Making Waves by Cassandra King

Making Waves Reviews

• 
  Denise Fisher

  Dumbest ending ever!
• 
  Ann

  I could have used a family tree (Mary Frances and Frances Martha were sisters?!). Taking a star off my rating because I hated the ending.
• 
  Michelle

  I love Ms. Kings books, did you know she's Pat Conroy's wife? I'm hoping this a gem like her others.
  I think this was her first novel and I could tell. I really enjoyed The Sunday Wife and The Queen of Broken Hearts, but this one was kind of boring and I didn't like the characters.
• 
  Carrie

  I've been kind of split on Cassandra King's books. I really liked The Same Sweet Girls and thought The Queen of Broken Hearts was just ok, but I was disappointed in this one.
  
  It was kind of a strange story. I didn't hate it, but it was just kind of odd. And I thought that it ended rather abruptly--I could've done with another couple chapters to wrap things up.
  
  I think what I liked least about it was that it had a lot of really psychologically messed up characters. There really wasn't a single character who was very likeable or that I really felt any sympathy for.
  
  
• 
  Eileen

  I LOVED "The Sunday Wife" and couldn't wait to read another book by this (for me) newly discovered author. But "Making Waves" turned out to be so dumb that I couldn't even finish it. The characters were really unlikable. It even felt a little condescending to a certain aspect of Southern life to me, or maybe I'm just too much of a Yankee. Either way, I didn't like it and I'm not sure if I'm going to try reading more of her books.
• 
  Roxie Gallinger

  All I can say is Wow...and it wasn't as I thought it would turn out to be...Hurray for Cassandra King to keep to the end as always...a truly recommended book..a must read that is highly applauded...I'm stunned
• 
  JudiAnne

  As much as I love down home southern tales this book was too hokey even for me. I didn't finish it.
• 
  Bridgett Junkin

  Do not like to be fooled into thinking a book will have a happy ending when it doesn’t. I won’t read anything more by this author.
  
• 
  Nichol Jones

  To say that I hated this book would be an understatement. I cannot think of one single thing about this monstrosity that I liked. There are several things I noticed that makes me seriously question who Cassandra King is as a person. I believe those things will become clear as you read the rest of this review.
  
  I have decided to do this review in the form of bullet points. Each bullet point represents yet another thing I found wrong with Making Waves by Cassandra King.
  
  *Racism/homophobia. While reading this book, I found several instances of major prejudice including racial and homophobic slurs. If the plot were about characters that overcome these things, I might could overlook it. However, that is not the case here. The racism and homophobia found throughout are irrelevant to the storyline and therefore unnecessary and quite frankly disgusting.
  
  *Sexism. This book is written as if it takes place in the 1950s or before considering what little respect is given to women. However, you find out about half way through that this actually takes place in 1985. Granted women in 1985 may not have been given the same respect, permissions, etc as they have today, but they certainly were allowed to drive and go to college. In King's world however, women are expected to get married, have children and make sure supper is on the table when their husbands return from work. One character actually mentions that women learning to drive is considered to be absurd. Gross.
  
  *Plot. What exactly is the plot of this book? After completing it, I am still not entirely sure. Truth is, there are so many subplots occurring throughout that there really is no real plot to speak of. That might not be so bad except that absolutely none of the subplots actually come to fruition. They are mentioned for a page or two and then never brought up again.
  
  *Characters. The characters are absolutely horrendous. Words can truly not describe how awful they are. They are not only racist, homophobic, and sexist, but they're also uneducated and incredibly naïve and immature. None of the characters know how to use proper grammar so reading this book in first person was nauseating as it meant that grammar was completely thrown out the window throughout the entire book. The maturity level of these characters is astoundingly low. They are all supposed to be adults but every single one acts like a child in grade school. There are several pages dedicated to arguments between two sisters, one in her sixties, the other in her eighties. Instead of sounding like the mature adults they should be at their advanced ages, they sound like five year olds fighting over a coveted toy.
  
  *Snooze-fest. Apart from constantly making me angry, I found this book brought about one other "emotion" - boredom. Absolutely nothing interesting happens ever.
  
  *Actions of the characters. Della spends the majority of her chapter listing off all of the things she tells Jesus every night before bed. It's fine that she prays, but this isn't relevant to any subplot so I therefore view reading multiple pages about it as a waste of time. Ellis spends most of hers complaining about her sister's love interest and occasionally saying ridiculous things like believing Jesus didn't have any goals in life. Donnette spends almost two whole chapters trying to keep her husband from moving forward with his life and achieving his goals. Ew.
  
  *The ending. I have never read a worse ending to a book in my life. I can't call it anticlimactic because there was no build up to begin with. But Donnette does something absolutely horrendous that ruins the lives of others and it just ends there. You're left with this awful feeling in your stomach and thinking the world is a terrible place.
  
  I was more than a little disappointed with the entire book but especially the ending. Because I had hoped the ending might save the book at least a little. That's why I continued to read even though I was not enjoying it at all. However, the ending simply made it worse. So. Much. Worse.
• 
  Sandy Young

  I loved this book! Such a beautiful collection of character descriptions. I loved King's changing characters with the chapters. My favorite character was the reprobate Taylor; my least favorite was the jealous, conniving Donnette. I absolutely loved Aunt Della. You probably know that Cassandra King was the wife of Pat Conroy, one of my favorite authors.
  
  Since I have ordered so many books in the past year, I'm what we'd call in the South "book poor." So what am I doing? I'm "shopping" on my bookshelves, rereading books that I read a while back. Maybe I read Making Waves earlier, but I surely didn't recognize either the characters or the plot. I think I've already read The Sunday Wife and maybe The Same Sweet Girls, but I'm going to read them again because now Cassandra King is one of my favorite authors!
  
  Hope you'll read this book if you haven't already . . . or even if you have!
• 
  Nanci

  This was a book that I chose to read after I finished "Tell Me A Story: My Life with Pat Conroy" which she wrote and being a huge Pat Conroy fan, I wanted to read it. I had not read any of her books prior to the memoir. I recalled Pat Conroy saying in an interview about their marriage that "she is a better writer" than he is. The book Making Waves was a decent book, but was her first, so I'm guessing her writing got even better after this book. It was okay, not so much about the quality of her writing, but just the subject matter itself. It's a story about the people living in a small town in the south (reflective of her own experience living in a small town), but tends to focus on the "small mindedness" characteristic that can be representative of small towns in any area of the US.
• 
  Jane Hoppe

  What a literary voice Cassandra King has! Her novel, Making Waves, is emotionally powerful, not just pertaining to the story and characters, but also as a revelation of human nature. King sets Making Waves in an Alabama town small enough that everyone knows everyone’s business. The business in question is: What happened between Taylor and Donnette’s husband Tim that maimed Tim? King gives the perspectives of Donnette, Taylor, Aunt Della, and Ellis with plenty of facts laced with opinions, some funny, most unflattering. King’s dialogue is probably the liveliest I’ve ever read. The story is fast-paced and emotional—a really good read.
• 
  Nicole

  Was okay, it took me halfway in to find out it was set in 1985. I was trying to figure it out with some of the language that was used. I was hoping for something kind of quaint like a Fannie Flagg book. Sadly it was not.
  I do think it’s a shame that most of Taylor’s family treat him poorly after his mother abandoned him. And that ending! Seriously I guess what can we expect from a 20 year old who has been married for 2 years to her high school boyfriend except for petty jealousy and insecurity. Yep, Donnette really pissed me off threatening Taylor like that so he leaves Tim and his friendship behind.
• 
  Russell Sanders

  Cassandra King’s Making Waves is a wonderful example of a true Southern novel. It has the peculiar brand of wit that pervades the South, it is filled with Southern idioms and unusual words (supposively?), and it is filled with characters that can only populate the Southern states. Her book concerns Taylor and Tim, two high school buddies whose lives took a decidedly bad turn, and two years later, Taylor is back in their tiny Alabama town to take care of his Aunt Della while Tim is floundering in a marriage to high school sweetheart Donnette. Donnette is scheming and conniving and about as faux-stereotypical Southern belle as she can be. As things unfold, we are treated to a lot of humor, a lot of gossip, and a lot of soul-searching. But darn, how I hated the ending. I sped through the novel, loving every minute of it, and then King wrote those last ten pages that I was forced to read. I wanted, I wished for, I craved a different outcome. But perhaps this is how life sometimes turns out.
• 
  Lin Stepp

  I loved Cassandra King's QUEEN OF BROKEN HEARTS and went looking for another title of hers. This book was different. Sill had that Southern charm .... added a lot of humor and some quirky characters but the story didn't draw me in and hold me as much.I was interested in the author interview at the end of the book. Learned there the author lived in the book setting near Tuscaloosa, Alabama, at one time. She seems to show small town life as more narrow than it is, missing the aspects of good in a small community in many ways. Perhaps her own experiences were like that.
• 
  Shannon Davis

  This book is filled with Southern charm, humor, family drama, and quirky characters that you'll like and probably even despise. I truly enjoy small-town fiction, whether it's romance or women's fiction, and I am also fond of the way this author writes, but I felt the story's plot was a bit lacking and the ending was somewhat disappointing. I'd still recommend this author because her other books are wonderful!
• 
  Sarah Branch

  I wanted to love this book. I’ve read so many others by this author and lived them. I’m not sure how, but I finished feeling disappointed. I think my favorite character was supposed to be the villain? It seems like Donnette was meant to be the main character but I truly only cared about Taylor and Della.
• 
  Helen

  A good debut. Set in Alabama, it gives a look at southern culture, a small town of narrow minds, where religion, football and gossip prevail. Much of the story feels forced. King states she has created characters and events fashioned from her own experience. The ending is disturbing highlighting the less than admirable trait of manipulation.
• 
  Wendy

  Making Waves, also the name of the beauty shop run by the protagonist, is a story of small town life in Alabama where a promising young man's future is cut short by an accident and the wife who loves him. This is King's first book.
• 
  Angela McVay

  I’ve had this on my “to read list” probably 9 years after I had discovered and read a few other books by Mrs. King that I really loved. I wish I hadn’t put it off for so long. Once I started I couldn’t put it down. I love southern stories and what about that ending!?!!
• 
  Jennifer

  If you want to read about several absolutely detestable people abusing a few decent people and getting away with it, showing zero character growth, then you might enjoy this. Personally, I found it disgusting. I would never read anything by this author again.
• 
  V

  2.5
• 
  Loriann Summers

  Meh.
• 
  Carol Guertin

  I enjoyed reading this book, but wasn't fond of the ending. It left me wanting more story.
• 
  Connie Marx

  Was a good read, not what I expected, but it kept me interested, the ending was polar opposite of what I expected, and left me thinking.... Not many books do that.
• 
  Dallas Strawn

  Charming and funny and southern...til the end. I wasn’t impressed with the end at all.
• 
  Edi McNinch

  Cute book. ''Read'' via audio..Hoopla from library. Loved the dialogue. Spot on SC 'talk'.
• 
  Vicki

  So, that’s the ending? WTH?