A good-natured romp through the New York newspaper world of the 1930s, by the whimsical author of such unconventional comic fiction as Freaks' Amour (1979)—and a previous novel about the joys and sorrows of the cartoonist's life, Funny Papers (1985). De Haven's narrator, Al Bready, looks backward from the vantage point of cranky old age to the palmy if conflicted days when ``strip'' cartoonists were media kings and when Al, a self- taught hustler steeped in the works of Jack London and Booth Tarkington, wrote scripts for irascible Walter Geebus's popular Derby Dugan strip, which portrayed the adventures of a resourceful street kid and his faithful talking dog. Everybody loved Derby— even John Dillinger wrote Walter a fan letter from prison. But, as Al recalls it here, those were dangerous days as well: When his boss's inexplicable illness raises fears of a plot by a rival, Al is drawn into the unsettling lives of such broadly drawn individuals as lunchroom owner Jimmie Rodgers, who says everything twice, Jimmie's beauteous (and perhaps faithful) wife Jewel, an enigmatic man-about-town known only as Mysterious Jones, and several other Damon Runyonesque personalities. Walter Geebus is a wonderful creation, an inspired amalgam of curmudgeon, tyrant, bigot, and hypochondriac—and how can you not like a disheveled romantic who confesses, ``I fall in love at the drop of my pants''? Yet despite its stab at a melodramatic plot, the story moves slowly, and is further deadened by Al's shuttling back and forth between his battles with Geebus and his (unsuccessfully repressed) memories of a blighted childhood. Despite its raucous particulars, a lot of clever name-dropping, and some enchanting illustrations (that seem to blend the styles of Little Orphan Annie and The Katzenjammer Kids) by Art Spiegelman, the novel is both static and redundant. A real disappointment. Not nearly as much fun as it promised to be, and should have been. (First printing of 25,000; $30,000 ad/promo; author tour)
Pub Date: June 24, 1996
ISBN: 0-8050-4445-0
Page Count: 312
Publisher: Henry Holt
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 15, 1996
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
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