Customer Reviews

Dream When You're Feeling Blue: A Novel

5 star:		(24)
4 star:		(22)
3 star:		(39)
2 star:		(35)
1 star:		(20)

 

 

I am surprised to read some of the other reviews of this book, because I found this to be one of Berg's best. As a child of the 60's, most of what I know of WW2 is from a historical perspective. Berg made the second World War come to life for me, and put it in human perspective. It was sobering to realize that the worry about the soldiers in Iraq now is not so much different from how people worried about the soldiers back then. Will we never learn? I've read other novels of WW2, but found it refreshing how Berg allowed the character of Kitty to grow and develop questions about the patriotism of the day.

Coming from an Irish family, the accounts of daily life with the Heaney's struck a chord with me.

After a book rich with details and and a story evolving slowly, the ending came in a rush with so many unanswered questions. With her usual style and skill, Elizabeth Berg draws well defined characters that you can almost picture in your mind like an old movie. With an ability to capture the essence of every day life unlike any other, she enables you to live along with the characters.

Perhaps as another reviewer suggested, the author will write a sequel to fill in the gaps from the end of the WW2 period to the conclusion of the book that will provide the detail that we all crave. A book written from the vantage point of each of the other sisters - Louise and Tish - or even the mother, Margaret (who was strong and interesting in the glimpse we got of her)- would be possible without being overly redundant.

Much as I enjoyed the book, I was disappointed in the ending because it cheated us of the same level of detail that the rest of the book provided. It was like buying a candy bar, eating half and finding the second half was cardboard. Yup, we got a dramatic conclusion, but it landed with a thunk.

More story, please.

Oh, I hoped this would be good. I expected it to be good; at her best, Berg is such a great writer. And I have to say that I wonder whether this book would have been published if it had been submitted to an editor by an unknown.

I appreciate when authors do research for their books, but the trick is to use it wisely, to not overpower the reader by showing off all you know. The whole time I read I was thinking, Yes, we know you did your research. It was period-detail-drenched.

Which would have been forgivable if I had fallen in love with the characters. I kept waiting to. Expecting to. And I never did. When Berg's at her best, you can see inside the souls of her characters. In DREAM WHEN YOU'RE FEELING BLUE, I felt like she gave a shallow portrayal that was only rich in period details.

And it must be said; it had the most wholly unsatisfying and unbelievable ending I've come across in a long, long time.

I really loved "Dream When You're Feeling Blue" by Elizabeth Berg--that is, right up until the end. After reading the ending and thinking about it for a few days, I am sorry to say that I would not recommend this book. In my estimation, the ending is not believable.

The book tells the story of the tight-knit family living in Chicago during the later years of World War II. There are three older sisters and two younger brothers--and one bathroom that figures frequently and humorously throughout. The book focuses on the three sisters, all beautiful young women with the whole world at their doorstep. In the beginning, we follow the girls as they send their boyfriends off to war. In the following months, we watch them support the war by regularly attending USO dances, and corresponding with soldiers on the front. Much of the story is told through letters--letters of love, friendship, loneliness, hopelessness, homesickness, and terror. The telling is slow, which helps recreate the period; much time is spent developing the inner lives of the three sisters. It is time well-spent, for we really get to know these women, and care about their emotional well-being, especially Kitty, the independent sister, who wants much more out of life than the other two and is blessed with the sexy good looks of Rita Hayworth, to boot.

In this book, Berg was able to create a remarkable sense of place and time. I truly felt transported. The more I got into this book, the more I yearned to buy it for those few older friends of mine who actually lived through this period. I have heard so many personal stories about this period, but with this one book, I felt like I was living it myself.

The problem comes at the end, where there are two very brief shifts in time--one right after the other like the shocking double sonic booms following a Space Shuttle landing! First, there is brief scene set one year later.Then the book closes with a scene that takes place 60 years later. I have no problem with what takes place a year after the close of the war. That scene, however unexpected, is nonetheless consistent with the all character development that came before. What I object to so much is the scenes set in 2006. Perhaps I can believe Hank's part, but not Kitty's. This is not the Kitty that Berg takes such great care in developing over the course of the novel.

Berg, how could you do it? With just a few brief changes, this could have been a great book. Where was your editor? Where were your test readers?

As an avid fan of anything written by Elizabeth Berg, I was eagerly awaiting the publication of this book.

Although the book is well-written and the tone is reminiscent of other works by Ms.Berg, I must agree with others that this book was just not on a par with Durable Goods ,etc, and the characters were not as well-developed as I would have liked them to be.

That being said, there were parts of the book that were certainly enjoyable - there was real insight into the fear , anxiety , patriotism and loneliness that the young GI's suffered through along with the worry, heartbreak , pride and longing their sweethearts at home were experiencing .

I found the ending to be so unbelieveable and disappointing that it left me with bad taste in my mouth . Kitty, as the protagonist, was certainly the only character whose nature was fully explored and I could not reconcile the ending with the personality of this woman .

I will certainly continue to read anything by Elizabeth Berg because she and Anna Quindlen are my two favorite authors , but this was not her best work . Perhaps her other works were just so perfect that we as her readers and fans expected too much and not every book can be the piece de resistance of a collection .

There have been a lot of negative reviews of this book - mostly pertaining to the ending and I have to agree with them.

I enjoyed reading a book about this time period. I liked the family - especially for some reason, Frank, the father. I could picture the house, the activity of a large family, the sisters writing their letters to the servicemen in the evening. Then all of a sudden, things started happening that made absolutely no sense. And abruptly an ending that left me along with another reviewer shaking my head and saying "What just happened?!"

To be perfectly honest, the ending made me a little angry. To make it worse, I BOUGHT the book!

I carried this book around with me for three days. I was really loving the WWII imagery, the characters, the romances, and the letters from the GIs. But then it happened. That ending. Cripes, it was awful. It totally ruined the entire book for me. I want a rewrite with the proper ending!

I was surprised by all the negative reviews. Even though the last 2 chapters were unexpected and jarring, to say the least, that wasn't enough of a reason to detract from the novel as a whole. Like others, I read and re-read the last 3 chapters to see if I had missed something. In the end, I couldn't decide if the author had sincerely planned the ending, with the selfless sacrifice Kitty makes for her sister's sanity, or if it was more a case of impatient publishers crying for an ending, so they could print the book! The fact that I had to even wonder about that, to my way of thinking, made the book all the more intriguing.

Now, for why I wholeheartedly valued this book. The author successfully transported me into another era. The language people used back then, the attitudes, the music, the fashion styles, the parenting styles, all this and more felt authentic to me, and made me feel like I had time-traveled back into the 1940's.

The insights into the realities of war, via the correspondence from the soldiers, were both gruesome and poetic. Usually, I don't cry when reading novels, but this one hit me hard and made me care deeply. There was nothing romantic in Berg's gritty war descriptions.

Even though the parents were flawed human beings, at times there was so much wisdom that came out of their mouths. I'm thinking especially of the conversation Margaret had with her husband about why he should be proud of Louise and welcome her baby into their family. These gems of conversations were simply brilliant!

I'm disappointed and surprised that so many people gave this fine book such bad reviews. As far as I'm concerned, the book was brilliant!

Once again Elizabeth Berg demonstrates she is a master of the craft with her graceful, witty and detailed creation of characters we want to know and feel we already do. Entering the world of these sisters, their loves and their parents during World War II, we are treated to a dream of a novel that delivers more than we could dare hope. I recommend it highly.

I agree this was slower than her other novels, but I don't think that's a bad thing. I usually bolt through her novels in 4 hours, and this took me three evenings. I enjoyed being so fully immersed in the period, learning what it was like at home, comparing homefront attitudes toward heavy losses with attitudes today. I've never read what it was like for a Rosie the Riveter and enjoyed that. The letters from the soldiers were the best part, particularly the uncensored one from Michael. I felt such awe and gratitude for the soldiers who have made me free. I loved Hank and enjoyed Kitty's interactions with her family.

But the ending! Holy cow! When I read the Valentine's Day sequence, the bottom dropped out of my stomach. I understand her continuing the theme of extreme sacrifice, but after the shock wore off, I thought, come on. And then to fast-forward to present day and see the charade had continued for 60 years? Uh-uh. Don't buy it. That was a terrible ending. I love Berg and will continue to read her books, but her endings are either becoming too pat (We Are All Welcome Here) or utterly out of left field. They violate the faith I'm placing in her when I read her books.

You'll be much happier if you stop reading just before the Valentine's Day scene and create your own poignant ending.