Bellefleur: Amazon.ca: Joyce Carol Oates: Books

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A wealthy and notorious clan, the Bellefleurs live in a region not unlike the Adirondacks, in an enormous mansion on the shores of mythical Lake Noir. Written with a voluptuousness and immediacy unusual even for Oates, Bellefleur was hailed upon publication as the culmination of her work. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

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Customer Reviews

10 Reviews

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Average Customer Review

4.2 out of 5 stars (10 customer reviews)

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5.0 out of 5 stars This book bumps Marquez down a notch, May 21 2004

By	Lindsay Elizabeth Newlin (Boulder, CO) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Bellefleur (Paperback)

Next to Marquez's 100 Years of Solitude, Bellefleur has been the most entertaining and absording book I have ever read. Forget the meandering chronology, forget the "plot": this book is like a prosaic photo album of an extraordinary and haunted family that will leave you entirely drawn in. I picked this book up on a whim and am so glad I did, I find myself thinking about the characters still many months after reading it. For everyone who loves 100 Years of Solitude (and everyone else!), this book is an absolute must read.

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5.0 out of 5 stars Haunting and Extraordinary, April 4 2002

By	Laura J. Wellner (LaFayette, New York USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Bellefleur (Paperback)

Bellefleur by Joyce Carol Oates is ranked as one of my most favorite novels of all time; I savored this gothic tale cover to cover and didn't want it to end. It possesses a life of it's own, the characters became ghosts that would haunt me after setting it aside after a short reading and I would look forward to picking it up again. After I finished it, I felt homesick in a peculiar way that no book has ever done to me before; it is very likely that I will revisit the pages of Bellefleur again. Each chapter is an opulent sliver of time that peers into the lives and thoughts of the residents of Bellefleur Manor, an American family of notorious distinction. Their history is rife with joys and sorrows deftly exposed by the astounding craft that is signature in JCO's prolific literary career. The mesmerizing shifts of time, like historical memories, travel from the heights of the imposing Mount Blanc, wind through the decadent rooms of Bellefleur Manor, and plunge into the depths of mysterious Lake Noir where disconcerting spirits dwell. The fanciful characters endear themselves because of their human vitality and cause despair because of their human flaws; they are very tangible and seductive in spite of the brief glimpses into their lives. This is not a book for the faint of heart for it isn't a serene walk in the walled garden of Bellefleur Manor. JCO reveals the grotesque that exists within the soul of the American dream, and with abrupt grace she divulges the unforeseen twists of fate that arise with incredible violence that will leave you reeling with astonishment. It is a unique and contemplative tale, not to be consumed in a few sittings; however, the temptation of the eloquent prose begs to be gorged until the reader is sated. Open this book and open your mind, and give your imagination a workout. If you read this book with a rigid, black and white mind-set you will come away frustrated by it. I highly recommend this novel to anyone who is looking for something out of the ordinary to read.

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4.0 out of 5 stars What Am I Missing?, Oct 30 2001

By	Carol Lindberg Feight (Rochester, MN USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Bellefleur (Paperback)

It's taken me 21 years to finally get around to reading "Bellefleur" and it's classic Joyce Carol Oates... I must say that it wasn't one of the fastest reads chiefly because I was flummoxed from page one by the chronology. Because the characters in the family tree didn't have birthdates or death dates should've been my first clue. I find it unsettling when I don't have a frame of reference for the TIME involved in a story. At first I thought Leah and Gideon were living in the early 'teens of the last century. Then it would appear that no wait --- it must be the 30's, whoops, now it's the 50's, now back to the 20's and so on. That was extremely frustrating for me, and when I finally finished the book I almost had to conclude that the entire story took place in Bromwell Bellefleur's parallel universe.

All this left me with a real uneasy sense of a colossal "HUH???" Although the prose was beautiful and the imagery was striking, I felt a bit of a sense of let-down when I couldn't figure out the basic theory of time in this novel.

So -- what did I miss?

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Most recent customer reviews

3.0 out of 5 stars Bellefleur
I find myself always swept along in the exquiste flow of Oates prose; reading this book was no exception. The problem, ultimately, is that this river really doesn't go anywhere. Read more

Published on Sep 5 2001

5.0 out of 5 stars One of the best novels ever written
I will admit from the outset that I am NOT a diehard Joyce Carol Oates fan, but in this book she manages to retain all of her strengths (her poetry, her characterizations) and... Read more

Published on Jun 24 2000

4.0 out of 5 stars A GOOD BOOK
Although I was not totally taken into the plot, teh character did make me want to continue to see how they endended up. .. Read more

Published on Nov 4 1999

2.0 out of 5 stars Difficult to read because it is chronologically challenging.
Our bookclub found this long epic difficult to read because it is chronologically challenging. Ms. Oates takes you through many generations of the Bellefleur family but not in... Read more