Against the Season [Paperback]

Jane Rule (Author)

Product Details

• Paperback: 224 pages
• Publisher: Naiad Pr; First Edition edition (January 1984)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0930044487
• ISBN-13: 978-0930044480
• Product Dimensions: 8.4 x 5.4 x 0.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 10.4 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,079,316 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

3 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Quirky book about living, May 30, 2000

By A Customer

This review is from: Against the Season (Paperback)

A novel about the tangled lives of small town folks both young and old and the relationships that evolve among them. A story that brings together people from various places and stages in their lives - Amelia, an older woman who recently lost her sister; Agate her young, pregnant housekeeper; Cole Amelia's grandnephew; Dina, the used furniture dealer; and Rosemary, the town social worker to name a few. Throw in some humourous misunderstandings, and this makes for some interesting reading.

3 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Still one of my favorites after 20 years., February 12, 2007

By 

Bent Lady - See all my reviews

This review is from: Against the Season (Paperback)

About a collection of characters, men and women of all types, in a smallish New England town. All of them connected through their relationship with the elderly Amelia Larson, one of the town's surviving matriarchs.

About love, hate, foolishness and consequence, compassion, romance, regret, life, death, complications, men's mental crap, women's mental crap, sticky situations, sex, pain, loss, dancing Greek sailors, change...

At turns funny, angering, erotic without being pornographic, sweet, and terribly realistic throughout. Most of the characters will become beloved friends, and those who don't will at least win your empathy.

The author doesn't insult the reader's intelligence with two dimensional characters, overused cliches, and unnecessary sentiment.

This story was set in a time when people still had to take responsibility for their own actions. And even though two of the main characters are lesbos (I can say that...*I'm* a lesbo), this book is definitely NOT PC. So if you're a liberal, you might want to stick to Alice Walker.

This book will make you *feel*. Some things have been lost in our modern society. Things like honor, integrity, a sense of duty, loyalty, morality. Those things we lost are in this book. Get out the tissue.

Because of the tone of the book, I would recommend it to anyone except leftist Democrats/Socialists. (Like I said, it is set during a time in the U.S. when folks had to take responsibility for their own actions.)

Generally speaking, this story has been told many times before, by other authors about different characters living in different times, and perhaps different countries. But this version is the most satisfying, realistic, engaging, erotic, heartbreaking yet uplifting one I've read so far.

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