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 enlarge | Author: Ann Patchett
Publisher: Harper
Category: Book
List Price: $25.95
Buy Used: $6.16
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Avg. Customer Rating:  199 reviews
Sales Rank: 151603
Format: Bargain Price
Media: Hardcover
Edition: 1
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 304
Shipping Weight (lbs): 1.3
Dimensions (in): 8.9 x 6.1 x 1.3
Dewey Decimal Number: 813.54
ASIN: B00150II3U
Publication Date: September 25, 2007
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
Condition: GOOD, EX LIBRARY, HAS FEW STAMPS, NO WRITING, NO HIGHLIGHTING, NO UNDERLINING, MINOR SHELF WEAR, 100% GUARANTEED, FAST SHIPPER, CHECK OUR FEEDBACKS.
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| Customer Reviews:
 a well made up story that is not truthful October 20, 2008
2 out of 2 found this review helpful
"Run" is certainly a page-turner. That is why I picked it up in the bookstore. However, it does not ring true when I finish it and look back. The characters have no emotional depths, and I suspect that is why the plot has to be so dramatic and have so many twitches and turns.
The story is about two African boys adopted by a white family, and they find their birth mom and a sister in an accident. All the main characters are very loving persons without any racial bias, though the book implies the larger society is very racist. The two adopted young men are extremely well behaved. They do not seem to harbor any anger or confusion being African American boys growing up in a wealthy white community. Barack Obama is an exceptional man in many regards, but even he was confused and adrift as a young man of mixed heritage. The author does not seem to be able to create a credible African American character, let alone four major ones in the book.
Great Characters, Weak Plot October 14, 2008
2 out of 2 found this review helpful
"Run" takes place mostly in one day. During that time, the biological mother of two African American men, who were adopted by a former Caucasian mayor of Boston, pushes one of her sons away from an oncoming SUV saving his life, and jeopardizing her own life and her eleven year old daughter's as well. These people had never met, but had been observed by the mother and daughter for the daughter's entire life. Needless to say, when the boys and their father find out who their savior was, it was a life altering experience. But there were too many coincidences to give this story credence.
I don't want to spoil the unfolding of the story for anyone who will read this book, so I can't go into all the contrivances.
Nevertheless, the characters are well defined and interesting.
 RUN To Get this Book October 9, 2008
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
While I have read many excellent books this year, few (if any) have resonated with me the way that this book did. While Ann Patchett presents her story in a straightforward easy to read style, each plot twist, each character, each paragraph is thick with meaning and insight.
The book describes a 24-hour period in the life of the Doyle "family" (quotes conveying the extended nature of the family), and the experiences that ensue when Tip, the black adopted middle son of white, Irish, former Boston mayor, Bernard Doyle, is saved from an oncoming hit and run (at the sacrifice of life and limb) by his theretofore unknown biological mother.
The author uses this event as the jumping off point for the exploration of family. The Doyle family consists of Bernard Doyle, his now deceased wife, Bernadette, his two adopted black sons, the aforementioned Tip and Teddy (named for two famous Massachusetts politicians), Doyle's biological son, nere-do-well Sullivan, and the dead mother's uncle, Father Sullivan. The family of the sacrificing biological mother, Tennessee Moser, consists of Tennessee, Kenya, her talented, intelligent, intuitive 11-year old daughter (and presumably Tip and Teddy's sister), and a largely unnamed friend (who comes to play a small, but crucial role later in the tale).
Ann Patchett does an extraordinary job of raising many compelling questions on the nature of family and the roles of the persons who comprise it. The following are some of the issues that caught my attention:
1. The author's message seems to be that a "family" is more a collection of persons who elect to view and treat themselves as such, rather than a relation based on blood or common ancestry. The book begins with a tale (a fable?) of a statue (a startling likeness of the now dead Bernadette) that gets passed down through the generations. Which "family member" ends up with the statue supports this view.
2. I was particularly interested in the presentation of the tension between the duties of a member of a family and the individual's desire to following his own interests and path. The elder Doyle desperately wanted his sons to adopt his social conscience and enter politics, while the studious Tip preferred the solitude of the ichthyology (fish) lab, and the caring Teddy desired to follow the lead of Uncle Sullivan into the priesthood. At one point, Tip and Kenya end up in his lab filled with fish specimens in glass jars, and he is so moved by the interest she shows in the specimens and Tip's knowledge--drawing a stark contrast from his father's lack of interest.
3. Tennessee, the boys' biological mother who gave them up, spent the last 20 years living as an unknown, unseen witness to the boys' lives, but always retaining a connection--even though they didn't know it. Passing them in the street, seeing them in restaurants and theaters, looking through their windows when they passed the house, knowing their interests and career paths, without them ever noticing. Honestly, this description gave me a chill. Tennessee relates to one instance when she almost touched Tip in a crowd, and even discusses feeling electricity when touching him for the brief moment necessary to push him away from the oncoming car. To have that much love and connection with someone who doesn't know you exist--even when passing you on the street--is truly a remarkable notion.
4. The books described pattern of familial behavior into which family members permit themselves to fall, and which tend to define the person, but aren't necessarily who or all those family members are as people. In this light, I was fascinated by the scenes involving the nere-do-well son, Sullivan, and his facility in interacting with the distraught Kenya--something the other family members found much more difficult. Sullivan was really much of a person than his family structure permitted, but sadly, even he himself bought into this restrictive definition in defining and comporting himself.
While I could go on, my best recommendation is to RUN and buy/read this truly extraordinary book.
Not as simple as it looks. October 6, 2008
0 out of 2 found this review helpful
Run by Ann Pachette
At first, my interest in this book was about a single parent with adopted children. It became even more interested when an incident brings another child to them for caretaking. This is a fantasy of mine, that I will be in a situation to care for a needy child.(I am a child and family therapist but cannot "rescue" children I work with professionally.) This part of the story is somewhat contrived but the ending, somewhat predictable but not in the sense of a recurring dream I have had since my husband died suddenly at a young age. In my dream, my late husband is always leaving. I'm now reading about a woman who disappears, needing to be invisible from her family.The theme of leaving a family under so many unusual conditions is a curious one. It leaves you wondering where is the character running away from or running toward. This is what made the book so interesting. I thought it was well written and now my favorite of Ann Pachette.
 Slowly Reaches the Finish Line September 24, 2008
2 out of 2 found this review helpful
I wanted so much to like this book. It speaks to so many life-impacting themes - family, race, class, politics, science. But, the many enjoyable parts do not congeal into a satisfying whole. The prose is softly spoken even when describing pain and death, and follow-on grief. The writer turns some phrases so well that they warrant reading them aloud. In a natural, off-hand manner, Patchett centers the plot on a white politician's and his wife's adopting two black children to fill out their one-child family. The children's acceptance by the Irish extended family further defines the capacity to love those born outside our bloodline. This is a strong, well done element of the book. The first sentence tells us that Bernadette, the mother has died, and this sets the tone for how the all-male unit, including the uncle, Father Sullivan continues in her absence. Yet, she is never truly absent; her memory drives the men's thoughts and actions. Also, the writer uses the device of the mother to connect to the other females, including the statue of the Madonna. Two of these females are another mother and her daughter, who are introduced in a contrived scene (one of several that just don't ring true). All the characters, including walk-on parts, convey nearly total goodness. Perhaps, this is the critical weakness in the story: everyone is just too good. The inter-generational conflict, the appearance of the birth mother, everyone's quiet approach to loss (lots of losses here), are subdued to the point of robotic. Yes, the characters are likeable, even lovable, if too often flat. The research in history and science is apparent. There just isn't enough dramatic heat to fuel total interest in the story.
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