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Turtle Moon transports the listener to Verity, Florida, a place where anything can happen during the month of May, when migrating sea turtles come to town, mistaking the glow of the streetlights for the moon.
A young single mother is murdered in her apartment and her baby is gone. Keith, a 12-year-old boy in the same apartment building - the self-styled "meanest boy" in town - also disappears. In pursuit of the baby, the boy and the killer, are Keith's divorced mother and a cop who himself was once considered the meanest boy in town. Their search leads them down the humid byways of a Florida populated almost exclusively by people from somewhere else; emotional refugees seeking sanctuary along the swampy coast.
After high school, Hoffman went to work for the Doubleday factory in Garden City. But the eight-hour, supervised workday was not for her, and she quit before lunch on her first day! She enrolled in night school at Adelphi University, graduating in 1971 with a degree in English. She went on to attend Stanford University's Creative Writing Center on a Mirrellees Fellowship. Her mentor at Stanford, the great teacher and novelist Albert Guerard, helped to get her first story published in the literary magazine Fiction. The story attracted the attention of legendary editor Ted Solotaroff, who asked if she had written any longer fiction. She hadn't -- but immediately set to work. In 1977, when Hoffman was 25, her first novel, Property Of, was published to great fanfare.
Since that remarkable debut, Hoffman has carved herself a unique niche in American fiction. A favorite with teens as well as adults, she renders life's deepest mysteries immediately understandable in stories suffused with magic realism and a dreamy, fairy-tale sensibility. (In a 1994 article for The New York Times, interviewer Ruth Reichl described the magic in Hoffman's books as a casual, regular occurrence -- "...so offhand that even the most skeptical reader can accept it.") Her characters' lives are transformed by uncontrollable forces -- love and loss, sorrow and bliss, danger and death.
Hoffman's 1997 novel Here on Earth was selected as an Oprah Book Club pick, but even without Winfrey's powerful endorsement, her books have become huge bestsellers -- including three that have been adapted for the movies: Practical Magic (1995), The River King (2000), and her YA fable Aquamarine (2001).
Hoffman is a breast cancer survivor; and like many people who consider themselves blessed with luck, she believes strongly in giving back. For this reason, she donated her advance from her 1999 short story collection Local Girls to help create the Hoffman Breast Center at Mt. Auburn Hospital in Cambridge, MA.
Anonymous
Posted July 5, 2009
I Also Recommend:
I read this book based on another author's recommendation. I thought the book was good, but not outstanding. Since reading Turtle Moon, I have read other books by Alice Hoffman that I have enjoyed more, such as Here on Earth and Local Girls.
1 out of 1 people found this review helpful.
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Posted February 8, 2013
U said meet u at turtle res 5
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Posted February 8, 2013
Whts that mean?
0 out of 1 people found this review helpful.
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Posted January 2, 2013
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Posted July 9, 2012
Nursury
0 out of 2 people found this review helpful.
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Posted January 5, 2012
another great story from Alice Hoffman....enjoyed her free moving story line and reminders of love found and love lost. Am now reading the The Dovekeepers and I think this is the best she has ever done....Bravo !!
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Posted May 19, 2011
My friend handed me this book 15 years ago and said "this is just the neatest book I ever read!" NEAT?? Well, 15 years later, still one of my favorites! Love this easy read with rich characters and plenty of twists and pace!
Was this review helpful? Yes NoThank you for your feedback. Report this reviewThank you, this review has been flagged.This book is wonderful, wonderful, wonderful, as is everything Alice Hoffman has ever written. I found myself reading aloud just to savor the richness of her language --- it's like the best dark chocolate you can buy.
Was this review helpful? Yes NoThank you for your feedback. Report this reviewThank you, this review has been flagged.This book was another enthralling Alice Hoffman read. As always, I could not put down her book. I recommend anything written by her.
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Posted February 2, 2005
A really good, interesting book that is fast and easy to read. It will pull you right in!!
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Posted January 26, 2005
No one writes like Alice Hoffman! A Hoffman read always lifts me up out of my reality and places me in another realm, somewhere between what is and what would be. Alice never disappoints.
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Posted December 6, 2002
Hey Trish, don't I have you on my MSN?! lol What a coincidence, anyway, to make a long review short, this book is a very well composed piece of literary work. My hat goes off to Alice Hoffman and her writing skills. Never have I read a book where a character gets laid three times, thanks for the slice of maturity Alice. >:)
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Posted May 24, 2002
This book was really amazing, this is my second Alice Hoffman book, and i plan to read many more. Alice Hoffman leaves me in tears, even at the simplest line. A must read.
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Posted July 26, 2001
A Great book, just read it last night.Everyone should read this book.
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Posted September 12, 2000
Highly recommended! Touching! Mothers with kindhearted, incecure, loud troublemakers will relate and understend the most!
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Posted March 27, 2000
I thought that the book was great. It included action, suspense, drama. It was an all out ***** star book.
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Posted January 5, 2010
No text was provided for this review.
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Posted January 10, 2012
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Posted September 8, 2010
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Posted June 24, 2010
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Overview
Turtle Moon transports the listener to Verity, Florida, a place where anything can happen during the month of May, when migrating sea turtles come to town, mistaking the glow of the streetlights for the moon.
A young single mother is murdered in her apartment and her baby is gone. Keith, a 12-year-old boy in the same apartment building - the self-styled "meanest boy" in town - also disappears. In pursuit of the baby, the boy and the killer, are Keith's divorced mother and a cop ...