Customer Reviews

Miami: A Saga

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

 

 

From someone who's lived in South Florida since 1959, I can tell you this is a delightful way to get your history. It is richly historical overlaid with an intense recounting of pioneer life in the wilds of Florida. The hurricane scenes are realistically frightening, the relationship with the Seminoles sadly insightful, and as always the basic human nature of the characters describes us or people we have known!

I read this book many years ago and it still sticks with me. I've been telling my friends about it for a long time and finally bought a copy to loan out and to read again. Very creative and historically informative. Ms. Mayerson eloquently describes the Florida landscape and has created wonderful, memorable characters.

Gives great insight to the history of Florida while telling very interesting stories about a multitude of characters that are all linked to each in some way.

I've read all of Mayerson's fiction, and, without a doubt, this is a great book. She has changed her writing style and her subject matter with each novel, and this one proves this writer can "bang them out" like no one else. Great for the historical backdrop; great for the story-line.

I actually had this woman as a teacher while earning a master's in creative writing. She made my class read her book, and after that moment I lost all respect for her not only as a professor, but also as a writer. Her writing is stiff, unintelligible, and monotonous. Her metaphors are feeble and floppy. Her slight attempts at being humorous are dull are forced. It is, quite frankly, an embarrassment as a writer, that works like this are even published. Don't waste your time.

The other review on this page using the tag line "horrible" is being disingenuous. Someone has taken my freelance business moniker, modernscribe, and my name, lisa, and perpetrated a review to make it look like I wrote it. I only wish I had caught this back in 2002 when it was authored. I took Evelyn Mayerson's class and read her book Miami as well as several of her other novels. She was an outstanding teacher, and I would NEVER have authored such a scathing review of her or her book. Dr. Mayerson was supportive and complimentary toward my work, so the disgruntled reviewer is probably a jealous student who also attended that class. Too bad the "reviewer" isn't working on his or her own writing instead of spending time trying to hurt Dr. Mayerson and ruin her impression of me. I honestly thought Miami was an engrossing book, and since I was living in Miami at the time, reading it was the best way I could have learned of that city's colorful history.