A mordantly witty, slyly intelligent take on the Brothers Grimm and their folktales, as seen from the viewpoint of a man-eating (or, more precisely, child-eating) wolf that they attempt to subdue. Schmitz (Lost Souls, not reviewed) imagines the brothers (ponderous, pompous Wilhelm and sly, cruel, beguiling Jacob) encountering, one dark night in a mysterious forest (populated by trolls, ghosts, and at least one devil), a talking wolf. Astonished, and then intrigued, Jacob attempts to seduce the wolf into recording his life story, quickly wringing from him the confession that his greatest pleasure, pursuing and eating the children who occasionally stray into the forest, has made him an outcast, shunned by other wolves, and perpetually hunted by men. The brothers, in the midst of gathering the folktales that (they are already convinced) will make them famous, see in the wolf a chance to garner unique material, while the wolf, in thrall to and repulsed by his appetite for humans, sees a chance to reform, to become more pacific and less wolflike, perhaps even to be happy. He agrees to allow the brothers to attempt a “cure.” The wolf’s voice dominates the tale. Sad and scornful by turn, haunted by its obsession, driven by a yearning to escape a life seemingly defined by violence, the voice charms, rages, and laments, in a language that nicely reflects the mingled quaintness and vigor of the Grimms’ own tales. Beating the brothers at their own game, Schmitz conjures up an animal that has more intelligence and wit than the humans hungering to destroy it. Things turn nasty when the wolf finally stumbles on the brothers— plot to kill him. Along the way, Schmitz offers a droll revisionist portrait of the Grimms as hustling, would-be bourgeois, and a witty send-up of a variety of modern theories about the origins of violence and character. An artful, ironic updating of venerable material, done with zest and great originality.
Pub Date: Nov. 26, 1998
ISBN: 0-88001-626-4
Page Count: 144
Publisher: Ecco/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 1, 1998
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
Britisher Swift's sixth novel (Ever After, 1992 etc.) and fourth to appear here is a slow-to-start but then captivating tale of English working-class families in the four decades following WW II. When Jack Dodds dies suddenly of cancer after years of running a butcher shop in London, he leaves a strange request—namely, that his ashes be scattered off Margate pier into the sea. And who could better be suited to fulfill this wish than his three oldest drinking buddies—insurance man Ray, vegetable seller Lenny, and undertaker Vic, all of whom, like Jack himself, fought also as soldiers or sailors in the long-ago world war. Swift's narrative start, with its potential for the melodramatic, is developed instead with an economy, heart, and eye that release (through the characters' own voices, one after another) the story's humanity and depth instead of its schmaltz. The jokes may be weak and self- conscious when the three old friends meet at their local pub in the company of the urn holding Jack's ashes; but once the group gets on the road, in an expensive car driven by Jack's adoptive son, Vince, the story starts gradually to move forward, cohere, and deepen. The reader learns in time why it is that no wife comes along, why three marriages out of three broke apart, and why Vince always hated his stepfather Jack and still does—or so he thinks. There will be stories of innocent youth, suffering wives, early loves, lost daughters, secret affairs, and old antagonisms—including a fistfight over the dead on an English hilltop, and a strewing of Jack's ashes into roiling seawaves that will draw up feelings perhaps unexpectedly strong. Without affectation, Swift listens closely to the lives that are his subject and creates a songbook of voices part lyric, part epic, part working-class social realism—with, in all, the ring to it of the honest, human, and true.
Pub Date: April 5, 1996
ISBN: 0-679-41224-7
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Knopf
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 15, 1996
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