kevin michael w

• Rated 3 stars

“the tale of an escalating battle for a little bungalow outside of san francisco, it's the subtext that engages with the question of what exactly makes a "good person". is it the action of actually doing something socially acceptable, such as working a nine-to-five? or sending your children to college? or is the wanting to do those admittedly good things enough? three souls, each with their own motive, crank up the volume on the question loud enough so the consideration may become a concern of yours as well...”

kevin michael w wrote this review 12 days ago. ( reply | permalink )

• Rated 5 stars

“a flawed love affair...is still a love affair. intricately plotted and yet simply told, the weight of living with the choices we make is quite often more than we can bear. one man herein struggles with his own choices in a resonant beautifully told tale of postwar Germany.”

kevin michael w wrote this review 3 weeks ago. ( reply | permalink )

0 of 1 members found this review helpful.

• Rated 4 stars

“as a matter of dignity the traditional English butler never breaks form...
not even if war breaks out.
not even if his family dies before him.
not even if the love of his life leaves him.
the author, rapturously in love with the English language, astutely warns to be careful what you ask for...”

kevin michael w wrote this review 3 weeks ago. ( reply | permalink )

• Rated 4 stars

“in an devastated post-apocalyptic america a few raggedy survivors struggle to hold onto life while wandering across the land and desperately looking for food. one father singleminded takes his own son, one of the last children alive, down to perhaps a mythical warmer somewhere, a better somewhere. but why bother at all? nothing is left. civilisation is gone. cannibals roam the land. and the father is dying himself.
existence itself is decided minute to unknown minute and the author grimly suggests that the value of life simply is what you yourself struggle to make it.
can't put it down, seat of your pants writing with some philosophical wool gathering thrown in for good measure.”

kevin michael w wrote this review 3 weeks ago. ( reply | permalink )

• Rated 5 stars

“situated in a small town somewhere in the south in the 1940's before the second world war the story follows lives of several of the motley inhabitants, what they do with their time and what they think about those lives finally, and what they think is this: "i'm not really special, no, i'm not, but if somebody would notice me, understand me, well...then...maybe i could be special, i would be, if somebody would notice me..."
only nobody ever does. or they notice the wrong thing. or they notice somebody else. nobody gets it right.
brutal and unforgiving, yet lyrical too, like a doorway in a terrible storm, this work shocks and surprises...and then you pause and muse that it was written by a 20-something back in the purported "good old days". incredible.”

kevin michael w wrote this review Thursday, October 8 2009. ( reply | permalink )

• Rated 3 stars

“yah, and it's a very ugly little world with pollution, corruption, war, and over-population...what's a modern society to do? wilson supplies almost like a science answer for what has been a religious question for centuries, and all while debunking religion as unsatisfactory at worst or quaint at best. and what is the answer? alien intervention. bet THAT surprised you. the nut on which this exercise in wish fulfillment turns is the nicely realised relationship of a trio thruout the years of their lives. interesting, but...”

kevin michael w wrote this review 3 weeks ago. ( reply | permalink )

• Rated 5 stars

“cantalamessa, italian professor and priest, herein presents the mostly forgotten third partner of the Trinity as necessary and desirable, integral and true, the cornerstone of salvation work, and thus will probably change the way one lives and how one prays. very admirable.”

kevin michael w wrote this review Thursday, June 4 2009. ( reply | permalink )

• Rated 3 stars

“this is primarily a manual for those considering or in the process of joining the Missionaries of Charity, the group of sisters and brothers who endeavor, through the love of the Lord, to serve and aid the poorest of the poor all around the world. theirs is a chosen life of poverty and prayer and, in the words of the work, Mother Teresa herself, not really a writer per se, advises her readers to essentially a closer walk with the Lord.
contemplative thought backed by a life of service to those ignored...”

kevin michael w wrote this review Thursday, April 23 2009. ( reply | permalink )

• Rated 2 stars

“undoubtably well-written well-researched juvenile adventure for adults, predictable as toast, essentially pablum.”

kevin michael w wrote this review Saturday, December 27 2008. ( reply | permalink )

• Rated 3 stars

“a young jewish family comes to america from the old country...only to have one daughter break with family tradition and expectations to truly embrace the american dream of creating yourself to surprising and heartbreaking results. told from two perspectives simultaneously, that of the girl who becomes a woman who becomes a mother of a mother, and that of one of her 12 (count 'em...12!) children, the story is one that follows the rocky path of self-definition against a storm of social protest and aptly displays how the only opinion of oneself that really matters when the said storm is at it's peak...is one's own.
it is simply written and the style often nonexistent, the writer lacking panache, but no matter as the facts tell the tale.
worth a look.”

kevin michael w wrote this review Thursday, December 18 2008. ( reply | permalink )