STACKING IN RIVERTOWN

Name: STACKING IN RIVERTOWN
Author: Barbara Bell
ISBN: 0-684-87035-5

by Barbara Bell ‧ RELEASE DATE: July 5, 2000

Newcomer Bell creates an engaging and sympathetic character while skillfully exploring the nature of obsession and human...

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A disturbing, often compelling first novel about a feisty young woman who’s had more than her share of abuse, cruelty, and loss but fights her way back to sanity.

Narrator Clarisse Broder, 31, is married to a rich, boring Wall Street guy with a fetish for dogs (his alarm clock doesn’t buzz, it barks). They met in a hospital, where Clarisse was supposedly recovering from an emergency appendectomy, and married a week later. As a result, there’s a lot he doesn’t know, and, despite Clarisse’s clever banter and wry sense of humor, it’s obvious that she’s haunted by sinister memories. The truth is that Beth, as she was once known, ran away from home at 16 and was taken in by a sadistic pimp named Ben, who tortured her physically and psychologically until she became a willing member of the stable of boys and girls he directed in S/M performances for the benefit of wealthy clients. The renamed Clarisse finds that a dull suburban existence isn’t enough to make her feel safe or happy, and there’s a nagging secret lurking just below her conscious recall. When the book of stories her husband encourages her to write develops a cult following, she worries that her past will be exposed. Desperate for relief, she decides to kill herself, but instead begins thinking about “a different type of suicide, the kind where you end up free, in a new life that you yourself decide.” To this end, she calls on Ben for help—a mistake that eventually prompts her to jump off the Brooklyn Bridge in an attempt to escape him. This proves to be the first step in a harrowing flight across the country, until Beth/Clarisse winds up in the arms of a woman whose love enables her to recover her memory and her life.

Newcomer Bell creates an engaging and sympathetic character while skillfully exploring the nature of obsession and human need: a graphically violent but impressive debut.

Pub Date: July 5, 2000

ISBN: 0-684-87035-5

Page Count: 304

Publisher: Simon & Schuster

Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010

Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 2000

Categories:

GENERAL FICTION

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SUMMER ISLAND

by Kristin Hannah ‧ RELEASE DATE: March 1, 2001

The best-selling author of tearjerkers like Angel Falls (2000) serves up yet another mountain of mush, topped off with...

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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

Categories:

GENERAL FICTION

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TO KILL A MOCKINGBIRD

by Harper Lee ‧ RELEASE DATE: July 11, 1960

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A first novel, this is also a first person account of Scout's (Jean Louise) recall of the years that led to the ending of a mystery, the breaking of her brother Jem's elbow, the death of her father's enemy — and the close of childhood years. A widower, Atticus raises his children with legal dispassion and paternal intelligence, and is ably abetted by Calpurnia, the colored cook, while the Alabama town of Maycomb, in the 1930's, remains aloof to their divergence from its tribal patterns. Scout and Jem, with their summer-time companion, Dill, find their paths free from interference — but not from dangers; their curiosity about the imprisoned Boo, whose miserable past is incorporated in their play, results in a tentative friendliness; their fears of Atticus' lack of distinction is dissipated when he shoots a mad dog; his defense of a Negro accused of raping a white girl, Mayella Ewell, is followed with avid interest and turns the rabble whites against him. Scout is the means of averting an attack on Atticus but when he loses the case it is Boo who saves Jem and Scout by killing Mayella's father when he attempts to murder them. The shadows of a beginning for black-white understanding, the persistent fight that Scout carries on against school, Jem's emergence into adulthood, Calpurnia's quiet power, and all the incidents touching on the children's "growing outward" have an attractive starchiness that keeps this southern picture pert and provocative. There is much advance interest in this book; it has been selected by the Literary Guild and Reader's Digest; it should win many friends.