Reviews for Dear Strangers

The average rating for Dear Strangers based on 2 reviews is 4 stars.

Review # 1 was written on 2010-04-18 00:00:00 Jose �lvarez Ju�rez "my book club is reading mullins's first novel, the rug merchant , this month. liking her sophomore effort so far. very different setting, similar themes." that was my status update while reading. the theme here was not the same- ushman's story was all about loneliness while this novel resonates the theme of loss. what i admire about mullins's writing is her ability to chose a theme and to craft a story around it. i believe that craft is in her case the correct word. this is a writer i'd love to meet, to interview, to observe "in process," because it seems to me that both novels revolve around their central themes like precisely-tuned and crafted machines. i've read a few negative reviews of this novel, several readers particularly critique it for "beginning well, then losing steam." i disagree. i will allow that a reader who needs, primarily, story or plot in a book, who will say that, at the end of the day, it's plot that makes a book worth the effort or not, will more than likely find the type of craftsmanship i'm extolling less than fully satisfying. perhaps he or she will not "find" it at all. i simply state there is substance here and skill, too. i'm looking forward to what she'll give us next.

Review # 2 was written on 2010-07-01 00:00:00 Robert Hartwood Oliver is a character obsessed--with his father's death when Oliver was very young, with the subsequent "return" of the baby they had adopted, with finding this brother and somehow acknowledging him. At times, I can imagine a reader growing tired with this story...obsession can be the same story over and over again. It is the other characters, as foils for Oliver, who make the story work. There is Oliver's mother, Mrs. Finley, Mr. Nice-guy, his replacement father, Oliver's girlfriend, Miranda, who is a photographer like he is, his sister, Mary, and Jared, the boy he thinks may be his lost brother. These characters interrupt his obsession but many of them also provide a wonderful insistence, in an odd way, on life and presence. My favorite part of the book was the photography--Nonny's flower on her tongue, Miranda's anonymous appointments with strangers she photographs from the dark yards outside their homes while they are inside. This is the second book I've read this summer where photography is a major theme. Wonderful.