Another female-bonding story from Delinsky (Together Alone, 1995, etc.), whose sometimes syrupy storytelling is given an edge here, thanks to the carefully researched theme of Alzheimer's. Grace Dorian is ``The Confidante,'' a world-famous advice columnist whose daughter Francine and 23-year-old granddaughter Sophie live in as much awe of her as everybody else . . . until Grace starts to forget things, turns out columns that don't quite make sense, gets in a car accident because she couldn't remember how to stop. The diagnosis provided by young doctor Davis Marcoux is grim—Alzheimer's—and thrusts all three generations into an emotional whirlwind. Francine especially feels she can't go on without her domineering mother, for whom she's worked and with whom she's lived, for most of her life. At Grace's command, and against Francine's better judgment, the Alzheimer's is kept a secret from the public, but one clever reporter, Robin Duffy, suspects that something's up; making one of her first autonomous decisions, Francine decides to hire Robin to help a rapidly failing Grace write her autobiography, leaving Francine free to write Grace's column full-time. Meanwhile, personal as well as professional lives are suffering; Grace wants Francine and Sophie to marry before she dies, but Francine is bored by Robert, Grace's choice for her, and rebellious Sophie is dating Gus, the family chauffeur. And there's the mystery: As Grace's mind deteriorates, details slip concerning her heretofore never-mentioned childhood; only Father Jim—Grace's oldest friend and her own confidante—knows the dramatic secrets of the past. With the help of Sophie, Robin, and Dr. Marcoux (by now far more to Francine than her mother's doctor), Francine begins to unlock those secrets—as well as some of her own. Delinsky's ability to put a human face on this horrifying disease gives a strength to what could have been a conventional romance-genre entrant. ($250,000 ad/promo)
Pub Date: Jan. 23, 1996
ISBN: 0-06-017781-0
Page Count: 368
Publisher: HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 1995
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 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.
Pub Date: July 11, 1960
ISBN: 0060935464
Page Count: 323
Publisher: Lippincott
Review Posted Online: Oct. 7, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 1960
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
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