bookshelf

FATHERS, SONS, AND BROTHERS

Name: FATHERS, SONS, AND BROTHERS
Author: Bret Lott
ISBN: 0-15-100262-2

THE MEN IN MY FAMILY

by Bret Lott ‧ RELEASE DATE: June 6, 1997

bookshelf

This lean midpoint memoir, fleshed out of collected short essays, alternates analysis of the author's male family relations with reflections on his experiences as the married father of two young sons. Novelist Lott (Reed's Beach, 1993, etc.)—a writing instructor at the College of Charleston and Vermont College—declares intriguingly that there is no way for him to write about his life without writing of ``RC,'' or Royal Crown Cola. His father's and his own early employer, the company is the locus on which his childhood, adolescence, and young adulthood centered and the subject of two of the longest pieces here. Lott is good at evoking the mysterious fraternal dynamic, the intensity of a father's love, the ambivalence of being a son and needing at once to accept parental guidance and to find one's own course. Some pieces succeed through use of a single clear image, as of the world ``growing blue'' for the author and his older son on a crisp December day spent outdoors following a rare South Carolina snowfall, a reflection that both gains context from and grounds subsequent recollections. In other chapters, though, Lott seems only to reach after epiphany, rather than arrive at it naturally. At its strongest, the writing focuses on concrete details, such as the author's childhood ritual of kneeling with his brothers at the curb, pouring out, in preparation for redemption, the returned soda bottles his dad brought back from his business rounds: Viewing the multibranded and hued soda swirling down the gutter, the boys ``watch the colors collide and move and mix,'' and out of such particulars a metaphor, unstated, is born—the river of soda as river of life. Lott has an instinct for the universal and sometimes finds it when he's not diverted by pursuit of everyday, less remarkable truths.

Pub Date: June 6, 1997

ISBN: 0-15-100262-2

Page Count: 208

Publisher: Harcourt

Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010

Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 1997

Categories:

GENERAL NONFICTION

- BOOK REVIEW
DEAD LOW TIDE
by Bret Lott

- BOOK REVIEW
THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN WOMEN AND MEN
by Bret Lott

- BOOK REVIEW
A SONG I KNEW BY HEART
by Bret Lott

bookshelf

NUTCRACKER

by E.T.A. Hoffmann ‧ RELEASE DATE: Oct. 28, 1996

bookshelf

This is not the Nutcracker sweet, as passed on by Tchaikovsky and Marius Petipa. No, this is the original Hoffmann tale of 1816, in which the froth of Christmas revelry occasionally parts to let the dark underside of childhood fantasies and fears peek through. The boundaries between dream and reality fade, just as Godfather Drosselmeier, the Nutcracker's creator, is seen as alternately sinister and jolly. And Italian artist Roberto Innocenti gives an errily realistic air to Marie's dreams, in richly detailed illustrations touched by a mysterious light. A beautiful version of this classic tale, which will captivate adults and children alike. (Nutcracker; $35.00; Oct. 28, 1996; 136 pp.; 0-15-100227-4)

Pub Date: Oct. 28, 1996

ISBN: 0-15-100227-4

Page Count: 136

Publisher: Harcourt

Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 1996

Categories:

GENERAL NONFICTION

- BOOK REVIEW
THE NUTCRACKER AND THE MOUSE KING
by E.T.A. Hoffmann ; adapted by Natalie Andrewson ; illustrated by Natalie Andrewson

- BOOK REVIEW
THE NUTCRACKER
by E.T.A. Hoffmann & illustrated by Julie Paschkis

bookshelf

TO THE ONE I LOVE THE BEST

EPISODES FROM THE LIFE OF LADY MENDL (ELSIE DE WOLFE)

by Ludwig Bemelmans ‧ RELEASE DATE: Feb. 23, 1955

bookshelf

An extravaganza in Bemelmans' inimitable vein, but written almost dead pan, with sly, amusing, sometimes biting undertones, breaking through. For Bemelmans was "the man who came to cocktails". And his hostess was Lady Mendl (Elsie de Wolfe), arbiter of American decorating taste over a generation. Lady Mendl was an incredible person,- self-made in proper American tradition on the one hand, for she had been haunted by the poverty of her childhood, and the years of struggle up from its ugliness,- until she became synonymous with the exotic, exquisite, worshipper at beauty's whrine. Bemelmans draws a portrait in extremes, through apt descriptions, through hilarious anecdote, through surprisingly sympathetic and understanding bits of appreciation. The scene shifts from Hollywood to the home she loved the best in Versailles. One meets in passing a vast roster of famous figures of the international and artistic set. And always one feels Bemelmans, slightly offstage, observing, recording, commenting, illustrated.