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LAURA WARHOLIC

Name: LAURA WARHOLIC
Author: Alexander Theroux
ISBN: 978-1-56097-798-8

OR, THE SEXUAL INTELLECTUAL

by Alexander Theroux ‧ RELEASE DATE: Dec. 15, 2007

A bloated Bonfire of the Vanities for the pomo set, full of carefully placed products (Pringles, anyone?), in-jokes and...

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A big, drooly, shaggy dog of a postmodern epic, one that takes up an awful lot of space but doesn’t give a lot of affection in return.

Theroux, perhaps best known for his meditative essays, The Primary Colors (1994) and The Secondary Colors (1996), has clearly read his dictionaries; his writing is a groaning board for logophiles, of a piece with, though more comprehensible than Finnegans Wake. One has the sense that, as in Joyce’s book, there’s a perverse private joke in play here, a way of memorializing pals and getting back at enemies. Friend and foe alike bear Helleresque names: There’s the unfortunate sort-of-artist Laura Warholic, her name redolent of tomb-raiding and the Factory, and the cultural critic Eugene Eyestones, who finds himself entangled with Laura and in trouble for controversial essays that offend various and sundry minorities. There’s the gluttonous Mr. Warholic, publisher and bon vivant who calls to mind any number of real-life publisher/bon vivant types, but who doubtless would not wish to be described as having, for instance, “a moon-fat face that gave him the grey, oily look of soft cheese.” There’s food writer Ann Marie Tubb and R. Bangs Chasuble, well-rounded film critic. Laura herself is described as “a highly edited person…[who] hated the arugula set,” more than a little needy, and more than a little pitiable. Then there are the random victims of fashion, their lives all T-shirts and “vodka, handcuffs, Pink Floyd LPs,” to say nothing of obligatorily ironic discs by Martin Denny. All these gasbags swirl about in the vast space of the First World, buzzing around Grand Central and alighting on San Francisco and Paris, trying to make sense of their lives, not doing much of anything, and talking. A lot.

A bloated Bonfire of the Vanities for the pomo set, full of carefully placed products (Pringles, anyone?), in-jokes and elegant blather.

Pub Date: Dec. 15, 2007

ISBN: 978-1-56097-798-8

Page Count: 888

Publisher: Fantagraphics Books

Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 15, 2007

Categories:

GENERAL FICTION

- BOOK REVIEW
THE SECONDARY COLORS
by Alexander Theroux

- BOOK REVIEW
THE PRIMARY COLORS
by Alexander Theroux

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BETWEEN SISTERS

by Kristin Hannah ‧ RELEASE DATE: May 1, 2003

Briskly written soap with down-to-earth types, mostly without the lachrymose contrivances of Hannah’s previous titles...

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Sisters in and out of love.

Meghann Dontess is a high-powered matrimonial lawyer in Seattle who prefers sex with strangers to emotional intimacy: a strategy bound to backfire sooner or later, warns her tough-talking shrink. It’s advice Meghann decides to ignore, along with the memories of her difficult childhood, neglectful mother, and younger sister. Though she managed to reunite Claire with Sam Cavenaugh (her father but not Meghann’s) when her mother abandoned both girls long ago, Meghann still feels guilty that her sister’s life doesn’t measure up, at least on her terms. Never married, Claire ekes out a living running a country campground with her dad and is raising her six-year-old daughter on her own. When she falls in love for the first time with an up-and-coming country musician, Meghann is appalled: Bobby Austin is a three-time loser at marriage—how on earth can Claire be so blind? Bobby’s blunt explanation doesn’t exactly satisfy the concerned big sister, who busies herself planning Claire’s dream wedding anyway. And, to relieve the stress, she beds various guys she picks up in bars, including Dr. Joe Wyatt, a neurosurgeon turned homeless drifter after the demise of his beloved wife Diane (whom he euthanized). When Claire’s awful headache turns out to be a kind of brain tumor known among neurologists as a “terminator,” Joe rallies. Turns out that Claire had befriended his wife on her deathbed, and now in turn he must try to save her. Is it too late? Will Meghann find true love at last?

Briskly written soap with down-to-earth types, mostly without the lachrymose contrivances of Hannah’s previous titles (Distant Shores, 2002, etc.). Kudos for skipping the snifflefest this time around.

Pub Date: May 1, 2003

ISBN: 0-345-45073-6

Page Count: 400

Publisher: Ballantine

Review Posted Online: June 24, 2010

Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2003

Categories:

GENERAL FICTION

- BOOK REVIEW
THE WOMEN
by Kristin Hannah

- BOOK REVIEW
THE FOUR WINDS
by Kristin Hannah

- BOOK REVIEW
THE GREAT ALONE
by Kristin Hannah

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THE ALCHEMIST

by Paulo Coelho & translated by Margaret Jull Costa ‧ RELEASE DATE: July 1, 1993

Coelho's placebo has racked up impressive sales in Brazil and Europe. Americans should flock to it like gulls.

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Coelho is a Brazilian writer with four books to his credit. Following Diary of a Magus (1992—not reviewed) came this book, published in Brazil in 1988: it's an interdenominational, transcendental, inspirational fable—in other words, a bag of wind.

The story is about a youth empowered to follow his dream. Santiago is an Andalusian shepherd boy who learns through a dream of a treasure in the Egyptian pyramids. An old man, the king of Salem, the first of various spiritual guides, tells the boy that he has discovered his destiny: "to realize one's destiny is a person's only real obligation." So Santiago sells his sheep, sails to Tangier, is tricked out of his money, regains it through hard work, crosses the desert with a caravan, stops at an oasis long enough to fall in love, escapes from warring tribesmen by performing a miracle, reaches the pyramids, and eventually gets both the gold and the girl. Along the way he meets an Englishman who describes the Soul of the World; the desert woman Fatima, who teaches him the Language of the World; and an alchemist who says, "Listen to your heart" A message clings like ivy to every encounter; everyone, but everyone, has to put in their two cents' worth, from the crystal merchant to the camel driver ("concentrate always on the present, you'll be a happy man"). The absence of characterization and overall blandness suggest authorship by a committee of self-improvement pundits—a far cry from Saint- Exupery's The Little Prince: that flagship of the genre was a genuine charmer because it clearly derived from a quirky, individual sensibility.

Coelho's placebo has racked up impressive sales in Brazil and Europe. Americans should flock to it like gulls.