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beana7227beana's review against another edition
4.0
I was truly torn between giving this novel three or four stars. Ultimately I decided to rate it four stars, but in all honesty that's because I simply adored Francine Prose's Goldengrove and will always be a little biased. The plot was simple enough: a college professor falls in love with a student after reading pieces of the novel she's working on. The question of whether or not the professor was falling for this student because of her writing, or because of who she is as a person was wonderfully intermittently woven throughout the piece. But the problem is that not one of the characters is truly likeable, not even the main character's wife. With no true loyalty or sentimentality for the main character or the other characters throughout, it was hard to feel truly moved by the story. And I'm not sure if that's what Prose intended, for us to not feel any special way towards any person, but she certainly achieved that goal. It was a good read for a few rainy days though, and it kept me interested enough to want to keep reading every spare moment I had.
booksaremysuperpower's review against another edition
3.0
(2.5-3 stars)
A quote from the movie "Jewel of the Nile" popped into my head as soon as I finished "Blue Angel": "Well, you got your book," said by Michael Douglas' character Jack Colton, to which Kathleen Turner's character Joan Wilder replies, "I got a lot more than that." For anyone unfamiliar with this classic adventure epic, Turner plays a frustrated Romance novelist struggling with severe writer's block, prompting her to leave her lover Jack (and the rocky patch in their relationship) behind while she plays journalist for a fictional dictator in North Africa. Things quickly turn dangerous and sketchy, and Douglas hightails after Turner that results in a wild chase across some stunning African desert scenery. At the end of the film, Turner and Douglas have just escaped a spectacular death scene (reimagined by the evil dictator from a scene in one of her previous books) and Douglas points out to her that she finally has a story to tell. Turner, of course, realizes that she also got the man of her dreams.
Ted Swenson, at the end of "Blue Angel", also now has a story to tell. He, unlike Joan in "Jewel", just lost everything of value in his life in order to tell it.
"Blue Angel" is a tried (maybe tired?) and true satire of not only an unfulfilled creative writing Professor's life, but also what happens when art imitates life and vice versa. For the first half of the book, I was scratching my head wondering how this seemingly simple and overused story became a National Book Award finalist. As a fan of Prose's "Reading like a Writer", I knew in my heart that she was much too talented and smart to write such a book as "Blue Angel", which is filled with cliche after cliche. Or is it?
I can completely understand why this novel threw readers for a loop and why it got such relatively poor Goodreads reviews. For all of Prose's craft and literary technique to create a story that is not what it seems, while it may have charmed the awards committee it did not endear her to her readers, myself included. There is something almost inaccessible about this story. Where the book finally got me (or where I finally got the book, I guess) was at the very end. As Swenson surveys his surroundings at the end of his hearing for sexually harassing a young student at the University, he sees the deer in the distance, hears the silence in the snow, feels the stillness in the air and for the first time, the character is living in the present moment.
How many of us sleepwalk through our own lives? Do we ever truly see the person sitting in front of us, or are we usually looking just slightly left of one shoulder, consumed with our needs and desires and regrets? This is what I think Francine Prose was getting at in the larger picture of her story. And these are interesting ideas to ponder, especially with Swenson's relationship with wife Sherry and his daughter Ruby. Here Prose explores how we sometimes gnaw at our pain and failings until it becomes too much to bear. The author chooses to use Ted's toothache as a metaphor to overexplain this point, though its final explosion was one of the funnier parts of the book.
We could see Ted's demise from page one, and I have to believe it's not an accident. We are begging him to wake up to his own life. And just as his agent pleads with him to forget his imagination and write what he knows and what he's experiencing right now (his affair with Angela), Ted finds himself at exactly this crossroads.
A few things that bothered me: The revelations during the sexual harassment hearing were somewhat confusing. At one point Ruby's ex-boyfriend (Max?) accuses Swenson of sexually abusing her. Was there supposed to be some truth to this? This section left me uneasy because it came out of nowhere and then it's never resolved.
Also, by satirizing the horrific awfulness of a campus beginning fiction writing class (Lena Dunham did a similar thing with her portrayal of Hanna's experience at the Iowa writing residency program in the show "Girls"), Prose inadvertently opens her novel up to the same criticism her student characters face with their own manuscripts. I felt a bit like character Claris when I read the dialogue between Angela and Swenson outside of the video store when she says, "Oh, I'm just out to get some Tampax." Like Claris, I wanted to point out that no girl I have ever met is so cavalier about getting period supplies that she would make a formal announcement. Not only that, but no girl or woman calls it by the brand name Tampax. So there, Francine.
My grandmother adored this book, and while I liked bits of it (and laughed out loud a few times) this isn't a novel I would highly recommend. Perhaps I needed to re-read "Reading like a Writer" to get more out of it.
A quote from the movie "Jewel of the Nile" popped into my head as soon as I finished "Blue Angel": "Well, you got your book," said by Michael Douglas' character Jack Colton, to which Kathleen Turner's character Joan Wilder replies, "I got a lot more than that." For anyone unfamiliar with this classic adventure epic, Turner plays a frustrated Romance novelist struggling with severe writer's block, prompting her to leave her lover Jack (and the rocky patch in their relationship) behind while she plays journalist for a fictional dictator in North Africa. Things quickly turn dangerous and sketchy, and Douglas hightails after Turner that results in a wild chase across some stunning African desert scenery. At the end of the film, Turner and Douglas have just escaped a spectacular death scene (reimagined by the evil dictator from a scene in one of her previous books) and Douglas points out to her that she finally has a story to tell. Turner, of course, realizes that she also got the man of her dreams.
Ted Swenson, at the end of "Blue Angel", also now has a story to tell. He, unlike Joan in "Jewel", just lost everything of value in his life in order to tell it.
"Blue Angel" is a tried (maybe tired?) and true satire of not only an unfulfilled creative writing Professor's life, but also what happens when art imitates life and vice versa. For the first half of the book, I was scratching my head wondering how this seemingly simple and overused story became a National Book Award finalist. As a fan of Prose's "Reading like a Writer", I knew in my heart that she was much too talented and smart to write such a book as "Blue Angel", which is filled with cliche after cliche. Or is it?
I can completely understand why this novel threw readers for a loop and why it got such relatively poor Goodreads reviews. For all of Prose's craft and literary technique to create a story that is not what it seems, while it may have charmed the awards committee it did not endear her to her readers, myself included. There is something almost inaccessible about this story. Where the book finally got me (or where I finally got the book, I guess) was at the very end. As Swenson surveys his surroundings at the end of his hearing for sexually harassing a young student at the University, he sees the deer in the distance, hears the silence in the snow, feels the stillness in the air and for the first time, the character is living in the present moment.
How many of us sleepwalk through our own lives? Do we ever truly see the person sitting in front of us, or are we usually looking just slightly left of one shoulder, consumed with our needs and desires and regrets? This is what I think Francine Prose was getting at in the larger picture of her story. And these are interesting ideas to ponder, especially with Swenson's relationship with wife Sherry and his daughter Ruby. Here Prose explores how we sometimes gnaw at our pain and failings until it becomes too much to bear. The author chooses to use Ted's toothache as a metaphor to overexplain this point, though its final explosion was one of the funnier parts of the book.
We could see Ted's demise from page one, and I have to believe it's not an accident. We are begging him to wake up to his own life. And just as his agent pleads with him to forget his imagination and write what he knows and what he's experiencing right now (his affair with Angela), Ted finds himself at exactly this crossroads.
A few things that bothered me: The revelations during the sexual harassment hearing were somewhat confusing. At one point Ruby's ex-boyfriend (Max?) accuses Swenson of sexually abusing her. Was there supposed to be some truth to this? This section left me uneasy because it came out of nowhere and then it's never resolved.
Also, by satirizing the horrific awfulness of a campus beginning fiction writing class (Lena Dunham did a similar thing with her portrayal of Hanna's experience at the Iowa writing residency program in the show "Girls"), Prose inadvertently opens her novel up to the same criticism her student characters face with their own manuscripts. I felt a bit like character Claris when I read the dialogue between Angela and Swenson outside of the video store when she says, "Oh, I'm just out to get some Tampax." Like Claris, I wanted to point out that no girl I have ever met is so cavalier about getting period supplies that she would make a formal announcement. Not only that, but no girl or woman calls it by the brand name Tampax. So there, Francine.
My grandmother adored this book, and while I liked bits of it (and laughed out loud a few times) this isn't a novel I would highly recommend. Perhaps I needed to re-read "Reading like a Writer" to get more out of it.
harriet_toad_maradona's review against another edition
i'd forgotten i'd read this until i was reminded by another lolita-the-student scene. ugh.
remember how francince prose told us that today's students are stupid because maya angelou is required reading? the way prose tried to manipulate the political landscape (anti political correctness as a ticket into the boys club, right?) makes me think thoughts both unkind and un[bullshit 2nd wave]feminist.
remember how francince prose told us that today's students are stupid because maya angelou is required reading? the way prose tried to manipulate the political landscape (anti political correctness as a ticket into the boys club, right?) makes me think thoughts both unkind and un[bullshit 2nd wave]feminist.
pogonotomy's review against another edition
1.0
Extremely predictable.
I wanted to like this book, or at least feel somewhat sympathetic for the main character.
By the end of this book I just felt really down, and irritated with Swenson (main char). I read this the first time a long time ago, attempted re-reading it a second time a few days, and just couldn't. The only scene I remember is when his tooth busts on him during an awkward sex capade with the stupid punk girl. falkasdfasf.
I wanted to like this book, or at least feel somewhat sympathetic for the main character.
By the end of this book I just felt really down, and irritated with Swenson (main char). I read this the first time a long time ago, attempted re-reading it a second time a few days, and just couldn't. The only scene I remember is when his tooth busts on him during an awkward sex capade with the stupid punk girl. falkasdfasf.
karolinatx's review against another edition
4.0
I thoroughly enjoyed reading Blue Angel. It was well-paced and clever; the characters were sketched out well, though not particularly likeable. The plot centers around a small college in rural Vermont. There, a washed out professor/writer, similar to the main character in Chabon's [b:Wonderboys|16707|Wonderboys|Michael Chabon|http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1327890565s/16707.jpg|2045395], finds new life in the form of a raggedy sophomore in his writing workshop. The girl, Angela, makes quite the impact on the professor by the end of the novel (don't want to give anything away), and the reader is left second-guessing his or her own assumptions about the novel's characters. It's a quick read, it makes you think, but I was a little turned off by the professor's neurotic ramblings. Overall recommended.
kirstiecat's review against another edition
3.0
Well, this book just seemed a little too predictable to me. I was pretty much guessing the entire outcome within the first 50 pages. It follows the classic professor falling for a college student ruse but I liked it better when it was called The Corrections and when that wasn't the entire premise of the story. That it's written from a female perspective while the protagonist is male is the only thing that makes the book slightly tricky and interesting. Still, it's so clear what will happen that it makes reading it almost painful to get through. I wasn't sure if we were actually supposed to feel sorry for the professor for being so pathetic, either...Regardless, it's somewhat enigmatic to me how this got to be a National Book Award Finalist. Oh well.
sarahbethveler's review against another edition
challenging
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
2.5
ryno23's review against another edition
3.0
I decided to read this book after reading "My Dark Vanessa". I was wanting to compare a modern book with a book from 20 years ago -- how it handled the teacher-student situation; how the burgeoning PC movement that was colliding with academia at that time, compared to the #metoo movement and cancel culture today. I pretty much reached the expected conclusion of my experiment. (I didn't mean to make my review so long)
However, they were vastly different books. "Vanessa" was a young teen pursued by a high school teacher; however, the current climate doesn't appear until Vanessa is an adult and the teacher is caught with another student. This was written in Vanessa's voice.
"Angel" was about an ageing writer (whose voice we are following), with a novel that he can't complete, who has been forced into being a professor with students that never show any promise. Until Angela arrived. She was the writer with promise he always has been looking for. While she's a tattooed, pierced punk, he doesn't fall in love with her as much as he becomes obsessed with her writing. Angela is the pursuer, luring him with her novel, a chapter at a time. She is willing to trade herself for the professor to show her novel to his publisher. The deed only lasted a couple of pages (and didn't come to completion), but the damage was done.
Getting involved with a student never crossed the professor's mind. Prose presented the professor as a occasionally forgetful, task-focused man with the usual simple faults as any man. He has a wonderful wife, and they have the usual difficult relationship with their teenage girl at college. He hates that he has to teach, and hates the spoiled brats in his classes, but he is a man just working through life with a great wife, the few friends which is all he wants, and an unfinished novel. Until he makes one, brief bad decision.
The story isn't unique, but the author presents it very well. It ends as expected, with the academics holding a closed-door review and the professor slinks off into oblivion. It is a page-turner, but without a lot of meat -- just being in the mind of a bumbling professor. And the ending was rather bland and tame. So I think my rating is appropriate.
However, they were vastly different books. "Vanessa" was a young teen pursued by a high school teacher; however, the current climate doesn't appear until Vanessa is an adult and the teacher is caught with another student. This was written in Vanessa's voice.
"Angel" was about an ageing writer (whose voice we are following), with a novel that he can't complete, who has been forced into being a professor with students that never show any promise. Until Angela arrived. She was the writer with promise he always has been looking for. While she's a tattooed, pierced punk, he doesn't fall in love with her as much as he becomes obsessed with her writing. Angela is the pursuer, luring him with her novel, a chapter at a time. She is willing to trade herself for the professor to show her novel to his publisher. The deed only lasted a couple of pages (and didn't come to completion), but the damage was done.
Getting involved with a student never crossed the professor's mind. Prose presented the professor as a occasionally forgetful, task-focused man with the usual simple faults as any man. He has a wonderful wife, and they have the usual difficult relationship with their teenage girl at college. He hates that he has to teach, and hates the spoiled brats in his classes, but he is a man just working through life with a great wife, the few friends which is all he wants, and an unfinished novel. Until he makes one, brief bad decision.
The story isn't unique, but the author presents it very well. It ends as expected, with the academics holding a closed-door review and the professor slinks off into oblivion. It is a page-turner, but without a lot of meat -- just being in the mind of a bumbling professor. And the ending was rather bland and tame. So I think my rating is appropriate.
xxx_xxx's review against another edition
emotional
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.0
bjr2022's review against another edition
5.0
Near the end of this story of a seductress and her feckless, hubristic seducee, there is a moment when the seducee—a teacher who has gone off the wire—gives up and doesn’t even try to defend himself, because the story has gotten so complex that saying anything simple seems impossible. It would feel like a lie. And he has lost the ability.
That’s how I feel about this book. Anything simple would be a lie. The story is an intricate psychological dance between a student and a teacher, where neither is good or honorable, and yet for the judgers of this the story, shallow “right or wrong” becomes the issue.
I’ve had moments in my life—completely different from this story—that share a similar ending of “walking through a crucible.” And for that reason, I found the ending spectacular.