Siegel's talent for thoughtful and responsible reportage, first evidenced in A Death in White Bear Lake (1990), finds a perfect showcase in this collection of pieces (most first published in The Los Angeles Times) on how ordinary Americans grapple with ethical ambiguity in courtrooms, scientific laboratories, doctors' offices, and everyday life. In Minneapolis, US District Judge Miles Lord chooses to exceed the limits of his judicial mandate to personally censor the actions of the unaccused corporate executives who marketed the Dalkon Shield. In California, two sisters decide, despite trepidations, to help their terminally ill father commit suicide. Also in California, a doctor anguishes over how much information to give an expectant mother about her as-yet-unborn child. Any one of the agonizing conflicts described in Siegel's perceptive and wide- ranging reports would provide enough material for a short story, or even a novel. Put together, his tales of a lawyer's efforts to arrange a pardon for a man on death row, of an Indiana town's semicovert efforts to play down a local teenager's murder of an Amish baby living nearby, of a middle-class community's confusion and anger when a very young child accuses a playmate's dad of sexual abuse, and so on overwhelm with a sense of hundreds of ordinary Americans agonizing over how to do what's right, as well as with a realization of the often utter impossibility of doing so. Early on in the book, dramatic courtroom dramas draw the most interest, but even Siegel's more ponderous explorations of the difficulties of modern-day prenatal counseling, and of the temptation for scientists to value career advancement over good research, prove fascinating in their complexity. The best possible combination of journalism and storytelling, matching weighty themes with real-life, three-dimensional Americans to wrestle with them. Not what you read in the headlines—this is captivating news.
Pub Date: Feb. 17, 1992
ISBN: 0-553-08115-2
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Bantam
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 15, 1991
This is not the Nutcracker sweet, as passed on by Tchaikovsky and Marius Petipa. No, this is the original Hoffmann tale of 1816, in which the froth of Christmas revelry occasionally parts to let the dark underside of childhood fantasies and fears peek through. The boundaries between dream and reality fade, just as Godfather Drosselmeier, the Nutcracker's creator, is seen as alternately sinister and jolly. And Italian artist Roberto Innocenti gives an errily realistic air to Marie's dreams, in richly detailed illustrations touched by a mysterious light. A beautiful version of this classic tale, which will captivate adults and children alike. (Nutcracker; $35.00; Oct. 28, 1996; 136 pp.; 0-15-100227-4)
Pub Date: Oct. 28, 1996
ISBN: 0-15-100227-4
Page Count: 136
Publisher: Harcourt
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 1996
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
An extravaganza in Bemelmans' inimitable vein, but written almost dead pan, with sly, amusing, sometimes biting undertones, breaking through. For Bemelmans was "the man who came to cocktails". And his hostess was Lady Mendl (Elsie de Wolfe), arbiter of American decorating taste over a generation. Lady Mendl was an incredible person,- self-made in proper American tradition on the one hand, for she had been haunted by the poverty of her childhood, and the years of struggle up from its ugliness,- until she became synonymous with the exotic, exquisite, worshipper at beauty's whrine. Bemelmans draws a portrait in extremes, through apt descriptions, through hilarious anecdote, through surprisingly sympathetic and understanding bits of appreciation. The scene shifts from Hollywood to the home she loved the best in Versailles. One meets in passing a vast roster of famous figures of the international and artistic set. And always one feels Bemelmans, slightly offstage, observing, recording, commenting, illustrated.
Pub Date: Feb. 23, 1955
ISBN: 0670717797
Page Count: -
Publisher: Viking
Review Posted Online: Oct. 25, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 1955
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