Uncas acknowledges he is “a terribly small man.” And this is a terribly small first novel.
Old-fashioned professor rejoices in his marriage. Then he remembers seeing his wife kiss another man 30 years ago. Uh-oh.
Uncas Metcalfe is a 60-ish professor of botany at a college near his hometown, Sparta, in central New York; he’s a fifth generation Spartan. It’s the 1980s; the action, what there is of it, takes place between Thanksgiving and Christmas. Uncas’s wife Margaret, former owner of a nursery school, is in the hospital with a leg injury. Margaret has the people skills; the often oblivious Uncas is known by his family (there are grown kids and grandkids) as Lord Reticent Taciturn. But Uncas sees himself as a steady man who can recognize that quality in others, such as Alex, a young woman new in town; what he hasn’t noticed is that she’s a lesbian. Alex and her girlfriend Hannah have been helping out while Margaret, now back at home, convalesces. Uncas, unmoored since Margaret’s injury, finds himself telling Alex about a long-ago incident in Cambridge, Mass., when Uncas, unseen, observed his wife kissing an old childhood friend in their kitchen. True to form, he had never discussed the matter with Margaret; when he questions her now, she dismisses the kiss as inconsequential, which it clearly was. Realizing an old wound is not enough to sustain a novel, Osborne concocts something else, a confrontation between Uncas and a former student, Carl Benson, whom Uncas has forgotten but who has not forgotten him. Years before, Carl had asked the professor for help in overseeing marijuana therapy for his father, who was suffering from Lou Gehrig’s disease; Uncas ignored the request. Now Carl is provoking Uncas, stealing his bike and his briefcase. But why, Uncas wonders, has calling him to account “suddenly become imperative”? Good question, never answered.
Uncas acknowledges he is “a terribly small man.” And this is a terribly small first novel.Pub Date: May 2, 2006
ISBN: 0-312-34277-2
Page Count: 240
Publisher: St. Martin's
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 15, 2006
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
The best-selling author of tearjerkers like Angel Falls (2000) serves up yet another mountain of mush, topped off with...
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
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