A predictable story that’s enjoyable enough for readers interested in medicine.
A fictionalized account of the author’s experiences in nursing school during the 1950s.
Jan Winston is studying nursing at a time when women aren’t doctors. Despite the strict rules regarding appearance—floor-length uniform skirts and no makeup permitted—she still finds herself sexually harassed by male doctors. Moreover, because she was raped as a college student at the opening of the novel, the incidents induce tremendous panic. Despite her original concern at telling Allen—the man who will become her husband—about her rape, he reacts with concern and respect. Some of the era’s politics and policies may seem foreign to readers with little knowledge of the time period, and even Jan occasionally finds herself at a loss to follow all the rules; for instance, she’s reprimanded by a superior for introducing herself to a child psychiatric patient by her first name rather than “Miss Winston.” The interactions between Jan and her superiors, particularly when she’s rebuked, are among the most believable in the book. A fair number of informative medical factoids are included, such as the definition of an aneurysm, lending a patina of believability to the vignettes about various types of patients, although the facts could have been better integrated into the story’s flow. The timeline is also somewhat unclear; some chapters have date stamps, but many don’t, so it’s difficult to tell, for example, how much time Jan spends on each rotation. Bizarrely, a little less than halfway through the book, the narrative focus abruptly shifts from Jan to Allen as he deals with the fallout from an accident involving his father. The change occurs without any transition, and several pages later, the text returns to Jan. Furthermore, the text is riddled with typography errors—missing quotation marks are the most common culprit—and antecedent references are often ambiguous.
A predictable story that’s enjoyable enough for readers interested in medicine.Pub Date: Jan. 4, 2013
ISBN: 978-1480086531
Page Count: 266
Publisher: CreateSpace
Review Posted Online: March 21, 2013
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
Briskly written soap with down-to-earth types, mostly without the lachrymose contrivances of Hannah’s previous titles...
Sisters in and out of love.
Meghann Dontess is a high-powered matrimonial lawyer in Seattle who prefers sex with strangers to emotional intimacy: a strategy bound to backfire sooner or later, warns her tough-talking shrink. It’s advice Meghann decides to ignore, along with the memories of her difficult childhood, neglectful mother, and younger sister. Though she managed to reunite Claire with Sam Cavenaugh (her father but not Meghann’s) when her mother abandoned both girls long ago, Meghann still feels guilty that her sister’s life doesn’t measure up, at least on her terms. Never married, Claire ekes out a living running a country campground with her dad and is raising her six-year-old daughter on her own. When she falls in love for the first time with an up-and-coming country musician, Meghann is appalled: Bobby Austin is a three-time loser at marriage—how on earth can Claire be so blind? Bobby’s blunt explanation doesn’t exactly satisfy the concerned big sister, who busies herself planning Claire’s dream wedding anyway. And, to relieve the stress, she beds various guys she picks up in bars, including Dr. Joe Wyatt, a neurosurgeon turned homeless drifter after the demise of his beloved wife Diane (whom he euthanized). When Claire’s awful headache turns out to be a kind of brain tumor known among neurologists as a “terminator,” Joe rallies. Turns out that Claire had befriended his wife on her deathbed, and now in turn he must try to save her. Is it too late? Will Meghann find true love at last?
Briskly written soap with down-to-earth types, mostly without the lachrymose contrivances of Hannah’s previous titles (Distant Shores, 2002, etc.). Kudos for skipping the snifflefest this time around.Pub Date: May 1, 2003
ISBN: 0-345-45073-6
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Ballantine
Review Posted Online: June 24, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2003
A presold prefab blockbuster, what with King's Carrie hitting the moviehouses, Salem's Lot being lensed, The Shining itself sold to Warner Bros. and tapped as a Literary Guild full selection, NAL paperback, etc. (enough activity to demand an afterlife to consummate it all).
The setting is The Overlook, a palatial resort on a Colorado mountain top, snowbound and closed down for the long, long winter. Jack Torrance, a booze-fighting English teacher with a history of violence, is hired as caretaker and, hoping to finish a five-act tragedy he's writing, brings his wife Wendy and small son Danny to the howling loneliness of the half-alive and mad palazzo. The Overlook has a gruesome past, scenes from which start popping into the present in various suites and the ballroom. At first only Danny, gifted with second sight (he's a "shiner"), can see them; then the whole family is being zapped by satanic forces. The reader needs no supersight to glimpse where the story's going as King's formula builds to a hotel reeling with horrors during Poesque New Year's Eve revelry and confetti outta nowhere....
Back-prickling indeed despite the reader's unwillingness at being mercilessly manipulated.
Pub Date: Jan. 28, 1976
ISBN: 0385121679
Page Count: 453
Publisher: Doubleday
Review Posted Online: Sept. 26, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 1976
PERSPECTIVES
© 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.
