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Constant Chatter Shopping Center - Cloudstreet: A Novel
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List Price: $14.00
Our Price: $6.99
Your Save: $ 7.01 ( 50% )
Availability: N/A
Manufacturer: Scribner
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Average Customer Rating:  
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Binding: Paperback
Dewey Decimal Number: 823.914
Format: Bargain Price
Label: Scribner
Manufacturer: Scribner
Number Of Items: 1
Number Of Pages: 432
Publication Date: 2002-04-30
Publisher: Scribner
Studio: Scribner
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Editorial Reviews:
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Cloudstreet: a broken-down house of former glories on the wrong side of the tracks, a place teeming with memories of its own, a place of shudders and shadows and spirits. From separate catastrophes, two families flee to the city and find themselves sharing this great sighing structure and beginning their lives again from scratch. Together they roister and rankle in a house that begins as a roof over their heads and becomes a home for their hearts. '"Imagine Neighbours" being taken over by the writing team of John Steinbeck and Gabriel Garcia Marquez and you'll be close to the heart of Winton's impressive tale' - "Time Out". 'Winton is just one of the best' - "Independent".
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Spotlight customer reviews:
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Customer Rating:
Summary: Amazing.
Comment: This is my first review on amazon.com. Why this book, why now? Because THIS is the book I can't stop telling people about. THIS is the kind of novel I always look for but don't often find. I can't believe that I had never heard of Winton, nor of this book, until recently. I can't add much to the well-written reviews above, except to agree with those who consider this book a classic.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Finest kind and then some
Comment: For the last several days I've been reading, wallowing in and savoring Tim Winton's Cloudstreet. Should the name Winton ring a bell, it might be because it was much remarked by critics and sundry that his most recent novel, Breath, wasn't even longlisted for the Booker. Ai de mi.
Winton an antipodean of the Australian persuasion and, near as I can tell, has been writing since he was knee-high to grasshopper since he's only 48 and has a string of novels behind him as long as your arm. I've read three of `em from various periods; Cloudstreet is my fourth and earliest from 1991. I've not hit a bum note yet with Winton; he's got the gift of story, the grace of language in its multiple manifestions, eyes that see as clearly in hindsight as foresight. He's not magic so much as he is its counter-clockwise extension of pragmatism that swings so pronounced as to come around to, maybe, magic.
Cloudstreet is the special sort of book that doesn't come around often. Finest kind, in fact.
Customer Rating: 
Summary: a lyrical journey
Comment: What a beautiful, lyrical journey this book takes you though. I even cried at one point. The author describes his landscapes so well it creates a new dimension for the mind.
Customer Rating:
Summary: very real
Comment: I've heard this described as 'the great Australian novel'. While not sure I fully agree I certainly rate it very highly. The book evokes Australia very strongly and in great detail. As an expat Australian I felt somehow at home... each of the interesting and complex, yet wholly real and easily related to characters had elements of people I've known. The way it is written is very thoughtful and empathetic, yet the language manages to stay low key and (as other reviewers have noted) loaded with Aussie slang which made it fun to read.
The storyline is engaging, sweeping and epic. I found myself rejoicing at the ups and frowning at the downs they experienced, and admiring the strength of just about all of them at one time or another. The only thing I didn't like was one or two of the plot turns. Rose's reconciliation with her mother seemed a little put on, for example. But it's the characters that made this story for me. On the whole, a very enjoyable read.
Customer Rating:
Summary: ONE NEVER TO FORGET
Comment: WHY didn't this novel win the Booker Prize? Reading Winton is the happiest and most startling relationship I've had with books since first reading Cormac McCarthy. Simply amazing!
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