condensation" for her ideas about her own life, nature, and community ties, the title was probably only a degree or so off target.

Whether or not a memoir is interesting is generally a subjective matter, even in the cases of writings by hugely famous people.There are those who have written here that the book was no good because the pig was not extraordinary and the author wrote too much of herself.Well, if you can't write about yourself in a memoir, where can you?

As for the pig, aside from sometimes making himself a nuisance, he effected many healings.There were the two girls who found happiness with him after being abandoned by their fathers.There was another young girl, dying of cancer, who depended on Christopher for much of the joy she experienced in her final months.There was the woman whom Christopher helped heal from the trauma of having seen a cherished pet shot to death. And there was the woman who distanced herself from an unhappy marriage, came to live by Christopher, befriended him along with the estranged parts of herself, and thereby healed herself and her marriage.

Perhaps, though, it's true that Christopher was not so very different from any other pig.Anyone with a knack for communing with animals must admit that any animal whom we get to know deeply is indeed extraordinary.According to a recent article in Science News, scientists are starting to address the fact that even invertebrates such as spiders have personalities:that is, they have found differences within given Arachnid species between how various individuals react to their environments and events.In other words, even the so-called "lower order" animals are not predictable machines.

The more biologically complex a species, the more variety we can expect between its members.In the case of humans, personalities seem to be as infinitely variable as fingerprints.Pigs have complex psyches and are extraordinarily intelligent, rivalling if not surpassing dogs (some of the data on this are discussed in the book), and thus any pig you meet who has been raised in an "enriched" social environment is going to really shine. Apparently Christopher Hogwood shone plenty, since he had enough admirers throughout the community to keep him fed to the tune of 750 pounds of body weight.And even if Christopher was not so different than any other pampered pig, clearly he was extraordinary to the woman who raised him.And after all the love and care she devoted to him, we must allow her that sentiment.

I found the author's stories about herself, her town, and her pig to be hope-inspiring.The fact that there are still places where neighbors help each other, care about their animals, and mourn each others' losses is significant in our era of disintegrating social mores and increasing lack of decency.That there are people like Ms. Montgomery who make it their calling to act as interspecies ambassadors should encourage all of us who find our culture's anthropocentric insensitivity to animals insupportably brutish.

What was extraordinary to me about Christopher was that he had such an impact on so many people.A personality of note not just in his home town but throughout New England and points beyond, his life must have held some measure of meaning in the eyes of those who admired him.Exactly what that meaning was of course would have varied among individuals, in accordance with their unique personalities.However, one thing is clear to all of us who love and respect other species: rather than mere objects for our use, those others can be fellow subjects in this miraculous world, subjects who feel, think, play, and often teach us profound lessons about ourselves.

A Good Good Book!!
It was a joy to read this book, written by someone who loves her pets as much as I love mine.Montgomerey's writing so often reflected what I think and feel about my two precious dogs that I read large portions of the book with tears in my eyes.The animal/human bond is an etra-ordinary thing.From the beginning of the book, we find out that the author's father--a father she idolizes is dying of Cancer; She's losing her house and cant get out of bed, that is until she brings home a sickly pig and that pig gives her a reason to keep going.And so begins the story of the wonderful relationship between a couple and thier pig.It is a wonderful story.My thought is that animals remind us of the best psrt of ourselves, their love is unconditional: they are a constant source of humor, comfort and joy. Christopher Hogwood embodied all these things for the people in his community--they all became his family.This is a wonderful story to remind us all of what is important.I feel lucky to have read it!

very different slant on animals
This book is so different !The author has a wonderful psychological link with animals & it's riveting to read about it.She makes the animals come alive & after you read it you can never again think of them in any other way.

pig buddha
Enlightening if you can understand. No matter what, a real joy for me to read.One review said Christopher is a pig buddha.You might have to think about it for awhile, it is true and delightful.Montgomery writes the way I like.Refreshing.
Purchased only because a friend had it.Who would ever consider buying a book about a pig?The last xmas card picture of Christopher did it.There is humor, fun and innocent wisdom. ... Read more

Product Description
One of a series of top-quality fiction for schools, this is the story of a friendship between two 16-year-old boys in an American boarding school - one a natural athlete and the other a scholar. Their different temperaments cause tensions that lead to tragedy. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (791)

Great buy
Wanted this book since we recently moved to NH and live near Exeter - where the prep school is based.Good quality, as expected.Great buy.

Boring.
Overall the book was not interesting but I did see some good in it, It really does bring you back in the past but it was just not interesting. The plot was good, laid-out very well, but I felt like things were going a little bit too slow for me, there wasn't much action to it besides maybe 3 scenes. This was my summer reading book for school though. And I read many books before and this is by far one of the worst I read. I just wanted to really stop reading it, almost tear the page off. But i had to for school. This is more for older people to read. Im 16 and couldn't find anything good to read in this book. I just didn't like it.

A Good Read
This book was one of the most exciting books I've read. It starts out somewhat boring like all other books, but it gets better as the story progresses. John Knowles must be a genius!

Very pleased with it over all
I had to read this book for school, and I thought it was a good book.It was, in all, a well written novel.

4.5 Stars . . . A Muted War
Had I been subjected to this novel as a school assignment, I, like many of the younger reviewers on here, might have found it a chore to get through. The action is sparse, the conflict more psychological than physical, and the setting hard to relate to for readers in 2010. And yet, I loved it.

"A Separate Peace" follows two high school boys, at a New England private school in 1942 and '43, as they tumble through one glorious summer and then face the consequences of that summer and the ensuing darkness of winter and world war. Gene Forrester is the intelligent, brooding narrator of the story, and he draws us into the carefree and charismatic world of his best friend, Phineas. Finny, as he is known, challenges other boys to acts of courage, comes up with unannounced winter festivals, and pushes the boundaries with his somber schoolteachers. Despite his wild-child ways, Finny never seems to get in trouble. The teachers realize he means no serious harm and acts out of no real rebellion. This intrigues many of Finny's classmates, but Gene begins to suspect an ulterior motive--and once he buys into this suspicion, finds himself plotting against his own friend.

Gene's actions lead to trouble for Finny, but Gene is the one locked away in a world of guilt and deception. Soon, other schoolmates latch onto the truth, and they push for a full unveiling. In the end, the results are somewhat sudden, surprising, yet inevitable. As others prepare for recruitment into the war, Gene discovers a separate peace inside himself, the lull after he has fought his own muted war. Like the much darker "Lord of the Flies," this book explores the evil that can sprout within the human heart, even in the midst of idyllic surroundings. Jealousy, envy, suspicion, rage--they all show their hands through John Knowles' vivid and utterly believable narrative. ... Read more

Product Description
This book provides a sustained look at literacy development and language instruction across the curriculum in a teacher's primary classroom during one school year. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (2)

My Thoughts on The Author's Chair and Beyond
Children have a great imagination, and this book is great to have when you are starting to teach young children how to write.Great ideas are given such as what materials to have in writing centers and how to go about using the writing center.Karelitz pretty much explains that the writing process for children ismuch like the writing process taken for adults and if you can have the children use this process and make them feel comfortable while using the method, it is a great success."The Authors Chair" is a must have book for teaching children the essentials to becoming a great writer. This is also a must have book for those of you in the teaching profession and those wanting to become educators.It was fun to read and it fills you with ideas and great teaching techniques used in teaching the writing process.

My Thoughts on The Author's Chair and Beyond
Children have a great imagination, and this book is great to have when you are starting to teach young children how to write.Great ideas are given such as what materials to have in writing centers and how to go about using the writing center.Karelitz pretty much explains that the writing process for children ismuch like the writing process taken for adults and if you can have the children use this process and make them feel comfortable while using the method, it is a great success."The Authors Chair" is a must have book for teaching children the essentials to becoming a great writer. This is also a must have book for those of you in the teaching profession and those wanting to become educators.It was fun to read and it fills you with ideas and great teaching techniques used in teaching the writing process. ... Read more

Product Description
In 1930, philanthropist Edward S. Harkness bestowed a gift of $5.8 million on Phillips Exeter Academy, expecting to inspire "something revolutionary" in secondary education. The gift enabled the Exeter, New Hampshire, academy to redesign pedagogy and classrooms around distinctive oval "Harkness tables" that could accommodate twelve students plus a teacher and to remake its campus into a residential community.The gift transformed education at the school, but its impact spread well beyond the classroom.Since 1930, principles of free and open inquiry and discussion have come to animate Exeter's efforts to deal with major challenges and changes, including working with an increasingly diverse community, introducing coeducation, and governing and financing a large,complex institution.After the Harkness Gift demonstrates how one leading independent school adopted a distinctive approach to teaching and learning and then successfully adapted it in the service of continuing institutional change. ... Read more

Product Description
When Jack St. Bride arrives by chance in the sleepy New England town of Salem Falls, he decides to reinvent himself. Tall, blond, and handsome, Jack was once a beloved teacher and soccer coach at a girls' prep school -- until a student's crush sparked a powder keg of accusation and robbed him of his reputation. Now, working for minimum wage washing dishes for Addie Peabody at the Do-Or-Diner, Jack buries his past, content to become the mysterious stranger who has appeared out of the blue.

With ghosts of her own haunting her, Addie Peabody is as cautious around men as Jack St. Bride is around women. But as this unassuming stranger steps smoothly into the diner's daily routine, she finds him fitting just as comfortably inside her heart -- and slowly, a gentle, healing love takes hold between them.

Yet planting roots in Salem Falls may prove fateful for Jack. Amid the white-painted centuries-old churches, a quartet of bored, privileged teenage girls have formed a coven that is crossing the line between amusement and malicious intent. Quick to notice the attractive new employee at Addie's diner, the girls turn Jack's world upside down with a shattering allegation that causes history to repeat itself -- and forces Jack to proclaim his innocence once again. Suddenly nothing in Salem Falls is as it seems: a safe haven turns dangerous, an innocent girl meets evil face-to-face, a dishwasher with a Ph.D. is revealed to be an ex-con. As Jack's hidden past catches up with him, the seams of this tiny town begin to tear, and the emerging truth becomes a slippery concept written in shades of gray. Now Addie, desperate for answers, must look into her heart -- and into Jack's lies and shadowy secrets -- for evidence that will condemn or redeem the man she has come to love. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (164)

Poor language
I thought I was going to enjoy this author I recently came upon.I greatly enjoyed Nineteen Minutes and bought Salem Falls next.The poor language (taking the Lord's name in vain) has been a huge turn off; I'm actually embarrassed to listen to this audio book while my son is around.Jodi Picoult, please refrain from this langauge!It is not needed to form the characters or make a point in the book.

Cant Go Wrong With A Picoult Novel
This book kept me up well into the night reading... Love the way Picoult always teaches you something new in her novels, in this case about Wiccan.

I really enjoyed the characters in this book, had trouble understanding Jack's mother though or why he'd want to bother visiting her after the way she treated him!

The only flaw was Charlies storyline was completely predictable, right from where he was sitting drinking with his old football coach and it was obvious where his story was heading. Well actually it was probably obvious from when we first meet him in the novel in hindsight, but i didnt pick up on it at first.

The reason this is getting a 4 star from me and not a 5 (Picoults books usually get 5 stars from me) is because of the abrupt ending. Picoults usual twist at the end just isnt here. I d never ve guessed she d end the book like this because she's not usually that predictable.

On the whole though, I really enjoyed this book, lots of amusing bits too, like when Roy brings everyone Muffins and Matt refuses to eat one on principle. Love it! Matt was quite likable in this story too, even though he was working for the prosecution. His love for his daughter Molly would melt the hardest heart.

There are quite a few father daughter/mother son relationships in this story each of these relationships has a story in itself. Amos and Gillian, Charlie and Meg Roy and Addie Jordon and Thomas and Jack and his mother.

Strange that the fourth girl in Gillian's circle is not really brought into the book more, to the extent that I cant even remember her name! Gillian, Meg and Chelsea all play a large part in the story.

I dont think ill ever stop reading Picoult, as long as she keeps writing, ill keep reading.

Just ok.
This book follows the typical Picoult format...bouncing back and forth with stories all coming together at the end.

Picoult is famous for the "shocking ending," but in this case, I felt it was oddly predictable, yet totally random and pointless.

Good, but fell a little short
First, I enjoyed the book and it was one that I didn't want to stop reading once I started. The premise is one that I love, the innocent man fighting to prove his innocence. The book starts strong, making us feel for both Jack and Addie. We see Jack as a kind, sensitive man whodue to his good looks and profession (teacher, coach) is the kind of guy schoolgirl dreams are made of. It turns into a curse when accusations are aimed at him and he's forced to into a corner.

Addie has a tragic past that she can't or won't forget, and when Jack walks into her life, the two are drawn to each other.

The first half of the book sucked me in, but the second half focused on other characters, with Jack and Addie turned into almost secondary characters, even though it is their fate that is going to be decided at the end of the book. For me, that made the book less compelling. I wanted it to stick with Jack and Addie's pov, but instead, we see most of the rest of the book through the defense attorney's eyes.

Very disappointed with this book and Jodi Picoult
I'm a big fan and have read a bunch of books by her - 19 minutes, Plain Truth, Vanishing Act, The Pact, and My Sister's Keeper.I loved those books.Is it me, or does the majority of her books have some type of court room scene?
Salem Falls, I couldn't get passed page 51.It seemed that every chapter she added new characters that would confuse the heck out of me.....and the story was so slow and I just didn't like the character of Addie........and found Jack's character just too hard to figure out.And wayyyyyy too many characters to keep track of -
This won't deter me from Jodi's books, but I'm hoping I don't cross another bad one......I do NOT recommend this book - it was terrible.....sorry Jodi. ... Read more