Details magazine's sex columnist, Radakovich (The Wild Girls Club, 1994) has spent too long in the trenches of sex journalism, as evidenced by this utterly unerotic book. Her idea was to travel the country in search of the randiest among us, visiting such lubricious sites as swingers' bars, nudist colonies, and polygamist clubs. But with nothing much to say about any of the behavior she sees, she resorts to poking fun at the paunchier swingers, offering endless jokes about ``packages'' that only a 12-year-old could enjoy, bragging about the men who try to pick her up, or, in a neat contradiction, griping about the men who stare at her. Radakovich (or ``Mistress Anka,'' as she refers to herself) generally hates every place she goes, and if she's not having fun, neither is the reader. She eventually heads to Las Vegas, where she and her girlfriends repeatedly flash their breasts in a feeble attempt at being wild. It's a sad picture of women of a certain age feigning the insouciance of youth, and the reader longs for someone like the much more droll Candace Bushnell to add a little zest and wit to the situation. The only essay that works is the conclusion to the ``win-a-date-with-Anka'' story, when Radakovich eases her relentlessly too-tough stance and admits that her feelings are hurt when the date on whom she has developed a huge crush manipulates and rejects her. A look at America's favorite pastime by a reporter who's lost her edge. (photos, not seen) (Author tour)
Pub Date: April 1, 1997
ISBN: 0-517-70195-2
Page Count: 240
Publisher: Crown
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 1997
BOOK REVIEW
This is not the Nutcracker sweet, as passed on by Tchaikovsky and Marius Petipa. No, this is the original Hoffmann tale of 1816, in which the froth of Christmas revelry occasionally parts to let the dark underside of childhood fantasies and fears peek through. The boundaries between dream and reality fade, just as Godfather Drosselmeier, the Nutcracker's creator, is seen as alternately sinister and jolly. And Italian artist Roberto Innocenti gives an errily realistic air to Marie's dreams, in richly detailed illustrations touched by a mysterious light. A beautiful version of this classic tale, which will captivate adults and children alike. (Nutcracker; $35.00; Oct. 28, 1996; 136 pp.; 0-15-100227-4)
Pub Date: Oct. 28, 1996
ISBN: 0-15-100227-4
Page Count: 136
Publisher: Harcourt
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 1996
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Stricter than, say, Bergen Evans or W3 ("disinterested" means impartial — period), Strunk is in the last analysis...
Privately published by Strunk of Cornell in 1918 and revised by his student E. B. White in 1959, that "little book" is back again with more White updatings.
Stricter than, say, Bergen Evans or W3 ("disinterested" means impartial — period), Strunk is in the last analysis (whoops — "A bankrupt expression") a unique guide (which means "without like or equal").Pub Date: May 15, 1972
ISBN: 0205632645
Page Count: 105
Publisher: Macmillan
Review Posted Online: Oct. 28, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 1972
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