A pretentious farrago.
A back-to-nature youth festival in Weimar Germany and a dangerous WWII guerilla mission in Central Europe provide the backdrop for this restless, convoluted novel from Grant (Kaspian Lost, 1999, etc.).
Though it opens in 1944 and then proceeds through awkward flashbacks, the story really begins in the summer of 1929, when friends and neighbors Ingo Miller and Martina (Marty) Panich are young college students in Washington, D.C. Ingo (German-American) and Marty (nominally Jewish) attend that youth festival in the idyllic German countryside. The attendees, who range from Communists to anti-Semitic rightists, celebrate the German “folk-soul” and homoerotic sentiments. Ingo will fall in love with a German lad; Marty will be deflowered by a supercilious American journalist, Samuel Butler Randolph III. In a move that’s crucial for the plot, Ingo will rescue an American Jewish kid, Isaac, from right-wing bullies; the flawlessly beautiful Hagen, a devious rightist, will lead the Americans to apparent safety. Fifteen years later, the enigmatic and underdeveloped Isaac is a guerilla leader in the mountains on the Czech/Polish border; the Little Fox is legendary for his attacks on the SS. Word reaches Ingo and Marty in Washington that Isaac possesses an invaluable document, Himmler’s order to eradicate the Jews; he will hand it over, but only to Ingo. An unlikely ragtag band of “desk warriors,” including Ingo and Marty, leave for Europe after basic training in Maryland. Yet there’s no suspense here. The mission to obtain the document is interrupted, not only by flashbacks but also by reports from Butler, a loyal Communist; he is embedded with the Red Army and under orders to obtain and destroy that all-important directive. Another impediment to a fast-moving narrative is the author’s fanciful commentary (“the lustral agonies of the Third Reich were only the fall of the House of Burgundy all over again”). The key players (Ingo, Isaac, Butler and Hagen, now an SS officer) will converge in a bloody climax weighed down by references to Macbeth and Clausewitz.
A pretentious farrago.Pub Date: Aug. 18, 2006
ISBN: 0-307-26359-2
Page Count: 384
Publisher: Knopf
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 1, 2006
Too beholden to sentimentality and cliché, this novel fails to establish a uniquely realized perspective.
Hunter’s debut novel tracks the experiences of her family members during the Holocaust.
Sol and Nechuma Kurc, wealthy, cultured Jews in Radom, Poland, are successful shop owners; they and their grown children live a comfortable lifestyle. But that lifestyle is no protection against the onslaught of the Holocaust, which eventually scatters the members of the Kurc family among several continents. Genek, the oldest son, is exiled with his wife to a Siberian gulag. Halina, youngest of all the children, works to protect her family alongside her resistance-fighter husband. Addy, middle child, a composer and engineer before the war breaks out, leaves Europe on one of the last passenger ships, ending up thousands of miles away. Then, too, there are Mila and Felicia, Jakob and Bella, each with their own share of struggles—pain endured, horrors witnessed. Hunter conducted extensive research after learning that her grandfather (Addy in the book) survived the Holocaust. The research shows: her novel is thorough and precise in its details. It’s less precise in its language, however, which frequently relies on cliché. “You’ll get only one shot at this,” Halina thinks, enacting a plan to save her husband. “Don’t botch it.” Later, Genek, confronting a routine bit of paperwork, must decide whether or not to hide his Jewishness. “That form is a deal breaker,” he tells himself. “It’s life and death.” And: “They are low, it seems, on good fortune. And something tells him they’ll need it.” Worse than these stale phrases, though, are the moments when Hunter’s writing is entirely inadequate for the subject matter at hand. Genek, describing the gulag, calls the nearest town “a total shitscape.” This is a low point for Hunter’s writing; elsewhere in the novel, it’s stronger. Still, the characters remain flat and unknowable, while the novel itself is predictable. At this point, more than half a century’s worth of fiction and film has been inspired by the Holocaust—a weighty and imposing tradition. Hunter, it seems, hasn’t been able to break free from her dependence on it.
Too beholden to sentimentality and cliché, this novel fails to establish a uniquely realized perspective.Pub Date: Feb. 14, 2017
ISBN: 978-0-399-56308-9
Page Count: 416
Publisher: Viking
Review Posted Online: Nov. 21, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2016
BOOK TO SCREEN
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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