by Craig Nova ‧ RELEASE DATE: July 13, 2004
Like a depressing tale of crime and woe from the evening news but shorn of tabloid extravagance—and with an uncommonly human...
Cop with relationship problems meets a psychopath computer repairman; differences of opinion ensue.
To say that Nova (Wetware, 2001, etc.) takes the road of understatement would be—an understatement. His ostensible protagonist, Russell Boyd, is a highway patrolman who seems to have his life pretty much buttoned down. The job isn’t exciting, but it’s also not nearly as dangerous as people would like to believe. Plus, he’s got a girlfriend, Zofia, who seems to appreciate his quiet, no-risk-taking, slow-and-steady demeanor and is committed to him in a way that’s not cloying or overly marriage-focused. Contrasted with Boyd, however, is Frank Koehler, a computer technician living by himself with an unhealthy desire to keep hunters and fisherman off his land. Lonely and looking for companionship, he decides to get a mail-order bride from Russia—not likely a good idea for either him or her. Not long after the grasping bride, Katryna, has showed up and proven to be not quite what he’d expected, Frank starts edging out of his barely sane state. Russell has a brief run-in with Frank when he takes Zofia and a couple of her schoolchildren on a fishing trip that happens to put them on Russell’s land. It’s nothing serious, just an odd encounter with a socially maladjusted man zealous about property lines, but it sets the stage for their confrontation later on, when Frank has finally snapped. Nova sets down both men’s march toward fate with a blank, determined voice that ruthlessly weeds out any sentimentality or emotional fripperies—almost making it difficult to sustain much interest in the narrative, which can seem half-asleep. As deadly details mount, though—violence creeps up unexpectedly: menacing traffic stops, a dull domestic dispute that explodes in gunfire—things take on a weighty and inevitable solemnity.
Like a depressing tale of crime and woe from the evening news but shorn of tabloid extravagance—and with an uncommonly human sensibility.Pub Date: July 13, 2004
ISBN: 1-4000-4536-3
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Shaye Areheart/Harmony
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 15, 2004
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by Craig Nova
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by Craig Nova
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by Craig Nova
by J.D. Salinger ‧ RELEASE DATE: June 15, 1951
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
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SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
APPRECIATIONS
by Kristin Hannah ‧ RELEASE DATE: March 1, 2006
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
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