by Arthur Flowers ‧ RELEASE DATE: Feb. 1, 1993
Memphis-born blues singer Flowers (De Mojo Blues, 1986) moves back to hometown Beale Street in the 1920's—when the bluesmen were kings and jazz was still an upstart—for a colorful but erratic romance between two temperamental, headstrong people. Lucas Bodeen and Melvira Dupree are masters of their respective crafts—he as a fireballing blues pianist, she as a powerful conjure woman. The passion between them when they come together in Sweetwater, Arkansas, on the Mississippi delta befits a meeting of titans and proves to be more volatile than they can control. Melvira, restless after hearing the call of her long- vanished mother in a cock's crow, decides to move to Memphis in search of her, taking Bodeen with her. But back in his old stamping grounds, the hard-living, free-spirited Luke reemerges, causing the lovers to have a bitter falling out. When they part, he goes rapidly to ruin even while retaining his silver-tipped touch at the keyboard, but she finally is rewarded in her quest when the Memphis hoodoo king befriends her. Luke hits the road, returning home in time to witness his proud father's end, but in time he comes back through Memphis, forsaking future fame to rejoin Melvira on the final leg of her journey to her mother. Not even a furious Mississippi flood can deter them; and although she's powerless to stop the Baron (Death) from claiming the old woman, the circle that was broken is forged anew, so that Melvira and Bodeen ``lived happily ever after.'' Best in its blues scenes and delta moods, most disappointing in its lack of depth and continuity, with Melvira a shadowy character next to her man. Flawed, then, but not without its shining moments.
Pub Date: Feb. 1, 1993
ISBN: 0-670-84821-2
Page Count: 224
Publisher: Viking
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 15, 1992
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BOOK REVIEW
by Arthur Flowers ; illustrated by Manu Chitrakar
by J.D. Salinger ‧ RELEASE DATE: June 15, 1951
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
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BOOK REVIEW
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SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
APPRECIATIONS
by Kristin Hannah ‧ RELEASE DATE: March 1, 2006
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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