Using a McLuhanesque idea—the notion that, when faced with the totally new, we seek refuge in the past—editor Prior gathers an anthology of short fiction, heavy on contemporary British writers with a handful of somewhat better-known Americans, that looks back to earlier decades with something like nostalgia. Some stories concern a present informed by the past, several are coming-of-age passages: in college, leaving college, first job in the “real” world. Others are more concerned with the dislocation from the familiar confronted by travelers, and some are simply set in the past. In Tony White’s “The Jet-Set Girls,” in which LSD refers to “pounds, shillings, and pence,” a writer recalls a shaping experience with underworld London toughs who demand from him work with extra-literary qualities. Emily Perkins’s “Let’s Go” is a picaresque about young Bohemian Brits who romp through contemporary Prague acting decidedly un-British. Chris Mazza’s “His Helpmate” looks back to the late ’70s when, through dubious means, its protagonist secures a spot in a band for her less-than-talented husband. Bidisha’s “A Taste of the East” lampoons the academic West’s fascination for the East. Pagan Kennedy’s “Glitter” recalls a John Waters-like punk era Baltimore, replete with vintage clothing, Russ Meyer movie posters, and a transvestite named Miss Patty. The contributors range in age and experience from the very young Bidisha to the very established Joyce Carol Oates. Regardless, most of their stories burn at the same heat: tepid.
Pub Date: Sept. 1, 2000
ISBN: 1-85242-644-6
Page Count: 242
Publisher: Serpent’s Tail
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 2000
Wacky plot keeps the pages turning and enduring schmaltzy romantic sequences.
Sisters work together to solve a child-abandonment case.
Ellie and Julia Cates have never been close. Julia is shy and brainy; Ellie gets by on charm and looks. Their differences must be tossed aside when a traumatized young girl wanders in from the forest into their hometown in Washington. The sisters’ professional skills are put to the test. Julia is a world-renowned child psychologist who has lost her edge. She is reeling from a case that went publicly sour. Though she was cleared of all wrongdoing, Julia’s name was tarnished, forcing her to shutter her Beverly Hills practice. Ellie Barton is the local police chief in Rain Valley, who’s never faced a tougher case. This is her chance to prove she is more than just a fading homecoming queen, but a scarcity of clues and a reluctant victim make locating the girl’s parents nearly impossible. Ellie places an SOS call to her sister; she needs an expert to rehabilitate this wild-child who has been living outside of civilization for years. Confronted with her professional demons, Julia once again has the opportunity to display her talents and salvage her reputation. Hannah (The Things We Do for Love, 2004, etc.) is at her best when writing from the girl’s perspective. The feral wolf-child keeps the reader interested long after the other, transparent characters have grown tiresome. Hannah’s torturously over-written romance passages are stale, but there are surprises in store as the sisters set about unearthing Alice’s past and creating a home for her.
Wacky plot keeps the pages turning and enduring schmaltzy romantic sequences.Pub Date: March 1, 2006
ISBN: 0-345-46752-3
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Ballantine
Review Posted Online: June 24, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2005
A strict report, worthy of sympathy.
A violent surfacing of adolescence (which has little in common with Tarkington's earlier, broadly comic, Seventeen) has a compulsive impact.
"Nobody big except me" is the dream world of Holden Caulfield and his first person story is down to the basic, drab English of the pre-collegiate. For Holden is now being bounced from fancy prep, and, after a vicious evening with hall- and roommates, heads for New York to try to keep his latest failure from his parents. He tries to have a wild evening (all he does is pay the check), is terrorized by the hotel elevator man and his on-call whore, has a date with a girl he likes—and hates, sees his 10 year old sister, Phoebe. He also visits a sympathetic English teacher after trying on a drunken session, and when he keeps his date with Phoebe, who turns up with her suitcase to join him on his flight, he heads home to a hospital siege. This is tender and true, and impossible, in its picture of the old hells of young boys, the lonesomeness and tentative attempts to be mature and secure, the awful block between youth and being grown-up, the fright and sickness that humans and their behavior cause the challenging, the dramatization of the big bang. It is a sorry little worm's view of the off-beat of adult pressure, of contemporary strictures and conformity, of sentiment….
A strict report, worthy of sympathy.Pub Date: June 15, 1951
ISBN: 0316769177
Page Count: -
Publisher: Little, Brown
Review Posted Online: Nov. 2, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 1951
BOOK REVIEW
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