A wealthy and notorious clan, the Bellefleurs live in a region not unlike the Adirondacks, in an enormous mansion on the shores of mythic Lake Noir. They own vast lands and profitable businesses, they employ their neighbors, and they influence the government. A prolific and eccentric group, they include several millionaires; a mass murderer; a spiritual seeker who climbs into the mountains looking for God; a wealthy noctambulist who dies of a chicken scratch; a baby, Germaine - the heroine of the novel - and her parents, Leah and Gideon. Written with a voluptuousness and immediacy unusual even for Oates, "Bellefleur" is widely regarded as one of her masterworks.
--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
| ||||||||||||||||||||||||
Book Description
Product Details
Would you like to update product info or give feedback on images?
|
More About the Author
Joyce Carol Oates is the author of more than 70 books, including novels, short story collections, poetry volumes, plays, essays, and criticism, including the national bestsellers We Were the Mulvaneys and Blonde. Among her many honors are the PEN/Malamud Award for Excellence in Short Fiction and the National Book Award. Oates is the Roger S. Berlind Distinguished Professor of the Humanities at Princeton University, and has been a member of the American Academy of Arts and Letters since 1978.
Customer Reviews
|
Share your thoughts with other customers:
|
||||||||||||||||||||||
|
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
31 of 35 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Haunting and Extraordinary,
By
Amazon Verified Purchase(What's this?)
This review is from: Bellefleur (Mass Market Paperback)
Bellefleur by Joyce Carol Oates is ranked as one of my most favorite novels of all time; I savored this gothic tale cover to cover and didn't want it to end. It possesses a life of it's own, the characters became ghosts that would haunt me after setting it aside after a short reading and I would look forward to picking it up again. After I finished it, I felt homesick in a peculiar way that no book has ever done to me before; it is very likely that I will revisit the pages of Bellefleur again. Each chapter is an opulent sliver of time that peers into the lives and thoughts of the residents of Bellefleur Manor, an American family of notorious distinction. Their history is rife with joys and sorrows deftly exposed by the astounding craft that is signature in JCO's prolific literary career. The mesmerizing shifts of time, like historical memories, travel from the heights of the imposing Mount Blanc, wind through the decadent rooms of Bellefleur Manor, and plunge into the depths of mysterious Lake Noir where disconcerting spirits dwell. The fanciful characters endear themselves because of their human vitality and cause despair because of their human flaws; they are very tangible and seductive in spite of the brief glimpses into their lives. This is not a book for the faint of heart for it isn't a serene walk in the walled garden of Bellefleur Manor. JCO reveals the grotesque that exists within the soul of the American dream, and with abrupt grace she divulges the unforeseen twists of fate that arise with incredible violence that will leave you reeling with astonishment. It is a unique and contemplative tale, not to be consumed in a few sittings; however, the temptation of the eloquent prose begs to be gorged until the reader is sated. Open this book and open your mind, and give your imagination a workout. If you read this book with a rigid, black and white mind-set you will come away frustrated by it. I highly recommend this novel to anyone who is looking for something out of the ordinary to read.
18 of 20 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
This book bumps Marquez down a notch,
By Lindsay Elizabeth Newlin (Boulder, CO) - See all my reviews
This review is from: Bellefleur (Mass Market Paperback)
Next to Marquez's 100 Years of Solitude, Bellefleur has been the most entertaining and absording book I have ever read. Forget the meandering chronology, forget the "plot": this book is like a prosaic photo album of an extraordinary and haunted family that will leave you entirely drawn in. I picked this book up on a whim and am so glad I did, I find myself thinking about the characters still many months after reading it. For everyone who loves 100 Years of Solitude (and everyone else!), this book is an absolute must read.
18 of 21 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
One of the best novels ever written,
By A Customer
This review is from: Bellefleur (Mass Market Paperback)
I will admit from the outset that I am NOT a diehard Joyce Carol Oates fan, but in this book she manages to retain all of her strengths (her poetry, her characterizations) and somehow minimize all of her weaknesses (most notably what seems to be a real masochistic/sadistic streak--check out Blonde, for example). I've always read this as an homage of some sort to Garcia Marquez's 100 Years of Solitude, and even in comparison to the masterpiece that THAT book is--this well holds it own. It might even be better. (And if you can't sacrifice chronology to theme every once in a while, well, you might as well be reading Danielle Steele.)
Share your thoughts with other customers: Create your own review
|
|
Inside This Book
(learn more)
Browse and search another edition of this book.
Browse and search another edition of this book.
First Sentence:
It was many years ago in that dark, chaotic, unfathomable pool of time before Germaine's birth (nearly twelve months before her birth), on a night in late September stirred by innumerable frenzied winds, like spirits contending with one another-now plaintively, now angrily, now with a subtle cellolike delicacy capable of making the flesh rise on one's arms and neck-a night so sulfurous, so restless, so swollen with inarticulate longing that Leah and Gideon Bellefleur in their enormous bed quarreled once again, brought to tears because their love was too ravenous to be contained by their mere mortal bodies; and their groping, careless, anguished words were like strips of raw silk rubbed violently together (for each was convinced that the other did not, could not, be equal to his love-Leah doubted that any man was capable of a love so profound it could lie silent, like a forest pond; Gideon doubted that any woman was capable of Read the first page Key Phrases - Statistically Improbable Phrases (SIPs): (learn more)
elk manure, jaws devour, superb health Key Phrases - Capitalized Phrases (CAPs): (learn more)
Lake Noir, Bellefleur Manor, Raphael Bellefleur, Gideon Bellefleur, Nautauga Falls, Bushkill's Ferry, Lord Dunraven, Fort Hanna, Jean-Pierre Bellefleur, Mount Blanc, Turquoise Room, Mink Pond, Noir Vulture, Nicholas Fuhr, Port Oriskany, Lamentations of Jeremiah, New York, Stanton Pym, Mink Creek, White Sulphur Springs, Charles Xavier, Garnet Hecht, Miss Leah, Silver Lake, Bloody Run New!
Concordance | Text Stats Browse Sample Pages:
Front Cover | Table of Contents | First Pages | Back Cover | Surprise Me!
It was many years ago in that dark, chaotic, unfathomable pool of time before Germaine's birth (nearly twelve months before her birth), on a night in late September stirred by innumerable frenzied winds, like spirits contending with one another-now plaintively, now angrily, now with a subtle cellolike delicacy capable of making the flesh rise on one's arms and neck-a night so sulfurous, so restless, so swollen with inarticulate longing that Leah and Gideon Bellefleur in their enormous bed quarreled once again, brought to tears because their love was too ravenous to be contained by their mere mortal bodies; and their groping, careless, anguished words were like strips of raw silk rubbed violently together (for each was convinced that the other did not, could not, be equal to his love-Leah doubted that any man was capable of a love so profound it could lie silent, like a forest pond; Gideon doubted that any woman was capable of Read the first page Key Phrases - Statistically Improbable Phrases (SIPs): (learn more)
elk manure, jaws devour, superb health Key Phrases - Capitalized Phrases (CAPs): (learn more)
Lake Noir, Bellefleur Manor, Raphael Bellefleur, Gideon Bellefleur, Nautauga Falls, Bushkill's Ferry, Lord Dunraven, Fort Hanna, Jean-Pierre Bellefleur, Mount Blanc, Turquoise Room, Mink Pond, Noir Vulture, Nicholas Fuhr, Port Oriskany, Lamentations of Jeremiah, New York, Stanton Pym, Mink Creek, White Sulphur Springs, Charles Xavier, Garnet Hecht, Miss Leah, Silver Lake, Bloody Run New!
Concordance | Text Stats Browse Sample Pages:
Front Cover | Table of Contents | First Pages | Back Cover | Surprise Me!
Citations (learn more)
This book cites 18
books:
See all 18 books this book cites
- You Must Remember This by Joyce Carol Oates in Front Matter
- Son of the Morning by Joyce Carol Oates in Front Matter
- With Shuddering Fall by Joyce Carol Oates in Front Matter
- A Garden of Earthly Delights (20th Century Rediscoveries Series) by Joyce Carol Oates in Front Matter
- Once Upon a Time (Read and Share) by Vivian French on page 378
See all 18 books this book cites
What Other Items Do Customers Buy After Viewing This Item?
Suggested Tags from Similar Products(What's this?)Be the first one to add a relevant tag (keyword that's strongly related to this product).
|
Sell a Digital Version of This Book in the Kindle Store
If you are a publisher or author and hold the digital rights to a book, you can sell a digital version of it in our Kindle Store.
Learn more
Customer Discussions
|
This product's forum
Active discussions in related forums
Search Customer Discussions
|
Related forums
|
