Alma Mater [Paperback]

Rita Mae Brown (Author)

Product Details

• Paperback: 260 pages
• Publisher: Ballentine Publishing Group; 1ST edition (2001)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 096532219X
• ISBN-13: 978-0965322195
• Product Dimensions: 9.1 x 6.1 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 12.8 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 2.9 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (35 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #9,982,106 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Rita Mae Brown is the bestselling author of the Sister Jane novels-Outfoxed, Hotspur, Full Cry, The Hunt Ball, The Hounds and the Fury, The Tell-Tale Horse, and Hounded to Death-as well as the Sneaky Pie Brown mysteries and Rubyfruit Jungle, In Her Day, Six of One, and The Sand Castle, among many others. An Emmy-nominated screenwriter and a poet, Brown lives in Afton, Virginia.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The best Rita Mae book yet., April 1, 2006

By 

V. Meredith Toenjes (Kansas City, KS USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Alma Mater (Paperback)

Other than her mystery series, I've read every novel Rita Mae Brown has written. I read "Rubyfruit Jungle" so many times in my teen years that I'd memorized quite a bit of it. "Six of One" is also one of my favorite reads in any genre. Alma Mater is both of those all grown up. It is all the good parts of those books and more. Set in 1980, two girls at the end of their time in college meet and, in a suprise for both of them, they fall in love. What happens around that and the characters that inhabit their lives makes for an incredible read.
Once I read it, I wanted to be able to read it again for the first time.

18 of 22 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars Once Upon A Time . . . But No More, November 18, 2001

By 

C. Wilcox "Rainbow Goddess" (Seattle WA USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Alma Mater (Hardcover)

I confess. Once upon a time I was a great fan of Rita Mae Brown. Unfortunately, "Alma Mater" provides indisputable proof that her talent is diminishing at an alarming rate. This story of a young woman's coming to terms with her sexuality is inexplicably set in 1980. There is no reference to the culture or politics of the time (do Ronald Reagan & Anita Bryant ring a bell?). The only apparent reason for the trip back in time is so that the characters can indulge in unprotected sex. And even those pedestrian sex scenes can't spice up this tripe. The book follows the life of college senior Victoria Savedge and her family, friends and neighbors, good Southerners all. Ms. Brown has a tendency to create flat characters who are all flawlessly beautiful, who say and do the right thing. She doesn't seem to know the difference between dialog and diatribe. The book is full of lengthy speeches and ruminations on the nature of love, loyalty, fate, etc. Victoria must choose between the expectations of her parent & society or following her own heart (and other parts of her anatomy). This is ground that Ms. Brown has covered previously, and it's not clear why she feels the need to repeat herself. If Ms. Brown spent as much time plotting her novel as she does describing the Virginia sky, this would probably be a different book altogether. As it is, one finds it difficult to care about the characters, especially when their actions and reactions are so unrealistic as to border on ridiculous. Overall, this book feels like a first draft that was never corrected -- an oversimplified plot, cardboard characters, and a rushed and unsatisfactory ending. A story with a lot of potential that follows the most predictable, and sometimes ludicrous, path. So don't waste your time. Read some of Rita Mae's work prior to 1987 if you want to find out what a great writer she used to be.

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars Ugh. Save your money and time for something better., May 1, 2003

By A Customer

This review is from: Alma Mater (Paperback)

I for some reason wanted to read a particular Rita Mae Brown book (this wasn't it) but forgot which one when I went to the library. So I chose this one off the shelf because I went to the College of William and Mary, a prestigious university. I wish she'd just made up some school, because it embarrasses me that she's supposed to be writing about my alma mater. She has no idea what she's talking about and is way off on a lot of the details, terminology, and layout, which just bugged the heck out of me. Now those of you unfamiliar with W&M may say, "So what?" and not care, but this just shows you that the author did not do her research and thus you have to wonder about the research, thought, and effort that went into the rest of this book and her other books. If you're going to pick a real university as your backdrop, get the details right!

A student with a clean record would not be expelled for dressing up a statue with no permanent damage, even if the statue were a religious one off campus, as it is in this book. On W&M's campus, Thomas Jefferson gets a party hat and balloons every year on his birthday, and a pumpkin on his head for Halloween.

I don't think her depiction of life and attitudes in that part of Virginia is at all accurate, even for 1980, which is when the story takes place. And I seriously doubt there are several new car dealerships in Surry County (if any). The little details can make all the difference, and when they're inaccurate, the entire work suffers.

The characters are not fully developed and I didn't care about a single one of them. The writing was poor and the story fairly predictable. I found myself skipping over large parts of text and skimming a lot. The epilogue crams the resolutions of the characters' lives into a hastily written five pages.

Reading this was a waste of time.