Tracy Chevalier - Girl With a Pearl Earring

Pros: compelling story, main character fascinating
Cons: none

Despite having read positive reviews and having my sister in law recommend it, I picked up Girl With a Pearl Earring by Tracy Chevalier with trepidation. I'm not sure why I thought I wouldn't like it; I usually enjoy historical novels. ...

Pros: Interesting period in history.
Cons: somewhat flat characters.

Girl with a Pearl Earring

by Tracy Chevalier
"A New York Times Bestseller"


Let me just go on the record as saying that this book was loaned to me by a person who told me how good it was. I did not choose it,...

Pros: lovely language, engaging main character and great historical detail
Cons: ending that feels somewhat unresolved and oddly unsatisfying

Johannes Vermeer's "Girl with Pearl Earring" was painted in 17th century Holland, sometimes called the Dutch Mona Lisa. When you look at her on the cover of the book, you can see why. Looking over her left shoulder, the girl's expression is difficult...

Pros: Superbly written; evocative, thought-provoking, fascinating insight into 17th century Dutch life.
Cons: Some readers might find it slow.

Girl with a Pearl Earring. Tracy Chevalier. Paperback. 248 pages (1999) Harper Collins; ISBN: 0-00-651320-4 Intro Girl with a Pearl Earring appeared on cinema/TV screens not so long ago, and having been impressed by the movie, I ...

Pros: An Excellent Book from Tracy Chevalier on One of Vermeer's Greatest Paintings.
Cons: At Times, It's a Bit Slow.

(Note: This Review is dedicated to Scarlett Johansson as an early B-Day present, whose B-Date is 11/22/84, Happy B-Day Ms. Johansson.) One of the most celebrated and mysterious painters of the 17th Century, Dutch artist Johannes Vermeer was a seminal ...

Pros: Admirable main character, and other eccentric characters, beautiful prose
Cons: None

The painting of The Girl with a Pearl Earring is not only very famous, it has to be one of the most beautiful portrait paintings ever painted, in my opinion. The look on the young woman’s face makes it seem as if she is about to speak. Just ...

Pros: I became so intrigued that I read it in almost one sitting.
Cons: None

I must have been pre-occupied this past year because I did not know this book had been out and was now a movie. I vaguely remember hearing something about a girl with a pearl earring but did not pay attention until I saw this book on display at K-Mart ...

Pros: A beautiful word painting of a young girl's journey through love
Cons: Nothing

Art historians have called Jan Vermeer's painting "Girl With A Pearl Earring", the "Mona Lisa of the North". Painted in the 1660's in Delft, Holland, the young woman in the portrait gazes at the viewer with a look that defies definite description. Does...

Pros: Opportunity to learn about Vermeer's private life.
Cons: Faulty narration. 1600's language is a bit too common, and thus unrealistic. No intensity.

Unlike the last reviewer of Tracy Chevalier's "Girl With A Pearl Earring," I write this review with absolutely no trepidation. "Girl" is unequivocally terrible.

PLOT SUMMARY: It's the mid 1600's in Holland and 16-year-old Griet is plucked...

Pros: good builup to the painting of the portrait (only ten pages at best)
Cons: unoriginal plot and characters, lack of invigorating writing

I have yet to read a satisfying novel of Tracy Chevalier's. (See my review on Falling Angels.) Girl with a Pearl Earring is a good beginning. It is quite obvious Chevalier or her understudies did an exhaustive amount of historical research ...

Pros: Simple, clear prose; a engaging look at Vermeer and his society
Cons: Almost too simplistic, although this supports the book thematically.

This month my book club read Tracy Chevalier's "Girl With a Pearl Earring," a novel based on Vermeer's painting of the same name. This was a book I had to be kicked and dragged to read. The title did not interest me, I knew virtually nothing about...

Pros: engaging, historical, vivid, well-written
Cons: may only appeal to historical fiction lovers

Like Arthur Golden's Memoirs of a Geisha, this book transports you to another time and place. In Girl With a Pearl Earring, we are transported to seventeenth century Delft.

Griet, the 16 year old protagonist, transforms in many ways as she...

Pros: Imaginative, Heartfelt, Believable, Engaging, A Good Read.
Cons: A Little Too Much Of A 17th Century Soap Opera.

Synopsis: This story is an incredible journey of a simple maid who gets unusual access to the upper class of her time. She is taken from her humble abode of her blind father's hovel to the inner sanctuary of a celebrated painter. She starts out being...

Pros: A superbly crafted, powerfully evocative story
Cons: May not have broad appeal to readers unfamiliar with art history or the historical context of the Netherlands in the seventeenth century

If Vermeer had written a novel, this is the language he would have used. Naturally, I don't mean that he would have written in English, but that his style and way with words would have been that of Tracy Chevalier in "Girl with a Pearl...

Pros: beautiful writing, good plot
Cons: it ended. that was sad.

I wasn't so excited about reading this book, but I came highly recommended, by a trusted friend, so I had to try it. I wasn't disappointed in the least. I expected a boring art history book, but in the end, I found excellent writing, strong...