A quite literally gorgeous novel and a reading pleasure not to be missed.
The provenance of a classic painting is artfully fictionalized in this sparkling second novel from the English author (now residing in Australia) of the prizewinning debut, The Company (2001).
The masterpiece in question is The Raft of the Medusa, completed in 1819 by French painter Théodore Géricault (1791–1824). Set in Paris in 1818, Edge’s witty narrative observes the young artist at several crisis points: He’s unable to think of a subject for his next canvas; frustrated by his unequal friendship with colleague Horace Vernet, an untalented mediocrity who thrives by cranking out celebratory depictions of recent historical events; and guilt-ridden over his inability to end the affair in which his uncle (and patron) Charles Caruel’s beautiful young wife Alexandrine has ensnared him. When one of Vernet’s models tells him the story of the Medusa, a French frigate recently shipwrecked from which officers and passengers of note escaped in lifeboats and left “rabble” below decks to their fates—and solemnly declares “ . . . this catastrophe represents a very microcosm of France” (i.e., in the years following Napoleon’s defeat and the restoration of the Bourbon monarchy)—Géricault knows he has found his subject. The novel then recounts his passionate research (interviewing survivors, battling officialdom’s determination to suppress embarrassing details), as he devotes his every energy to the composition of an accusatory image that will tell the truth and shame the devils sworn to bury it. Edge tells the story thrillingly, and the urgent pace never slackens. It’s intensely pictorial, keenly sensitive to the artist’s eye for color, form and the swirling context of humanity and landscape that feeds his hungry imagination. And Géricault is a wonderful character—an intensely romantic idealist who’s both compromised and inspired by the pleasures and mysteries of the senses.
A quite literally gorgeous novel and a reading pleasure not to be missed.Pub Date: March 6, 2007
ISBN: 0-7432-9484-X
Page Count: 352
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2007
BOOK REVIEW
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
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
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