Often pedestrian, sometimes engrossing, much like Facebook itself.
Strong uses the brave new world of social networking to explore the timeless themes of love, betrayal, jealousy and friendship.
Chloe is a successful Manhattan professional in her early 30s. By day, she works her dream job as a film critic for a major entertainment magazine; by night, she hangs out with a glamorous gossip-columnist roommate and supportive fashion-designer best friend. Her social and professional lives are in order, but her romantic life is a consistent disappointment—until a hesitant foray into Facebook leads to an unexpected reunion. A few states away, Morgan has settled into a stable if mundane routine. She takes care of her two young children, keeps house and fills her downtime with Facebook. It’s an activity that allows her to express herself outside the confines of her home, but also allows her to obsessively follow her husband’s Facebook activities—specifically his interactions with a certain ex-girlfriend. It is unfortunate that Morgan’s ability to keep tabs on her husband far outweighs her ability to say anything particularly noteworthy on the public site. Strong dutifully records Morgan’s day-to-day postings, but it’s unclear whether she’s making a comment on modern oversharing or simply filling her novel with the type of minutiae that already clogs the Internet. Brynn is also a dedicated wife and mother, but at 40, with her two children well into their teens and her husband consumed by work, she feels increasingly isolated. Once again, Facebook becomes a source of both tension and relief. Brynn escapes her dissatisfaction by writing to a high school boyfriend, but when the relationship goes beyond the virtual, Brynn is caught between following her desires and protecting her family. What do these women have in common? A lot more than we think, as it turns out, but most importantly, they all use Facebook to express their most significant emotions. One character even proposes marriage through a “status update.” But Strong doesn’t sufficiently examine the total lack of separation between virtual and actual communication in her characters’ lives. The reader may wish that these women would get off the computer and talk to one another.
Often pedestrian, sometimes engrossing, much like Facebook itself.Pub Date: March 23, 2011
ISBN: 978-1257092406
Page Count: 339
Publisher: N/A
Review Posted Online: May 10, 2011
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
A first novel, this is also a first person account of Scout's (Jean Louise) recall of the years that led to the ending of a mystery, the breaking of her brother Jem's elbow, the death of her father's enemy — and the close of childhood years. A widower, Atticus raises his children with legal dispassion and paternal intelligence, and is ably abetted by Calpurnia, the colored cook, while the Alabama town of Maycomb, in the 1930's, remains aloof to their divergence from its tribal patterns. Scout and Jem, with their summer-time companion, Dill, find their paths free from interference — but not from dangers; their curiosity about the imprisoned Boo, whose miserable past is incorporated in their play, results in a tentative friendliness; their fears of Atticus' lack of distinction is dissipated when he shoots a mad dog; his defense of a Negro accused of raping a white girl, Mayella Ewell, is followed with avid interest and turns the rabble whites against him. Scout is the means of averting an attack on Atticus but when he loses the case it is Boo who saves Jem and Scout by killing Mayella's father when he attempts to murder them. The shadows of a beginning for black-white understanding, the persistent fight that Scout carries on against school, Jem's emergence into adulthood, Calpurnia's quiet power, and all the incidents touching on the children's "growing outward" have an attractive starchiness that keeps this southern picture pert and provocative. There is much advance interest in this book; it has been selected by the Literary Guild and Reader's Digest; it should win many friends.
Pub Date: July 11, 1960
ISBN: 0060935464
Page Count: 323
Publisher: Lippincott
Review Posted Online: Oct. 7, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 1960
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
The best-selling author of tearjerkers like Angel Falls (2000) serves up yet another mountain of mush, topped off with...
Talk-show queen takes tumble as millions jeer.
Nora Bridges is a wildly popular radio spokesperson for family-first virtues, but her loyal listeners don't know that she walked out on her husband and teenaged daughters years ago and didn't look back. Now that a former lover has sold racy pix of naked Nora and horny himself to a national tabloid, her estranged daughter Ruby, an unsuccessful stand-up comic in Los Angeles, has been approached to pen a tell-all. Greedy for the fat fee she's been promised, Ruby agrees and heads for the San Juan Islands, eager to get reacquainted with the mom she plans to betray. Once in the family homestead, nasty Ruby alternately sulks and glares at her mother, who is temporarily wheelchair-bound as a result of a post-scandal car crash. Uncaring, Ruby begins writing her side of the story when she's not strolling on the beach with former sweetheart Dean Sloan, the son of wealthy socialites who basically ignored him and his gay brother Eric. Eric, now dying of cancer and also in a wheelchair, has returned to the island. This dismal threesome catch up on old times, recalling their childhood idylls on the island. After Ruby's perfect big sister Caroline shows up, there's another round of heartfelt talk. Nora gradually reveals the truth about her unloving husband and her late father's alcoholism, which led her to seek the approval of others at the cost of her own peace of mind. And so on. Ruby is aghast to discover that she doesn't know everything after all, but Dean offers her subdued comfort. Happy endings await almost everyone—except for readers of this nobly preachy snifflefest.
The best-selling author of tearjerkers like Angel Falls (2000) serves up yet another mountain of mush, topped off with syrupy platitudes about life and love.Pub Date: March 1, 2001
ISBN: 0-609-60737-5
Page Count: 336
Publisher: Crown
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2001
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