This book is very well-written. Hamilton's writing is quirky and poetic. But there is very, very little plot to the end. I grew impatient for *something* significant to happen, but not much did till the last 75 pages, when the book becomes a real page turner.

That being said, this is an interesting and accurate portrayal of a segment of our population that many of us never see--or choose to ignore. If you've ever wondered how people can be so ignorant and short-sighted as to keep themselves trapped in a cycle of desperate unhappiness and poverty, this book offers some explanation.

Not everyone rises above their circumstances. Despite what we read, that is the rare exception, not the rule. Ruth is a protagonist, yes--not the heroine we hope she will become. Few people manage to rise above such unfortunate circumstances, and her story (up till the last 75 pages) is sadly common for persons reared with almost every card stacked against them. I admire Hamilton's realistic portrayal of Ruth, and her unwaveringly and heartbreakingly realistic portrayal of her.

I found The Story of Ruth intriguing, depressingly sad, and so real. I was caught up in the inherent goodness that exixts in all people (Ruth, Aunt Sid, Rudy, Daisy, even May...) only to be caught off guard by the insanity in the inherent badness that also exists near the end of the book. The resilency of humankind is also an important theme in the book. I'll admit, I needed a good ending. It didn't happen, but it was one that leaves you pondering for a long time.

This book was enjoyable to read and the end was quite a shock. I would recommend this book to anyone. It was wonderfully written.

What ever happened to that odd, quiet girl in your high school class? Ruth is that invisible girl, poor and proud, but curious, solid, and worth knowing all the same. She has a talent for bowling, a talent for loving, a gift for friendship, and a longing for understanding and truth. Her narrative looks at her bleak life unsparingly, tries to make sense of her suffering, and doesn't dodge her own culpability. We listen as she tries to make sense of tragedy, tries to understand the glib promises of faith, and tries to learn to be the mother her child needs. We count our blessings in comparison, but with a shudder, realize that "there but for grace, go I."

A sad story about a girl woman who suffers low self esteem derived from a long suffering childhood of verbal sometimes physical abuse at the hand of her well meaning mother. She is the strong one (only she doesn't know it) who shows unconditional love for a pathetic man whom she only sees the good in when no one else can. Sometimes we all get trapped in these type situations.

The Book of Ruth does a great job of examining family dynamics and everyday life in a small rural town. The relationships with the characters were realistic and the internal conflict of the heroine was poignant.

I found the book to be very riveting and could not put the book down. I do admit it was very depressing at times but life is that way. The thing I liked about this book was that it was sooooo realistic. You can go to any town in the usa and find somebody like that. And the truth is they do not know they are bad off for this is all they know. I think she did redeem herself at the end. It was one of the best books I have ever read.

This is a very sad, but believable, account of a young woman growing up poor in a small town. She dreams of getting out of her current situation and away from her critical and demanding mother. To make her current situation worse, she marries a drug-addicted alcoholic.

The author, Jane Hamilton, writes beautifully and even a little comically. I found that I was looking forward to the times when I could get back to the book. I saw Jane Hamilton at an "author speak" recently and she said that her books do not have a plot so much as they draw characters and tell stories about them. This is evident in the "Book of Ruth" as nothing is really resolved in the end, but there is certainly a climax.

Highly recommended.

Picked this up since it was our book club's selection -- it was well written, with believable but depressing characters -- couldn't help but think, why? Just watch the news.

Picked this up since it was our book club's selection -- it was well written, with believable but depressing characters -- couldn't help but think, why? Just watch the news.

I REALLY disliked this book. The Book of Nothing. I found the characters to be very shallow, the story to be very shallow and at the end of the day you really didn't care what happened to anyone. I feel that this book WAS a waste of time and if Oprah had not picked it, I don't believe it would have been significant in any way.

i read this book a very long time ago, and still think about it as baffling. it gives extreme insight into a culture the educated will never experience.

it is very well written, the character, ruth's, ways are heavy as narrative. i can't even begin to explain this book, now that i think about it. it is a must read.

The Book of Ruth tells the sad story of the dimwitted Ruth, daughter of a spiteful woman who favors her genius son more. The leading lady tries to make good of her life, and thinks things are going well for her when she marries Ruby Dahl, a drunkard who can't hold down a job. Despite his many shortcomings, she tries to see good in him, even after a night when a shocking incident changes everything.

This was an excellent book. It took a little while for me to really get into it, but when I did, I breezed through the last two-hundred or so pages. You come to really know and care about the characters (even weirdos like Randall or Dee Dee Foote) and when it comes time for the book to end, it's almost impossible to let these people go quite yet. I got through the climax in the breakroom at work and almost started bawling in front of a couple coworkers, including the boss. :)

I'd suggest this for anybody. But be warned, this isn't a warmth-and-fuzzies story. It's definitely not a Secret Life of Bees kind of story. It's packed with great writing and strong characters that you'll remember for a long time.

Did you ever think about how when you see some "sensational, human interest" tragedy on the evening news, that there are real people in that story? The news wants you to think it's entertainment. Meanwhile, Hamilton writes a story that reads like real. Hard struggles, and nobody is all good or all bad. People muddle through. Thankfully, most people do not experience tragedy. And yet I think most readers will find something familiar in the Book of Ruth.

A bit of a slow reader. Great other than that. Brought out some self-reflection.

I love this writer. Her books draw the reader in and are so hard to end. I hated finishing this book because I missed all the people in it so much when I did. This story is amazing about a daughter and a mother who are probably retarded. How they live their lives and what happens to them is amazing. It gets a little violent but it made sense that it would.

My second Jane Hamilton Book. I am now certifiably hooked. This book was sad but sometimes hilarious. I could not help but sometimes laugh at Ruth's string of bad decisions and naive approach to life. I felt sad for Ruth especially because her mother made no secret of the fact that she valued her math-prodigy son more. The vivid descriptions of her husband just painted an annoying nauseating picture of what living with him was like. I often wanted to reach in to the book and smack or kick him out of their lives. Highly recommended!

Reading Jane Hamilton's "Book of Ruth" is like diving into a sea of outrageous dysfunction. It is like drowning. It is like observing from below the surface and unable to do a damn thing about the events happening before your eyes.

If one is a writer, The Book of Ruth is the absolute perfect novel to study--because it is structurally superb, beautiful, full of foreshadowing (burnt black birds hanging upside down the telephone line), flowing with imagery, honesty,and more importantly, the characters are likable, hatable, and exquisitely designed.

Jane Hamilton has taken a dysfunctional, uneducated family--and through her characteration and mastery, made us care about what happens to them; made us part of the family, even when we didn't care to be there. Hamilton takes a character like mean old May, and causes us to feel empathy for her, even though May is unbearably vicious.

"The Book of Ruth" is about families we all know--but do not invite into our lives because they smell, use the wrong vocabulary, forget to brush their teeth, and make their careers at the dry-cleaners. These people are undesirable,invisible, and sit in the back of the bus.

But Hamilton makes us live with them, get to know them, understand them, hate them, and in the end, love them.

***I was surprised by the other reviews--as I thought The Book of Ruth was deliciously stunning and overflowing with insight.

My book club read THE BOOK OF RUTH as our September pick. This book was a very good discussion book as there are a lot of situations in the plot to discuss. Things like, "What is wrong with Ruth that she can not get her life on track?" and "How can she be attracted to that skuzzy Ruby?" and Why did she stay with her mother and let herself continue to be abused?". So, there are certainly many questions to discuss concerning life questions.
However, it is not a "feel good" book so I probably would not recommend it for pleasure reading. Emotionally, this book is a downer and I had to get out of the house after finishing it to shake off the melancholy. I checked this out from the library and am ready to get it back to them like a bad talisman.

I enjoyed the book. The authors discriptions and reactions to certain things were very funny and entertaining. It had all the qualities of how a young girl in her circumstances might react. The book also dealt with extreem tragedy in a very touching way. I have recommended it to friends.

I truly liked this book. It is easy to condemn Ruth for staying with an alcoholic husband whose IQ level is probably the same as his shoe size. He is certainly no bundle of joy as a husband or anything else for that matter. Before one does condemn Ruth and cast her aside, perhaps we should really take an indepth look at Ruth's environment. Her mother, May, has not been herself since the loss of her husband in World War II, and for her life is just another day. May is self-absorbed and what little concern she has seems to have is centred on Ruth's brother, Matt, the math whiz who is off to bigger and better things in the city. Meanwhile, Ruth plods through life with low self-esteem and takes each day in stride.

I found all the characters unique and fascinating in their own way, and the story kept compelling me to read more. There was not much about Ruth to like, or dislike, she was just Ruth, trying to make the most out of an unpleasant life. The ending is somewhat of a surprise but it adds to the spirit of the book. "The Book of Ruth" is not an upbeat one but a very endearing one as many of Hamilton's are.

I read the book in its entirely because it was an Oprah selection -- my first mistake -- and I kept THINKING that Ruth would finally GET IT. As Ruth struggled early on, I was right there cheering her on, but what a massive disappointment for a reader to discover the character never changes and will probably go on to make the same old stupid mistakes. There was nothing heroic about Ruth. She whined and shivered and settled for a dimwitted alcoholic with rotten teeth who couldn't hold down a job. She was still making excuses for him in the end; however, she flip-flops over it because, guess what, the woman seldom holds a thought for more than two seconds because she is as dimwitted as her husband. It's as if Hamilton tried to think of the crummiest, dullest traits in the world to give her characters and guess who won? Ruth! Ruth survives her ordeal, but she is not a survivor. And because there is no substance to her, the reader doesn't care. I hate having my time wasted.

None are so blind as those who do not wish to see. Ruth, the unreliable narrator of this sad tale, lives this maxim throughout her life. "The Book of Ruth" is an uncomfortable reminder of how we can be blind when we want something bad enough--even if that thing is an unwise choice. With success, Jane Hamilton places the reader in the mind of a disturbed young woman; somehow Hamilton creates sympathy for the undesirable characters in this novel. Definitely a triumph for the author's first book.

Do not read this book if you are looking for something lite to snuggle up with. The Book of Ruth is disturbing; it will make you think.

The Book of Ruth's title reminds me instantly of the Biblical Book of Ruth. However, this novel is far from a religious story. If anything, it is rather anti-religious, and a deeply funny book as a result.

The book starts a bit slowly, and the reader is rather unsure what the point of the book is until the voice of Ruth telling you about her odd life wins you over. Ruth is a rather dim-witted girl, yet the narrator of the novel. She tells about her life with her genius brother, Matt, and her mother, May, and then her involvement with Ruby, the man she falls in love with. Ruth's life is far from glamorous, being teased in school, working at a dry-cleaners, her evenings filled with bowling or walking with her man. The novel's characters border on the grotesque, yet because the story is told from Ruth's point of view, I sympathized with Ruth, and it is easy to understand why her life is the way it is and how she found it difficult not to live differently.

Ruth is not a genius like her brother, who takes off the first chance he gets, leaving Ruth to live with their mother. Yet Ruth is intelligent in her own way--she is not booksmart, and not smart in love, but she has a certain common sense expressed in sarcastic comments that make you laugh out loud. Some of her remarks are pointed at religion, and understandably, because while her mother is difficult to get along with, her mother believes in trying to live the life their Reverend preaches to them. Ruth realizes whatever the Reverend preaches doesn't seem to make any difference, and after the dramatic climax of the novel, she tells him so in no uncertain terms, while he is hard-pressed to know how to reply or comfort her following her tragedy. One example of her humor is when she comments upon how God is always trying to tell people what to do like "Honor your mother" but that was easy for God to say because his mother was a saint.

Without giving away the ending, it is sufficient to say that Ruth makes it on her own, without her mother, brother, or man, and certainly without God. What she learns is the strength she has inside and that is greater than her reliance on anyone else. It is an inspiring, yet a very down-to-earth story. There are no great revelations, but rather a simple determination to carry-on.

I think the book will appeal to most readers who aren't afraid to look at real life. This is a dissecting of human nature at its finest--which is the whole purpose of literature.

Tyler R. Tichelaar, author of Iron Pioneers, The Marquette Trilogy: Book One

How could you? How could you take such an awesome title and lace it with evil, mind-bending, homocidic confusion?! This book's got me making up words. Here's the rundown. Okay, here we go:
Intriguing Characters - Check
Page Turning Storyline - Check
Oprah likes it lots - Check
Deranged family drawing you in - Check
Suicidal thoughts while reading - Check
Matches to burn this book by the
time I'm down to the last 5 pages - Check, check, check, check and check!
I wrote an Amazon review years ago, but it is gone gone gone. As is my settled stomach, my peaceful countenance, 5 hours of my time and my willingess to trust Oprah, good titles and acclaimed writers. I can't leave this book uncanned! It stinks like a neglected vase of flowers. And to think, a scholarly seemingly coy Jehovah's witness promised me I'd love it. The world is so cold. Hate is such a strong word, yes. But also so very appropriate in the case of The Book of Ruth. Blasphemous.

I noticed that this book had an average rating of 3.5 stars and I couldn't believe it! This amazing novel is jam-packed with philosophical undertones delivered to the reader through eloquent lyricism and a unique voice pleading to be heard. This novel wasn't just a static read. It was very complex and involving - demanding the reader participate via an internal philosophical debate. Engaging and entertaining... I couldn't put it down and still think of Ruth's dynamic character over 10 years after reading the novel. If you haven't read it, please do! I encourage you to question Ruth's character constantly. I re-read this book in college for a philosophy class and the class discussion was very lively. Treat yourself to a deeply moving read and a woman you'll never forget.

This book was the biggest waste of my time. I'm not sure why I kept reading it, I guess I was waiting for it to get better. I thought the ending didn't fit at all. Don't waste your time, unless you have lots of time, then I recommend doing something else besides read this book.

This is the story of Ruth. It is the story of her struggles, her fears and anxieties, her victories and failures but, ultimately, it is the story of her growth. Like a butterfly emerging from a cocoon Ruth emerges from her trials stronger and more beautiful than she ever believed she could be.

I love this story. Just reading it is an affirmation of the human spirit. My own life has been a thousand times easier than Ruth's and yet Jane Hamilton weaves her tail so skillfully that I still could see bits of myself in poor Ruth. And in the end, after seeing how Ruth overcame so much, I knew for sure that I could take on the world and win. Damn right! One hand tied behind my back.

Go Ruth! And go Jane Hamilton! Books like this don't come along too often and when they do they should be mandatory reading by order of the king of the universe.

As a huge fan of Jane Hamilton, I was disappointed overall with this story. The narrator is a mildly-retarded young woman who lives with her emotionally abusive mother. Lonely, poor and unmotivated - Ruth is attracted to a substance-abusing parasite who rapes her on their first date. She then marries him, they start a family and continue to sponge off of her mother - who grows more angry and cruel. Ruth corresponds by mail with her estranged aunt, who appears to be the only one in the family with any redeeming qualities. Her resistance to her aunt's advice and offers of help perpetuate the hopeless situation.

What I found especially frustrating was the narrator's lack of acceptance that her situation is the result of her own irresponsible thoughts and actions. She continually makes excuses for herself and her boyfriend...making them out to be perpetual victims rather than slackers. Also - despite her lack of education or basic common sense - she occasionally tells the story in a way that is inappropriately well-spoken and insightful. My initial feelings toward Ruth were of pity, but that quickly changed to contempt.

Readers...be prepared for a strange ending.

I read this book nearly 5 years ago, and yet I can clearly remember details from it. Nearly every book that I have ever read that makes an impact on me I read at least twice.

This was not necessary with The Book ofRuth. I give it a 3 because it certainly is a story that gripped me from the very beginning, and forced me to continue to the very end in one sitting. It also has stayed with me, which is certainly not the norm for a book read in one sitting and never read again.

For me, this was a difficult book to read, because it was so incredibly bleak. The tiny points of brightness in it were vivid, though sparing, which I suppose were made more vivid in the overwhelming tangle of harshness and deprivation.

Does this novel have impact? Yes. When a storyteller can seize you with a tale so that you devour it in one sitting, never pick it up again, and still vividly recall details about it years later, that is definitely a novel that makes an impact.

My frustration with this novel, however, is that the impact rather felt like a jackhammering of my psyche, rather than an ephiphany or at least a sense of wonder at a wonderful tale told well.

It is a tale told well, but it is not a wonderful tale.

I have never known whether to recommend this to anyone because of the fact that it *is* a tale told well, or whether to keep my mouth shut on this one, because I'm not convinced one way or the other that the tale was worth telling.

Hamilton is beyond doubt talented and gifted in character description (at least of Ruth), has an excellent grasp of narrative voice, but I have read nothing else by her since this book and likely never will. I guess that I am glad that I read the Book of Ruth, because in my opinion it is a classic example of having all the right tools and all of the right gifts and then wasting them on an irredeemable cast of characters.

Do I recommend it? Yes - If you are interested in seeing how to right fabulously and still make a mess of things.

I read it a few years back. I could explain the whole story to someone in one sentence. You follow the misery of this one girl and in the end she's still miserable, only in a different way. Was bored through the whole story but kept at it because, after all, Oprah really liked it!!!

This book was absolutely fantastic. I'm working my way through Oprah's book list and I haven't been disappointed yet! I put this one near the top, though. The narrator is so likeable, such an "everyman" despite her many faults and "lack of intelligence," that the reader can't help but sympathize. You get to know this character closely and personally, and because of that, the story draws you in, almost in a Holden Caulfield kind of way. The END is shockingly surprising and unexpected, but makes sense, and leaves the reader rooting for Ruth, even in the very end.

A really warped book. It was interesting, but I did not like the end. It tells of a young girl's stuggle in a poor and dysfunctional family. How she tried to gain independence and fell in love. Her husband was strange and in the end was even stranger! A bit too morbid and violent for me.

I had this book sitting on my shelf for sometime since Oprah first recommended it. I happen to pick it up recently to take to the beach. I must admit it was not an easy read and there were many times when I wondered why I was reading it because it was so painful. The ending was not unexpected for me because I felt like we were always leading to a crescendo only I was secretly hoping it would have been a happy one. Needless to say, it was certainly more appropriate than anything sugar coated. I was truly emotionally touched by Ruth's wonderful ability to look past the imperfections of those around her. I completely agree with other reveiwers in that this is not a light read but one that will never totally leave your heart and soul. The book is well worth the effort.