Customer Reviews

Five Fortunes

5 star:		(13)
4 star:		(13)
3 star:		(5)
2 star:		(7)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

Loved the characters, loved the story line. LOVED IT! I finished the book over the weekend while the laundry piled up!!! Oh well! Treat yourself to some new friends ... Laurie, Rae, Jill, Amy and Carter. What a group! Rae is a wonderful older woman who I'd love for a mother-in-law! Jill and Amy have the usual mother/daughter relationship but you are able to watch it mature and grow. What every mother hopes for ... to be friends with her teen-age daughter. Carter is the immortal 'girl most likely to not ....' She turns out to be a real friend to Jill at the lowest point in her life. And Laurie ... who could not like Laurie. She just lost her husband, has 5 kids and is burned out. Wow! Does she come a long way! Take a chance and read this book ... it won't disappoint you!

This is definitely an entertaining read, but it's far from being Gutcheon's best. The characters are well-drawn, but their various situations don't always ring true; everything seems to be wrapped up a little too neatly in the end for all concerned. The story tends to meander from one incident to the next, leaving the book with a somewhat unfocused feeling. Still a good read, but I'd recommend starting with "Domestic Pleasures" or "The New Girls".

My mom handed me this book and said, "Here, you have to read this." Skeptical, I opened the first page and couldn't put it down until the end. Gutcheon crafts a wonderful, thought-proviking story of 5 different women and the trials and tribulations of their lives.

At a spa designed to pamper, slim, and rejuvenate wealthy and overweight or unhappy women, five clients meet and share a week of exercise and body wraps. Over the next year, the women's lives intertwine and change dramatically.

"Five Fortunes" is an enjoyable and lengthy read. It skips rapidly among the characters in short vignettes and successfully interweaves a number of plotlines; however, there are a large number of characters and occasionally they are difficult to keep track of. The tone is lighthearted despite the often-serious subject matter, which allows the story to be entertaining even as it (peripherally) addresses such serious subjects as rape, adultery, drug use and death. The book's shortcomings - lack of deeper resonance and vague ending - are serious literary failures, but they don't stand in the way of its enjoyability.

This is the second book by Beth Gutcheon that I have read (the first was Domestic Pleasures) and this will be my last. Even though this novel was much better than Domestic Pleasures, it still lacked a certain something. The idea behind the plot, showing a year's worth of interaction and lives between women who meet at a spa/fatspa, is great. The characters are all different and very interesting at times, but even with that interest I still found myself skimming sections and not really dying to know what happens to these ladies next. If you read this, it won't be a waste of your time, but there are better "go women" reads out there.

Despite what some readers wrote for a review this was a great book. Yes the characters had money, which made it even more interesting, can't as adults we still live in a fairy tale world. It's fiction, if you want the facts read a non-fiction book! Great characters that were very loveable and easy to get to know. They did face real problems from rape, random violence, death of a spouse, politics, becoming a 'mother', and the love of friends. Definately recommend this book as well as other Gutcheon books.

I was totally absorbed by this book, and actually learned something from it. These were all women who started out damaged or vulnerable who learned it was up to them to change their lives. It's been a while now, but I remember the section that affected me most was when Solange, the psychic, told the overweight daughter that she was "building a shrine" to the person who hurt her. That hit me where it hurts. These were all people you'd want to spend more time with, and I was sorry when the book was done. I love Gutcheon's style and can't wait for more. I've read most of her stuff, and this and Saying Grace are my favorites. These would make great screenplays!

I gave this book to my mother for mother's day and had 1/3 of it read before she left with it, it was so engrossing. The story was wonderful, made me want to go to the Cloisters which is the health spa/fat farm where the 5 main characters meet. It is a story of life and love, and overcoming things that occur in your life. Each character has to deal with a life altering occurence. They meet at the Cloisters, for one week, and then go their very separate ways. Each one finds a little something of herself while at the spa. The book follows them throughout the next year of their life. During this year, each woman seems to go through some sort of life altering experience, and through something they gained from their friendship at the spa they are able to face their experiences and triumph. THere are quite a few secondary characters, and about halfway through it made me wish I had written them down as a "scorecard" to keep track of who was whom. Had to page back from time to time to figure out some reference. Overall an extremely enjoyable read, one that would be a good book club book as it will generate great discussion. One pet peeve, they describe the 18 yr old as being enormous, and she is only 180lbs. I realize to some this is enormous, but to me it is not. To each his own, I guess.

Once I got into the first few pages, I liked this book pretty well. It is about 5 wealthy women who are enjoying themselves at a luxurious spa for a week. They enjoy a week with fitness, watching their diets, and other heavenly treatments, (as I call them). They all make friends, and afterwords, their lives intertwine with one another.

We'll meet Rae Strouse, the older lady whose husband at home is beginning to suffer from dementia. He was a very wealthy philanthropist.

Laura Lopez is a politician, and has five kids. She recently lost her husband to an illness, and is recovering yet from the shock. She is working on running for senate.

Jill and Amy, mother and daughter have issues. Jill, the daughter has deep issues with her weight along with everything else in her life. Amy, the mother, is married to Noah a surgeon, who unbeknownst to Amy is having a secret affair.

Then there is Carter who is divorced from her husband Jerry, and trying to find a new life for herself. She is a private investigator, and her main theme in that field is to capture drug dealers. Later in the book, she tries to adopt a child from a friend who got killed and left her daughter an orphan.

The book is very true to life and you can relate to many of the events that happen here.

I took to this book after having read several of author Amy Tan's work. It was about five women who meet at a spa and how their lives became tangled. I laughed, cried, and was astonished at events and mysteries of these women while their friendships grew. This was a great little read during vacation!!