full of terrible language which served no purpose
599584
Must be for a teenage audience. I found the story simple, full of terrible language which served no purpose. Totally dumb movie.
3655579
The author calls herself a grammarian; but some of her descriptions in the book are pure gutter trash! In our family we make an effort to finish every book we open - like it or not.  I stuck to that edict; but I regret giving the book that much time.  I always am happy to pass my hardcover books on to my friends; however, this time I ripped the pages out and tossed it into the recycle bin  so that no other person has to read this kind of tripe.

The author has the credentials that would make one think "this will be a good read".  Not so.  I expect people who sell themselves as educators and grammarians to use the language to uplift and inspire others. This offering did neither.

I've wondered if this literal piece of trash wasn't just one more way for a grown woman to rebel against the principles and moral values in which she was
raised.  Either way, I exhort people who love good fiction to save your money to spend on real literature.
3284193
It was plain and simple horrendous. The language was completely out of place and crude. Reading through the dialog I wasn't sure if the story is taking place in the dark ages at a time of knights and nobles or in a current ghetto neighborhood.
There was no plot to speak of, the sex scenes started way too early and the entire book revolved around mating images. I am not one to give bad reviews, but this story line had absolutely nowhere to go after the 4th chapter. I romanticized this book from the plot I read in the cover and I was fascinated by the a good dragon story; in all truthfulness however, I was deeply disappointed.
1402696
I do not know what prompted me to order this book to begin with because it was a waste of time.  I don't care to read about abuse and this was certainly an abusive story and terribly written.
2940323
God, where to begin. In a nutshell, one of the worst books I've read in years. In addition to being simply bad prose, it is also racist, condescending, and full of factual mistakes.

This is written in 1991 by a conservative Brit who travels to then-Soviet Uzbekistan looking to experience it as the region where his fellow British gentlemen adventured throughout the 1800's. As such, he is dismissive of the current culture and politics, does not like to try the local food, passes judgement on the locals, and waxes nostalgic for the British Empire.

During one telling moment, the author notices hungry and tired people standing in breadlines (food shortages were common in the early 1990s), and calls them, inexplicably, "crocodiles". I'm not even sure what to make if this, other than that long lines of poorly dressed people waiting to buy food don't look aesthetically pleasing to a European traveler's eye.

Apart from its culturally insensitive tone, the book is also badly edited, with place names, names of historical figures, and ethnic group names wildly misspelled. Other times, old-style names coined during the British Empire days are condescendingly used. Sometimes multiple spelling variations are used throughout (such as Uzbeg versus Uzbek).

In short, absolutely the worst book on the area you will ever read. Uzbekistan has a lot to offer to someone interested in Central Asian history, and there is sadly a dearth of good books on the subject. This is why this book is especially disappointing: it could have provided real insight and information, but does nothing of the sort. If you want to read poorly written and very badly researched travel notes by someone who is condescending and not really interested in the region apart from the role it played in the formation of the British empire, go ahead and read this.
3245166
If I could give this a zero, I would. Rude, crude , disgusting humor. The type of language coming out of the mouths of the children was even rude.  It was so bad we turned it off before it was even halfway over.
2426271
The spanish words and phrases inserted throughout the book were totally mangled - spelling, grammar, everything. English errors also, e.g. 'more importantly' is always bad grammar. Some of the background about the Roman Empire didn't sound right to me but I didn't bother to investigate. With so many errors the author loses credibily and the reader loses interest.

If it is worth spending this much time writing a book it must be worthwhile hiring an editor.
296066
This book was written by someone who couldn't be bothered to spell, observe grammar, or the tiniest conventions of hack n slash zombie fiction.  I've read hundreds of zombie novels, short stories, even a few plays, and this is the most horredously amateur, intelligence-insulting piece of offal that I've had the misfortune of paying for.  Every single day I read better---and more exciting---English 101 essays.

If you have any respect for the correct use of our language, this novel won't be for you.  I bought it solely on the premise that all you folks who rated it as a top notch read couldn't be wrong, and of course, for you guys, maybe it did it for ya.

I thought this pos was so bad I actually got angry for having bought it. Amazon should be ashamed of fronting drivel, and poor edited drivel like this.
4877267
I had to seek this book out and write a review on it. I couldn't believe that a book filled with so much meaningless information ever made it past any respectable editor, especially any of those over at Harper-Collins Publishers, who are famous for being uncompromisingly shrewd with the red  pen.

The most unsavory example of Guterson's verbal barrage falls within  the first three chapters. He pads the pages with 5 and 10 dollar S.A.T.  words that seem horribly out of place and done as a second thought. I have  no problem with words like Stultify, attenuated, abaft, or miasma but the  problem here is, that Guterson himself refrains from utilizing these all-to-obvious flags as the book progresses. What a destructive way to use  the language. On page 253, he can barely muster a three syllable word. I don't mind it one way or the other but please, find some consistency. Even  Hemingway had to.

Snow falling ... had to be the biggest sleep-over and let-down of my entire literate life. It was clear that this book was written with the sole intention of selling it to Hollywood for the production of a movie.

This insipid piece of writing was so Perry Mason-esque that I thought I heard the music playing in the background, despite the millionth verbalized transgression upon the snow. And yes, you can take that both ways.

Note: The American Heritage Dictionary on page  1498 describes the word 'Verbalism' in section 3 as: Abundant use of words without conveying much meaning. Directly to the left, it shows the cover page for this book as an example.

I wish I could've given this book zero stars.
671946
I only gave this book one star so I could complain about the language.  I didn't make it very far in the book because the language was disgusting.
735068
If you like reading something that was just thrown together, you'll probably enjoy this. I had planned to read this to the end just because I needed to know what happened, but I can't even get halfway through let alone to the end. This book is awful. It's as if the author wrote it in one sitting and never went back through it to make sure there were no discrepancies (there are many). Occasionally, the language seems to be modern when the setting is clearly not. Profanities are tossed in infrequently (thank goodness) but almost as though the author suddenly remembered that she wanted some in there. I love to read, especially fantasy. But, this is terrible!!
1222307
The language was so bad, I can't tell you about the writing, violence, sexual content, etc.  I quit reading it in the second chapter.
1982012
I didn't get past the 2nd page of this book. I really wanted to learn the information the author had written, but in the first sentence he cursed using God's name and more cursing after that.  That was only the introduction of the book!  At the end of the 2nd page, I threw it onto the ground then threw it out in recycling right away. Whoever told the author that this kind of foul language is ok to the general public in book form is way off.  I wouldn't listen to that kind of talk or allow it in my house and certainly won't read a book with it either.
2635620
Interesting story, detracted from  by useless filthy language.
2381407
The grammar and spelling is so poor, it served as an unbearable distraction and I returned it for a refund.
1392068
I didn't like this book at all!! The language is senselessly vulgar and the plot is dumber than the ending. Don't waste your time!
3768184
author has a very limited vocabulary,  book was advertised as  clean language, but the 4 letter f word was on nearly every page
 clearly he needs more  education  on what  clean means.  I would not recommend this book to anyone