dgirl80 's review for:

New York: The Novel by Edward Rutherfurd

3.0

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If I could have given this a 3.5 I would have... I more than liked it, but not totally loved it. This really is a sweeping study of the city of New York. I won't bore you with a summary, other than that it follows the family history of the Master's (a fictional family) through the development of New York from a Dutch colony to today. Throughout the historical progress of the book, the Master family interacts with real historical figures and events. Edward Rutherford must have spent years researching the history to provide such a detailed story that made the historian in me keep turning the pages. The first 100 pages/characters were hard to make a connection with, so that part of the book was a bit trying to read through, but as long as you can stick it out, from there on the family becomes characters you find yourself attached to and want to see their progress. As the time passed and family members came and went my heart went through the usual stirrings one does in a typical novel. You find yourself attached to characters and must read through their loves and watch them pass to time. There are a few characters that I felt Rutherfurd let the reader down with. After spending hours reading about they would just disappear and I was left frustrated and upset I would not know what happened to them. I figured he would find a way to connect them all in the end, and I was not disappointed in that... in fact the one line that had them converge I just smiled and shed a little tear, "Caruso was a good doctor..."
I will read his novel about London now, am I am very glad I stuck out the first 100 pages, so I would for sure recommend this book!