 | | |
| Leota's Garden | 
 enlarge | List Price: $13.99
Buy New: $2.44
You Save: $11.55 (83%)
Buy New/Used/Collectible from $2.44
Avg. Customer Rating:  (based on 76 reviews)
Sales Rank: 16808
Category: Book
Author: Francine Rivers
Publisher: Tyndale House Publishers
Studio: Tyndale House Publishers
Manufacturer: Tyndale House Publishers
Label: Tyndale House Publishers
Languages: English (Original Language), English (Unknown), English (Published)
Media: Paperback
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 448
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.8
Dimensions (in): 8.1 x 5.4 x 1.3
ISBN: 084233498X
Dewey Decimal Number: 813.54
UPC: 031809034989
EAN: 9780842334983
ASIN: 084233498X
Publication Date: January 10, 2004
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
|
| Similar Items:
|
| Editorial Reviews:
Product Description
Now available in softcover! Award-winning author Francine Rivers opens a world full of vibrant characters with a powerful story of hope. In this stunning novel, Francine explores the new life that love can bring to a decaying garden of broken relationships. Through the lives of 84-year-old Leota, her granddaughter, and a college student with all the answers, Francine leads readers to ponder the value of life and truth in a way that only she can.
Amazon.com Review
Acclaimed Christian fiction writer Francine Rivers's (The Atonement Child) Leota's Garden uses the image of the garden as a metaphor for the cycles of life that the characters experience. While the story revolves around a number of lives, they are all connected through Leota--an 84-year-old grandmother--and her garden, which was once a place of beauty and hope but has in recent years gone to ruin. Beginning in desolation--Leota has been neglected by her self-centered daughter, whose obsession with getting her own daughter into the best college has driven them apart--the novel slowly shows the weaving together of lives in the mysterious ways of grace: a proud and narrow-minded college student ends up learning more from Leota than he'd bargained for, and the granddaughter Leota had never been allowed to know shows up looking for some answers, and even more, looking for Leota herself. A garden blooms, the novel suggests, by getting one's hands a little dirty doing the hard work of love. --Doug Thorpe
|
| Customer Reviews: Read 71 more reviews...
 A mixed bag November 17, 2008
What did I love about this book? I loved that Leota was so real--an elderly woman with a heart, soul and backbone. I loved that she had a granddaughter that came and administered to her at a lonely time--without resentment. She truly rejoiced in serving her grandmother. Infact, I was inspired to do more to reach out to my family after reflecting on some of the tender passages of sacrifice and selflessness on the part of Anne-Lynn toward her grandmother. However...
There were also some troubling issues for me. First of all, Anne Lynn came across as synthetic and shallow--way too "glory hallelujah" all the time. She lacked substance and it was difficult to care for her as much as I came to care for Leota, Corbin and even Eleanor. Furthermore, as one who believes that God is a big proponent of marriage, I had a hard time swallowing Anne-Lynn's being, basically, "married to Jesus." God heartily endorses marriage and family.
The time frame was also problematic for me... Okay, so Eleanor was, what, 46? The book seemingly took place in the 90s--with cell phones and computers--but Eleanor could remember living through WWII... She should have been atleast 60. Also, Leota was apparently 38 when Nora was born... I inferred from some passages that she was a very young mother during the war years... Yet she was apparently already well into her 40s (considering how old Nora was at that point). My logical side kept interrupting my reading with nagging questions about what the heck year it was supposed to be... The author didn't work out the timeline in a way that made sense, so focused did she seem to be on her religious message. In the end, there was more message than story here.
What's more, I did feel that Rivers used this novel as a soapbox time and again, filling her story with way too many of our society's issues... Somehow, the religious messages seemed to be more gently woven into her Mark of the Lion series. The last couple of her books that I've read (Atonement Child and this one) lacked that subtlety and left me understanding why so many in our culture today think of us Christians as narrow-minded zealots. Even when she's preaching in favor of views I hold near and dear, I find that I'm uncomfortable with her "Bible-thumping" approach to complex issues.
That said, I do carry away from this book a desire to be kinder to my friends and family. So it was not a wasted effort.
Garden Analogy August 23, 2008
Leota's Garden was a sweet story that revolves around Leota's Garden. The story is about a 84 year old neglected woman whose garden is neglected as her. She calls for help. A volunteer who is a college student learns more from Leota than he thought he would when he started volunteering to do a survey for a class. After being estranged from her family for many years her Granddaughter shows up and loves the garden as much as Leota does. Leota uses the garden to teach life lessons to the whole family and the college student that becomes more than a volunteer, in her life. I thought the plot was rather slow. I was disappointed in this book after reading so many others of Francine Rivers.
OK, tender, but not gripping. August 16, 2008
Rivers has a gift, no doubt about it. But this story did not affect me as most of the others I have read.
Sick twist July 4, 2008
I was glued to this book for the two days it took me to read it so
you can imagine my utter shock and frustration when the book took a
twist turn at the end concerning Leota and a medical technician.
It was so unnecessary. It would have been nice for Leota and her daughter to reconcile or at LEAST die a normal peaceful death. I was very disappointed but overall enjoyed the dialogue throughout the book.
The Halloweeen "skit" was too drawn out for my liking but Leota was such dear I read to find out more and more about her sweet self. Other parts of the book caused me to raise my eybrows... How "predicatble" that the black kids would have an absentee father who was probably "in jail." There were enough odd placed comments concerning race to make me squirm in my seat but I suppose that was the author's intent. Bottom line is this was a good book but I probably wouldn't recommend it. The "feud" between mother (Leota) and daughter (Nora) seemed entirely overblown. And Annie was too perfect to be true. It was a pleasant book and this is Just my two cents.
 I loved this sweet book! June 26, 2008
Leota's Garden
I absolutely loved this book! I can't wait to read other books by Francine Rivers now. It was just the neatest portraial of a granddaughter's love for her grandmother.
|
|
|
 Powered by Associate-O-Matic
| | |
