A pretentious megabook with mega themes from South African novelist Brink, already somewhat overtaken by events in South Africa and elsewhere. At the heart of the story are Tom Landman and Nina Jordaan, a young couple with impeccable Afrikaner credentials, who join a group plotting to assassinate the State President. When the attempt fails and Nina is killed trying to escape, Tom goes into hiding. As Tom, haunted by the death of Nina, tries to evade the security police headed by a fanatical brigadier, he recalls the seminal events that led to their decision to resort to terror. He meets free-spirited and courageous Lisa, another rebellious Afrikaner, who accompanies him on his long and perilous flight through the Cape countryside to the border. The police are always close behind, though the journey provides opportunities for leisurely encounters with certifiable types—the religious obsessive father, treacherous on principle; the loyal family retainer; and the simple but good self-made man. The pursuit ends in a fiery climax in which much is resolved, but the book doesn't end—not yet. To add more heft to an already big tome, Brink, who has frequently interrupted a basically exciting suspense story with self-conscious and labored discussions of when terror is justified, a sort of Ethics 101, now adds what is virtually another book: Tom Landman, somewhere in Africa, gives a ``tribal history'' of the 13 generations of Landmans in South Africa, conveniently allowing Brink to explore Afrikaner preoccupations and their place in Africa. Set in 1989, before the release of Mandela and the end of communism, the story, however compelling the scenes of police brutality, seems already dated—which wouldn't matter if characters weren't relentlessly trendy stereotypes illustrating equally trendy theories. Disappointing.
Pub Date: Jan. 1, 1992
ISBN: 0-671-74858-0
Page Count: 848
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 1991
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
SEEN & HEARD
APPRECIATIONS
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
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