Year of Fog

A reviewer

I totally agree it seemed like it was going to be a great read but it got boring very quick and I found it very hard to want to finish...I ended up skipping a lot of pages till I got to the end. It was like reading the same day every day over and over and then bam you get to the part about the kid and I was like that's it? Pretty disappointed.

6 out of 6 people found this review helpful.

Well Written but Too Long

I would actually give this a 3.5. When I began reading it, I thought I would love it, and I did admire some things. Richmond is a skilled wordsmith and an excellent developer of character. But not long into the book, I felt impatient. I actually skipped to the ending, and then went back and just skimmed the big middle section. About a hundred pages could easily have been pared from this book to tighten it up without losing any of the substance or flavor. I would read another book of hers, though.

3 out of 3 people found this review helpful.

Started out great but got lost in the fog.....

I received this book as a gift and proceeded to read it in April. It started out great but quickly ended up boring me to tears after the Nth chapter regarding memory and cameras....It was full of fluff and I almost gave up reading it but kept in there because I wanted to know what happened to Emma. I agree with quite a number of reviewers here that the story could have been told with at least 100 less pages and definitely not the repetition of all the theories concerning memory. I'd pass on reading this book.

2 out of 2 people found this review helpful.

Too many pages . . . a bit of a disappointment and a bit predictable

The premise of the book grabbed me -- a girl, Emma, goes missing while in the company of her future stepmother, Abby, while her daddy, Jake, is off on a male-bonding weekend. Guilt is a theme throughout the book as well as persistence and giving up. Abby never gives up while Jake gives up on the future marriage and of finding the girl. Lisbeth's, the girl's bio-mom, involvement was a bit too predictable -- any one could figure out her role early on in the book. The book was far too long and could have been presented in at least half the number of pages. Who cares about the techniques of different types of cameras, the process of working in a darkroom, past relationships, weird family members... Abby's sister Annebel is a neat character as well as Nick, a customer who had her do some photo work. The book had a disappointing ending ... it just sorta of hung there with no real committment as to where Abby's life was going to end up. I read the entire book -- but it took much longer than usual; I typically read 2-3 books per week while being a fulltime working mom of young kids (my secret is to read at night when everyone is asleep) - it took almost 2 weeks to read this book. There were times I wanted to walk away from the book but I didn't.

2 out of 2 people found this review helpful.

Good intentions, just be patient.

The Year of Fog starts off with a great story line that could hook anyone in, a soon-to-be-stepmother loses her future step daughter on a foggy beach. When people pick up this book, they think ¿how can this happen? What can this woman do? Losing your future husbands child is probably the worst thing you could do.¿ And peole are curious to find out how this woman, Abby, copes with everything and they want to know the rest of the story. And I think that with that kind of attracting story line this book would be great for young adults or even women who are worried about becoming stepmothers and their relationship with their stepchildren. While I was very interested at some points in the book, other times I felt that this book was longer than it needed to be. It starts off as a semi-nice day on the foggy San Fransisco Beach, when Abby turns around to find her future stepdaughter, Emma, no where in sight. This book takes the reader through all of the fears and stress that a mother figure has when they lose a loved one. And even after Emma¿s father, police, and everyone else have lost hope, this book proves that a mother¿s love and instinct is STRONG and its REAL. However, no matter how intriguing the story line is, there were times in my reading when the book The Year of Fog seemed to be very repetive and at some points, I really felt like it was going to take me a year to finish reading it and find out the turnout of everything. With that said though, there were a few chapters that did catch my attention, and made me want to keep reading. For instance, the eplanation on why we take photographs and how important photographs can be, really made me think about personal life, and how we can become so busy as people and forget to take time to admire the things around us. Overall, I would recommend this book.

2 out of 2 people found this review helpful.

Not so good

This story could have been told in 1/2 the number of pages used - it was alot of repetition and I found myself skipping pages to get to the end. Like watching a soap opera only on Fridays and Mondays - the other 3 days of the week are a waste of time!

2 out of 2 people found this review helpful.

Not enough for a novel

This would have been better as a short story instead of a 400 page novel. There wasn't enough story to make it interesting for that long. I found it to be very redundant and dragged out. What sounded like an intriguing premise turned out to be a disappointment.

2 out of 2 people found this review helpful.

drags a little, but a good story

I started really enjoying the book, but then it began to drag. It did keep me interested enough to find out what happened to the little girl. I found the chapters on photography and memory (and there's a lot of them) pretty boring. I started just skipping the chapter if it wasn't about the main story. The way the main story ended was good, but the way the book ended didn't flow with the rest of the book.

2 out of 2 people found this review helpful.

a book lover and avid reader

This book wasn't what I expected. There was hardly any dialogue between characters but at the same time it also allowed you to understand the love between a child and step-parent. I thoroughly enjoyed the way Michelle Richmond explained why we take photographs on page 393, very moving moment in the book.

1 out of 1 people found this review helpful.

Sounded Great but very disappointing

I thought this book was very long and disappointing.I finally got feed up with all the details about the minds process and the Bay area, and skipped to find out what happened to the little girl...then poof it was over! What started out as a great idea quickly got boring

1 out of 1 people found this review helpful.

Very good until the end

The story in this book really brings you in. I enjoyed reading until the end. I felt like the writer just gave up and made the ending very easy.

1 out of 1 people found this review helpful.

Very long winded

What started out as an exciting read went downhill very quickly. I couldn't decide if I was learning more about the cities/areas/interests of the Bay Area, or if I was in a classroom learning the psychological aspects of the mind and photography. The disapperance of Emma resorted to a sub-plot within this novel so-so novel. I debated about just flipping through pages of ramblings to the ending, which sadly was as disappointing as it was unbelievable.

1 out of 1 people found this review helpful.

Good until the end.....

This was a good story being told. You really get into the story. It had a good story line until the end. But, it was a little too long and somewhat wordy. The end seems too easy. You just don t find someone sitting there and waiting for you to come along. That is just too easy. It could use a better ending. There was no effort made to the end of the story.

1 out of 1 people found this review helpful.

A compelling subject but ..................

The kidnapping of a child is something we all think about and so I started this book with high expectations. I sympathized with the main characters, but did not like them much. The book was overly redundant.

1 out of 1 people found this review helpful.

A reviewer

Tedious, boring and drawn out are just a few descriptors for this book. If you are an insomniac and need a non-drug sleeping aid, buy this book. If not, save your money and buy something else. This is a never ending story of depression and self-analysis with trips into a past childhood that has no bearing on the story. Very predictable. You know the bad guy from the beginning. I skipped chapters just to get beyond all the verbage. Even the happy ending is covered with depression.

1 out of 1 people found this review helpful.

Don't Bother

A long drawn out boring book. I found myself skimming entire chapters.

1 out of 1 people found this review helpful.

Love<3

I've read this book about a thousand times and love every minute of it each read. I'll continue to recomend.

Highly recommend

Absolutely wonderful book. A bit of a thriller in that a child disappears and the soon-to-be stepmother, Abby, is the last to see her. Months pass without any progress. Some family members and the police give up but Abby refuses to believe that the little girl is dead, even with the cost of possibly losing her relationship with the girl's father.

Wow! I did not see the culprit until Richmond put it on paper--did I miss something? This is what kept me going--the suspense of not knowing if Emma has been kidnapped or swept away by the sea as many, including her father, believe. It is sweet and tender in parts, brutally honest in others. Highly recommend.

Okay book

Would of liked to see more action and adventure during the search for emma. Okay book quite insightful into the effects of the investigation on everyone.

LOVE

This book is GREAT! The ending wasn't what I was wanting, but what do you do?!