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 - Great Buy I'm usually concerned about purchasing items on line, especially books. I can honestly say that this experience was worth it. I would recommend this seller to anyone interested in purchasing good quality books at extremely reasonable prices. Buy with confidence, I did! Rating: - A great sellerProduct is exactly as described, shipping just took a little longer than anticipated. Otherwise a wonderful buying experience! Rating: - Great book!Needed book for required reading for school. Really enjoyed the read. Would recommend for anyone. Rating: - "In our free democracy, even fighting for its life, the truth will out"'Sixteeen-year-old Devon Academy students Gene and Phineas "Finny" are two among 200 private high school students in attendance at a rural New Hampshire boarding school as the story begins in the summer of '42. WWII is raging on other continents, but the best friends and their classmates are a world away. Serious, studious Gene is amazed and often envious of his friend Finny's spontaneous rule-breaking antics. And even more so by his ability to evade punishment and even obtain a smile (or more) from even the most staid faculty member as he dodges punishment with seemingly logical explanations and excuses for his ever-impulsive behavior. Athletic golden boy Phineas seems almost too good to be true, convincing the most reluctant student to participate in his crazy activities, made-up games and clubs. He even goes so far as to contend that the war is not real. But Gene begins to wonder if there might be a more sinister reason for Finny's follies: preventing him from showing up his friend by winning an award for academics. All it takes is one little well-timed jounce to change both lives forever. With its perfect descriptions of the surroundings, superb character development, and not entirely predictable plot, A Separate Peace will draw the reader in to a remarkable story of friendships between privileged, intelligent young men at the brink of manhood and involvement in the war. Both a life lesson and clinic on how to write descriptively, this novel is likely to stay with readers for a very long time. Also good, The Dive from Clausen's Pier by Ann Packer, better, and An American Tragedy by Theodore Dreiser. Rating:  - From The Marrow of His Bones: Brillantly Written But Slightly Flawed Portrait of Friendship and RivalryPublished in 1959, John Knowles' A SEPARATE PEACE is loosely based on the author's experiences while a student at Exter Academy during the 1940s--and tells the story of two students, Phineas and Gene, who strike up an unlikely but intense friendship that leads unexpectedly to tragedy and untimely death. It was extremely well-received by critics and public alike and is considered a minor classic of modern American literature, a frequent fixture on high school and university must-read lit studies lists. A fairly short work, A SEPARATE PEACE can be easily read from cover to cover in the course of two or three hours--but I wouldn't recommend doing so. Some novels should not be rushed, and this is one of them; Knowles' lyric style requires a certain patience to develop fully in the reader's mind and the almost ghostly manner in which he handles the novel's themes of friendship, rivalry, ethics, and morality requires a fair amount of thought. Gene, the novel's narrator, returns to Devon Academy, a private school he attended as a teenager during World War II. He hopes the visit will allow him to face the truth of and find meaning in the past--and he vividly recalls his relationship with school friend and roommate Phineas, a gifted athlete and charismatic eccentric whose charm encouraged his fellow students to numerous risky activities. Chief among these are a dangerous dive from a tree branch into the river, a dive that gradually acquires a ritualistic nature and ultimate gives rise to tragedy. The nature of the tragedy involved drives the action of the novel. Who is morally weak and who is morally strong? How much can Gene--and we--ascribe to accident and circumstance and impulse and how much arises from free will? Who is actually responsible? There are no easy answers. In both tone and story A SEPARATE PEACE seems to draw from three earlier masterpieces: F. Scott Fitzgerald's 1920 THIS SIDE OF PARADISE and 1925 THE GREAT GATSBY and Evelyn Waugh's 1945 BRIDESHEAD REVISITED. All three of these are lyical in tone; both PARADISE and BRIDESHEAD present young men in academic settings; and PEACE is quite similar in conclusion to GATSBY, both novels ending without a clear moral center and leaving the reader to sort of the meaning of the story in much the same way the characters must. This was Knowles' first novel, and in some respects his inexperience shows: at certain points, most notably Gene's visit to Leper's Vermont home and the impromptu student court, the construction feels forced and artificial, as if Knowles recognized these moments had to occur for the sake of the story but didn't quite know how to go about writing them. That aside, however, the style of writing is remarkable eloquent, the prose possessing a poetic quality that is remarkably fine. The conclusion never fully resolves the relationship between Gene and Phineas, never fully answers the questions it raises, and as such has a remarkably haunting quality. I personally A SEPARATE PEACE an often-brilliant piece of writing; I also suspect it is a novel that holds up extremely well to re-reading. At the same time, however, I confess I also found it slightly over-rated. There is a very fine line between narrative vagueness that inspires thought and narrative vagueness that is simply vague, and Knowles too often edges into the latter. Recommended, but perhaps best regarded as a slightly flawed "art" novel. GFT, Amazon Reviewer
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