An overripe but still entertaining gay fantasia.
A multitalented, bisexual, teenage slave becomes a symbol of freedom in this debut sci-fi saga.
In the America of 2115, flying cars exist, society is divided between an elite of super-rich “barronials” and a seething mass of impoverished “downers,” the Supreme Court has ruled that parents can sell their children into slavery, 18th-century fashions have made a comeback, and, perhaps unlikeliest of all, “gymnastics outdraws football and sometimes rivals soccer” as a spectator sport. Spartak Jones’ talent in the latter, along with his long blond hair, gorgeous face and Olympian physique, has made the 16-year-old gymnastics prodigy a hero to his fellow downers. (He’s also a classical pianist and a math genius.) Spartak navigates between the San Francisco slums and the toney private school where he’s a scholarship student, bullied by mean rich kids; he also navigates the bedrooms of both sexes, but mainly those of other men. Eventually, he gets kidnapped and learns that his cash-strapped family was forced to sell him to the plutocratic McClain clan, who gift him to 18-year-old heir Zinc McClain as “a pretty bauble to enjoy and discard.” Spartak is initially upset by the annihilation of his autonomy and personhood and by the tracking device riveted to his ear; there are also many gratuitous scenes in which he’s ordered to undress while bystanders pretend not to ogle his chiseled abs and buttocks. However, he seems to thrive, even in slavery: he wears sumptuous robes and lambskin slippers, starts to find Zinc’s crooked features and shy stutter endearing as their romance blossoms, and gets invited onto talk shows to pontificate about his status as the first bought slave since the Civil War. Best of all, he gets a high-tech sword and a body stocking that confers super-strength, which he uses to slaughter the attacking minions of an anti-barronial Christian cult. Coulter’s LGBT-themed yarn reprises the ubiquitous YA-fiction notion of a world that oppresses teens by making them celebrities, while also giving this narcissistic theme a prurient gloss. His characters often get on soapboxes as they relate the evils of inequality and involuntary servitude, drawing them as extensions of present-day American dysfunctions. However, these politics mainly serve as a pretext for lubricious domination-submission vignettes and revenge fantasies. The narrative does move along at a brisk pace, though, with energetic action scenes and sharply drawn characters, and the result is a vigorous tale.
An overripe but still entertaining gay fantasia.Pub Date: May 2, 2016
ISBN: 978-0-9966473-2-8
Page Count: 346
Publisher: Jubilation Media
Review Posted Online: April 21, 2016
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
BOOK REVIEW
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
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
APPRECIATIONS
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