Spotlight customer reviews:
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Customer Rating: 
Summary: Incredibly Sad, but Poignant
Comment: I wonder from the other reviews whether they either read the same book or didn't finish it. Reviewers point out that the main character Sarah is a little weak willed without the proper will needed to survive the frontier. I think that is the lens of modern feminist sensibilities.
Either way, this book is about true love's transformation of Sarah from a weak, wishy-washy girl to a strong, determined woman. Beginning with her willingness to accept an arranged marriage to a brutal oaf who cared not for her own needs, Sarah becomes a woman who could take care of herself. The tale is about Sarah and Imogene's love and how it transformed the younger woman into the gracious, strong woman that she would become. It's about the grief, heartache and utter joy that occurred in between those two extremes. Bittersweet chronicles what they do to keep that love alive and what it costs them.
I would not recommend the book for anyone who is depressed because it is extremely sad and rife with death. But the blossoming of love between the two characters is sweet and you will definitely root for them. If you need a good cry over what you have or what you lost, this is the book to read. It's beautifully written. Thank you, Nevada.
Customer Rating:
Summary: OUT STANDING
Comment: I loved this book. I have even given it to a number of friends of mine. I liked the book as it is. I also think if Barr wanted she could meake a second book about the lover that has become strong over the years, and where it could lead to a new life with all she has learned. I have a friend who has a family rance in NV and to go from one house to another is 28 miles on dirt roads, dusty, windy,and craggy. I could just picture the coundtry Barr discribed. This is a wonderful book for women's studies.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Possibly Nevada Barr's best book...
Comment: This is NOT a mystery, this is NOT one of the Anna Pidgeon series. It's a lesbian love story, set in the Old West. The people are real, their world is real. Again, very well-written. I didn't want it to end.
Customer Rating: 
Summary: Slow, clunky and overwrought
Comment: I realized late that this was Nevada Barr's FIRST novel, not her LATEST. Thank goodness she has learned better plot development since Bittersweet, which she wrote in 1984.
The trite title gives it all away. While the characters are well thought-out, consistent and potentially interesting, the plot is graceless and overly contrived. While I wouldn't expect a story about two women becoming lovers in the nineteenth century to be full of rainbows and butterflies, the story focuses primarily on their challenges and tragedies.
Unfortunately the two primary characters are also unlikeable. One is a perpetual victim and weakling, and the other is a sexual predator and a liar. Instead of being moved by their struggle and pathos, I just wanted to smack them.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Bittersweet smells like Roses!
Comment: I bought Bittersweet because I love Barr's style of writing, and I was waiting for the next mystery. I was wondering how I would like Ms. Barr's writing a different style than her Anna Pigeon mysteries.
Once again, Nevada Barr writes a compelling story! This one takes place in the old west and is basically a beautiful love story between two people, and the trials and tribulations they go through to be able to be together. As usual, Barr weaves the main characters intimately to the environment they find themselves in, as well as with characters that come and go in their lives.
This book is definitely for those souls, of any gender, who appreciate a wonderful love story that, like real life, may smell like roses along the way, but in the end, is truly bittersweet.
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