Another comfy read from megaselling Auntie Belva (Her Father’s House, 2002, etc., etc.).
Who pays retail?
Not Adam Arnring, illegitimate son of a Jewish storekeeper and a forlorn Irish girl, who grows up to run a department store and get rich. Not that the small-minded residents of his New Jersey town ever thought he would amount to much—though his loving Pa was absolutely certain his firstborn son would be a big man some day. It’s the dawn of a new century, and America is the land of opportunity. With tears in his eyes, Pa tells Adam the story of his out-of-wedlock birth and his mother’s tragic early death from diphtheria. But life goes on. Adam’s kindly stepmother provides two brothers: Leo the nasty one, and Jonathan the nice one. In 1907, Adam goes forth into the great world (okay, Chattahoochee, Texas). He quickly finds work at a small department store owned by the Rothirsch family and pines for the unattainable Emma Rothirsch, a cool, green-eyed beauty with an independent spirit and musical talent. Where did it come from? Emma reveals her deep, dark secret: She’s adopted and undoubtedly illegitimate. She and Adam marry. She gets busy making babies while Adam makes money. Jonathan is killed in the trenches in WWI. Adam grieves but life goes on. He and Emma have wonderful, talented children and life is practically perfect—until Adam’s brief dalliance with dress designer Blanche comes to the attention of his nasty brother Leo, the runt of the litter at only five foot two, always jealous of Adam’s success. Leo blackmails Adam, who pays so that life can go on. He dabbles in philanthropy and good works while the wonderful children grow up and are successes in their own right, producing wonderful, talented children of their own. More years go by. Many, many things happen. Sunrise, sunset . . . .
Another comfy read from megaselling Auntie Belva (Her Father’s House, 2002, etc., etc.).Pub Date: Jan. 6, 2004
ISBN: 0-385-33683-7
Page Count: 336
Publisher: Delacorte
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 1, 2003
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
Coelho's placebo has racked up impressive sales in Brazil and Europe. Americans should flock to it like gulls.
Coelho is a Brazilian writer with four books to his credit. Following Diary of a Magus (1992—not reviewed) came this book, published in Brazil in 1988: it's an interdenominational, transcendental, inspirational fable—in other words, a bag of wind.
The story is about a youth empowered to follow his dream. Santiago is an Andalusian shepherd boy who learns through a dream of a treasure in the Egyptian pyramids. An old man, the king of Salem, the first of various spiritual guides, tells the boy that he has discovered his destiny: "to realize one's destiny is a person's only real obligation." So Santiago sells his sheep, sails to Tangier, is tricked out of his money, regains it through hard work, crosses the desert with a caravan, stops at an oasis long enough to fall in love, escapes from warring tribesmen by performing a miracle, reaches the pyramids, and eventually gets both the gold and the girl. Along the way he meets an Englishman who describes the Soul of the World; the desert woman Fatima, who teaches him the Language of the World; and an alchemist who says, "Listen to your heart" A message clings like ivy to every encounter; everyone, but everyone, has to put in their two cents' worth, from the crystal merchant to the camel driver ("concentrate always on the present, you'll be a happy man"). The absence of characterization and overall blandness suggest authorship by a committee of self-improvement pundits—a far cry from Saint- Exupery's The Little Prince: that flagship of the genre was a genuine charmer because it clearly derived from a quirky, individual sensibility.
Coelho's placebo has racked up impressive sales in Brazil and Europe. Americans should flock to it like gulls.Pub Date: July 1, 1993
ISBN: 0-06-250217-4
Page Count: 192
Publisher: N/A
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 1993
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
BOOK TO SCREEN
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