In Impellizzeri’s debut novel, a history professor chooses between free-spiritedness and stability.
Kate, a mother and history teacher, contends daily with a decision made in her youth. The story skips through the decades of her life, revolving around a romantic compromise. While completing her master’s and working as a waitress, a young vivacious woman, Benton, takes notice of Kate, and Benton’s friend Ian can’t help but do the same. Although Benton knows of Ian’s infatuation with Kate, as the women become friends, she decides Kate would prefer her friend Rob. Kate goes on a date with Rob, but things quickly fizzle. Ian swoops in, and the two become inseparable, until he leaves on assignment. Kate—uneasy with his uprooted lifestyle and unsure of her feelings—loses hope for their relationship, despite Ian’s assurances. Rob re-enters her life, and following a miscarriage, the two decide to get married. Their marriage suffers more blows: job instability, adultery. When Kate feels as if she’s lost control, she receives an invitation from Benton for a “heartbreak cruise.” Relieved to spend a week with other scorned women, Kate finds that Ian is also attending the holiday, and she realizes this may be her second shot at love. Kate’s story speaks to the ways optimism and pessimism may affect choices. Rob condemns her for pessimistic attitude, while Ian will always cherish her as a “true optimist.” The way in which Kate grapples with their opinions of her reveals her own self-perception; she is often insecure, questioning her parenting and professionalism. The nonlinear structure makes her story unique; it switches from her days as a student to her experience as a newlywed to her failing marriage to her chance for redemption with Ian. The complex decisions at each turn build reader interest and investment in the characters.
A layered, bittersweet romance that questions consequences and explores second chances.
Pub Date: Oct. 8, 2014
ISBN: 978-1-939288-53-0
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Wyatt-MacKenzie Publishing
Review Posted Online: July 7, 2014
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
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
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
© Copyright 2026 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Follow
Popular in this Genre
We can’t wait for you to join Kirkus!
It’s free and takes less than 10 seconds!
Already have an account? Log in.
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
Welcome Back!
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
