A rich novel that explores the “darkness” of social dysfunction both in 10-year-olds and in the adult world.
Whatever they do in the dark, Coe makes it clear there’s plenty of darkness in which to do it.
At the center of the novel is Lallie Paluza, a pre-pubescent star on the British telly in the mid ’70s. Lallie is undeniably talented, doing an assortment of impressions as well as a kind of Vaudevillian farce in her popular sitcom, and some of her most ardent fans are about her age. Primary among these fans (it’s good to remember that “fan” derives from “fanatic”) are Pauline Bright and Gemma, who follow every show with breathless excitement. Pauline is a “bad” girl from the wrong side of the tracks. She comes from a family notorious for producing petty criminals, and she seems heading in the same direction, for she lies, fights, skips school and swears with abandon. Gemma, in contrast, comes from a more genteel family, but one that’s emotionally distant and dysfunctional (as Tolstoy might remind us) in its own way. Lallie-fever gets unbearably intense when the girls find out that she will be coming to their bleak Yorkshire town to shoot a movie. Not only do they hope to meet her, they also hope to get bit parts in the film. Coe switches narrators from the naïve and somewhat prim Gemma to a neutral, third-person voice that introduces us to an eccentric cast of supporting characters such as Frank, Lallie’s febrile and twitchy manager, who wonders what will happen to his own professional life when Lallie hits adolescence; Katrina, Lallie’s stage mother, who both protects and exploits her daughter; Vera, an aging actress who resents being upstaged by a 10-year-old; and Quentin, a sex-obsessed American producer who’s trying to decide whether Lallie would be right for a part in The Little Princess.
A rich novel that explores the “darkness” of social dysfunction both in 10-year-olds and in the adult world.Pub Date: March 19, 2012
ISBN: 978-0-393-08138-1
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Norton
Review Posted Online: Dec. 27, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2012
Still, a respectful and absorbing page-turner.
Hannah’s new novel is an homage to the extraordinary courage and endurance of Frenchwomen during World War II.
In 1995, an elderly unnamed widow is moving into an Oregon nursing home on the urging of her controlling son, Julien, a surgeon. This trajectory is interrupted when she receives an invitation to return to France to attend a ceremony honoring passeurs: people who aided the escape of others during the war. Cut to spring, 1940: Viann has said goodbye to husband Antoine, who's off to hold the Maginot line against invading Germans. She returns to tending her small farm, Le Jardin, in the Loire Valley, teaching at the local school and coping with daughter Sophie’s adolescent rebellion. Soon, that world is upended: The Germans march into Paris and refugees flee south, overrunning Viann’s land. Her long-estranged younger sister, Isabelle, who has been kicked out of multiple convent schools, is sent to Le Jardin by Julien, their father in Paris, a drunken, decidedly unpaternal Great War veteran. As the depredations increase in the occupied zone—food rationing, systematic looting, and the billeting of a German officer, Capt. Beck, at Le Jardin—Isabelle’s outspokenness is a liability. She joins the Resistance, volunteering for dangerous duty: shepherding downed Allied airmen across the Pyrenees to Spain. Code-named the Nightingale, Isabelle will rescue many before she's captured. Meanwhile, Viann’s journey from passive to active resistance is less dramatic but no less wrenching. Hannah vividly demonstrates how the Nazis, through starvation, intimidation and barbarity both casual and calculated, demoralized the French, engineering a community collapse that enabled the deportations and deaths of more than 70,000 Jews. Hannah’s proven storytelling skills are ideally suited to depicting such cataclysmic events, but her tendency to sentimentalize undermines the gravitas of this tale.
Still, a respectful and absorbing page-turner.Pub Date: Feb. 3, 2015
ISBN: 978-0-312-57722-3
Page Count: 448
Publisher: St. Martin's
Review Posted Online: Nov. 19, 2014
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2014
BOOK TO SCREEN
SEEN & HEARD
BOOK TO SCREEN
The emotions run high, the conversations run deep, and the relationships ebb and flow with grace.
When tragedy strikes, a mother and daughter forge a new life.
Morgan felt obligated to marry her high school sweetheart, Chris, when she got pregnant with their daughter, Clara. But she secretly got along much better with Chris’ thoughtful best friend, Jonah, who was dating her sister, Jenny. Now her life as a stay-at-home parent has left her feeling empty but not ungrateful for what she has. Jonah and Jenny eventually broke up, but years later they had a one-night stand and Jenny got pregnant with their son, Elijah. Now Jonah is back in town, engaged to Jenny, and working at the local high school as Clara’s teacher. Clara dreams of being an actress and has a crush on Miller, who plans to go to film school, but her father doesn't approve. It doesn’t help that Miller already has a jealous girlfriend who stalks him via text from college. But Clara and Morgan’s home life changes radically when Chris and Jenny are killed in an accident, revealing long-buried secrets and forcing Morgan to reevaluate the life she chose when early motherhood forced her hand. Feeling betrayed by the adults in her life, Clara marches forward, acting both responsible and rebellious as she navigates her teenage years without her father and her aunt, while Jonah and Morgan's relationship evolves in the wake of the accident. Front-loaded with drama, the story leaves plenty of room for the mother and daughter to unpack their feelings and decide what’s next.
The emotions run high, the conversations run deep, and the relationships ebb and flow with grace.Pub Date: Dec. 10, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-5420-1642-1
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Montlake Romance
Review Posted Online: Oct. 13, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 1, 2019
BOOK TO SCREEN
BOOK TO SCREEN
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