Reviews

Ragged Company by Richard Wagamese

winglady's review against another edition

5.0

This is an extraordinary story about the invisible people who don't fit into the "normal" life of knowing where they'll sleep tonight or where their next meal might come from. It's a remarkable examination of friendship, love, and understanding. Unique and utterly memorable.

gwencl's review

challenging dark emotional funny hopeful informative reflective sad medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.5

thereadinghouse22laura's review

adventurous challenging emotional funny hopeful informative inspiring reflective sad tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

robintinani's review

medium-paced

4.0

vanitar's review against another edition

5.0

This book will sit with me for a long time- after reading it, I would rank it as one of my top five favourite books. Where to begin? It tells the story of beautiful, complicated individuals who are often overlooked by the world around them. It is a book about the pain we carry, the friendships we share and how home and community become places of healing for our brokenness. The writing is evocative, allowing the reader a picture into the lives of each character, seeing what has shaped them and how they are changed moving forward as a result of facing and sitting with their pain and sharing it with others. This book was devastating, hopeful, sad and beautiful all at once. It is one I plan to read again and also makes me want to add all of Richard Wagamese's books to my want to read shelf.

rossbm's review

challenging dark emotional hopeful inspiring reflective sad slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? It's complicated
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.5

 "Ragged Company" is a novel about four homeless people in an unnamed Canadian city who win the lottery. The plot moves at a slow pace and the focus is more on revealing the backstories of the characters and how they are affected by their change in circumstances. The city and the time period are left unspecified, but one can guess that it is probably set in the 1980s based on the movies the characters watch. 

Movies play a significant role in this book, with the four homeless people - Digger, Timber, Double Dick, and One For The Dead - taking refuge in a movie theater during a cold spell. It is through the movies that they meet Granite, a former journalist with his own tortured past. They continue to bond over movies throughout the book, even after their lives change because of their lottery win. 

While there are many references to movies, they are direct rather than being allusions or parallels. Unfortunately, the language used in the book is overwrought or overly "poetical" at times, stretching things out rather than getting to the point. However, the chapters are fairly short, and the switch in viewpoints keeps things interesting. I also appreciated getting viewpoints into the lives of street people or "rounders," as they call themselves in "Ragged Company." Overall, I would recommend this book, but not strongly. 

rbrodeur's review

emotional hopeful sad medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.5

asmale's review against another edition

emotional inspiring sad slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

4.5

esther_habs's review against another edition

emotional inspiring reflective sad medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

3.5

megan_prairierose's review against another edition

1.0

This book was a huge letdown. A friend said this about it "I felt the four homeless characters behaved childlike in many ways, while the other 3 acted as stand-in parents. This would never happen like this in real life unless the 3 parent surrogates were going for the money. All this love they had for one another was certainly heart-warming but honestly unrealistic."
My thoughts exactly.