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American Pie: A Novel
by Michael Lee West
Product Group: Book
Publisher: Avon A (1997-10-01)
ISBN: 0060984333
EAN: 9780060984335
Dewy Decimal #: 813.54
Paperback: 336 pages
Edition: HarperPerennial ed
Release Date: 1997-08-22
SKU: N2967
Condition: Good
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Editorial Reviews
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Product Description
Acclaim for Michael Lee West American Pie "Colorful, larger-than-life characters strut and stew with zest across an equally colorful terrain..."
--Kirkus Review "American Pie is delicious, literary treat...Well worth reading for both the humor and poignancy it portrays."
--The Nashville Tennessean "West is a major talent, and American Pie serves as proof...West's writing is a 'Discovery Channel' for and about people."
--Nashville Life She Flew The Coop "The author of the acclaimed Crazy Ladies has captured the color, eccentricities and tragicomedy that the best Southern writers do so well."
--Publishers Weekly, starred review "Funny, irreverent."
--New York Times Book Review "West has created characters who are so teeming with life you would have to stand back to create some breathing room if you met them."
--Washington Post Book World Crazy Ladies "Not since Flannery O'Connor's first book has a debt by a young Southerner been so filled with wry humor and humanity, so precisely right in its idioms, and so distinctive in its voices."
--St. Petersburg Times
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Customer Reviews
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Only scratching the surface....!
Rating  (3)
Date: 2006-04-13
I thoroughly enjoyed "Crazy Ladies" and "She Flew the Coop"; other novels by West, so I was really looking forward to reading "American Pie". It left me slightly unsatisfied; the story was good, the characters were interesting and lovable, but I just felt that they could have been developed so much further! I actually felt that this book should have had another hundred pages in it, where West could have gone much, much deeper in describing each of the McBroom girls' personal struggles and experiences, trying to deal with life, death and relationships,- most of all with each other. Eleanor's agoraphobia, Freddie's insecurity about her marriage, and Jo-Nell's journey to self-discovery, it was all very intriguing, but it felt like all I got as a reader was merely the tip of the iceberg...! I will definitely look out for the next Michael Lee West novel, though!
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Takes after Fannie Flagg...
Rating  (5)
Date: 2005-08-01
I loved this book. It's written in the same fashion and with the same quirky characters as a Fannie Flagg novel. This was only the second book I've read by Ms. West, but it certainly won't be my last. Crazy Ladies was a great read, and so was this.
American Pie follows three Tennessean sisters and their grandmother...Freddie, Jo-Nell, Eleanor, and Minerva Pray. After Jo-Nell's car is hit by a train and she's in the hospital, their small little family gathers around to console one another. Freddie, all the way from California has given up her southern heritage and proclaims the west to be her new home. Leaving her husband and his sexy secretary alone on the island of Baja, she flies home to help her sisters and figure out what to do with her life after an old beau steps back in the picture.
Eleanor lives with their grandmother Minerva Pray, and has become scared to leave the house alone. She surrounds herself with senior citizens and her family to forget about it. Minerva Pray is convinced there's a curse on the family and that all bad thing's happen in six's to them. And as Jo-Nell sits in the hospital getting better, she decides to make some major changes in her life, and a move just might be the best thing.
Overall this was a wonderful book. One that I'd definitely recommend for fans of Southern Lit and authors such as Ms. Flagg, Sandra Dallas, and Adriana Trigiani. I can't wait to read more from Ms. West!
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Boring
Rating  (2)
Date: 2004-12-23
0 out of 1 customers found this reveiw helpful
This is the second book I've read by this author, and although it American Pie is better than She Flew the Coop, it still wasn't good. It semed to be building up to an interesting tale, but then it just ended. The characters were quite interesting, but the story fell flat. Apparently I was one of the few who didn't like it though, so if you enjoy southern, gentle fiction you may want to check it out from the library.
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Can't go wrong with this one
Rating (5)
Date: 2004-03-01
2 out of 2 customers found this reveiw helpful
If you're a fan of great Southern literature such as CRAZY LADIES, DIVINE SECRETS OF THE YA-YA, or Jackson McCrae's BARK OF THE DOGWOOD, then you will love this book. As always, West gives us enough colorful characters to fill the pages of several novels and does it with enough zest and talent that they become larger than life, but not in a cardboard cut-out way.While I did like CRAZY LADIES better than this effort, AMERICAN PIE is still worth your time and money. For that matter, read all of West's books. Also recommended: CRAZY LADIES, BARK OF THE DOGWOOD, FRIED GREEN TOMATOES
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Sliced into character renderings, not the best of West
Rating (3)
Date: 2003-09-09
Well, perhaps it is the more modern rendering of a tale, a reunion of family, of sisters, drawn together by tragedy, that makes this pie less delicious. I certainly like Michael Lee West's other books, especially, "She Flew the Coop," and "Consuming Passions". But I find this novel less enticing, easier to put down and do something other than read.
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