Customer Reviews

Bring Us the Old People

5 star:		(6)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(3)

 

 

From the moment I read the opening sentances of this book I was hooked in. Maime pulled me into her reality in a way that very few characters ever have. I had been looking for a piece to do for Dramatic Interpretation in speech/debate when I came across it.

Marisa Kantor Stark did a wonderful job on this novel. And with this performance peice I won the position of 1st Alternate to the National Tournament from my state.

Truly, I have come to love Maime. I especially like the parts where she would flashback to a time in her past. There were so many themes in this book it was hard to cut some of them to make the 10 minute time limit.

Now, as a person who has memorized pieces of this novel by heart, I reccomend to the book not just as an award winning performance piece, but as a wonderful read.

Pick it up! Stark will not disappoint you.

An excellent novel that represents the reality of moral questions that faced so many during the Holocaust. Maimie's actions seem so easy to condemn at times and yet so disturbing to the reader who is forced to asked themselves about their own actions during such circumstances. Stark's use of flashbacks to tell the story is first rate. A thought provoking read.

As the grandson of Jewish, Polish Holocaust survivors who has spent countless hours listening to tales of fear and sorrow relating to both war-time and post-war life, I related very well to the themes and main character in Stark's book. I found the book to be very well-written and enjoyed it immensely. I look forward to Stark's next work - regardless of the subject matter. Congratulations on an excellent debut novel!

This novel is an intriguing account of an elderly woman's experiences in World War II. The author captures the character of Mamie perfectly, bringing her to life in every respect. I loved the book; once I started it I couldn't put it down! I would definitely recommend it to any reader.....

While there are so many positive things that I can say about this book, I feel that I must emphasize the narrator's voice. Maime's voice is powerful and resonant, converting her from a character in a novel to a real person with real hopes and dreams and very real shortcomings. It is this overwhelming sense of reality that sets this novel apart from others of its genre. I sincerely hope that Ms. Stark will continue to create characters that are capable of generating the emotional pull of Maime.

This is a fascinating tale of an elderly Polish woman's early life; married life; surviving the holocaust and making a new life in America. She tells this story from a nursing home and is over 90 years old at this time. The narration is not gramatically correct but the words of an uneducated but smart lady.She is very upset that her nephew placed her in the nursing home and attempts to escape while reminiscing about her life. Excellent first novel

I assume that this was published because of the subject matter, which might have been interesting in the hands of a more talented writer. This is workshop prose designed to please a workshop teacher--clipped, stripped-down style, with enough invoking of "weighty" issues to give the appearance of being serious. Sadly, this story doesn't cut it.

Mamie's voice is unengaging, and her broken speech gets not only insufferable but offensive at times. I agree with the reviewer who said that the pivotal moment was buried far too deep in the book to justify reading it, and at no point is there any mention of the moral and ethical issues faced by the narrator. In an era where workshop prose by Raymond Carver write-alikes rules the day, it's easy to see how this got published, but that doesn't mean it's worthwhile.

boring. The book reads like a writing workshop exercise, not a novel. Maime's tone is one of unwavering petulancy, and the book's central device (she turned in her parents to avoid capture) is breezed over, with hardly a mention of its political, ethical implications. It's impossible to get into the character, and by the end of the book, my sole question was: Why bother?

This book on the Holocaust is an embarrassment for those who have survived. This young writer should chose subjects she might be more familiar with, like what's it's like to be a rich, spoiled brat who went to Princeton.Perhaps then she can lend insight into a subject.