First novel from the author of a story collection (Hard to Be Good, 1987) and of a nonfiction attempt to define the great state of California (Big Dreams, 1994). Barich's setting is the grape-growing region of northern California, as good a place as any to muse on the mythology of the state. His protagonist, Arthur Atwater, manages a large vineyard for its aged patriarch, Victor Torelli. Atwater has a checkered past—substance abuse problems and a brief career as a hippie—but he's committed to delivering the crop for Torelli, who has given him ``a third chance.'' Atwater is a confirmed bachelor, a loner, and he throws himself fanatically at his task. Through his and Torelli's eyes, the reader sees the old, Italian California; the coming, gentrified California; and the ordinary, blue-collar California. Into the mix Barich skillfully weaves a subplot concerning Mexican legals and illegals, and his scenes in Tijuana, in particular, show great range. But at the core of the story is a modern, believable, touching romance between Atwater and Torelli's daughter, Anna, who's come home from New York because her mother is dying. Such a love story, marred neither by genre conventions nor ideology, is a considerable feat in the current climate, and, given Barich's attention to detail in the vineyard, along with his graceful, contemplative style, makes this a very good novel, indeed. One might be tempted to compare it to East of Eden, say, except that Barich, in relating to nature, lacks Steinbeck's quirky pantheism, and his view of the world is far gentler than Steinbeck's. But he resembles his elder in that he writes beautifully and, for his own time, captures California. Barich is also often quite amusing, particularly during scenes satirizing the literary life in New York City, upon Anna's return there. A quietly but genuinely remarkable debut.
Pub Date: March 26, 1997
ISBN: 0-679-44210-3
Page Count: 352
Publisher: Pantheon
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 1997
A strict report, worthy of sympathy.
A violent surfacing of adolescence (which has little in common with Tarkington's earlier, broadly comic, Seventeen) has a compulsive impact.
"Nobody big except me" is the dream world of Holden Caulfield and his first person story is down to the basic, drab English of the pre-collegiate. For Holden is now being bounced from fancy prep, and, after a vicious evening with hall- and roommates, heads for New York to try to keep his latest failure from his parents. He tries to have a wild evening (all he does is pay the check), is terrorized by the hotel elevator man and his on-call whore, has a date with a girl he likes—and hates, sees his 10 year old sister, Phoebe. He also visits a sympathetic English teacher after trying on a drunken session, and when he keeps his date with Phoebe, who turns up with her suitcase to join him on his flight, he heads home to a hospital siege. This is tender and true, and impossible, in its picture of the old hells of young boys, the lonesomeness and tentative attempts to be mature and secure, the awful block between youth and being grown-up, the fright and sickness that humans and their behavior cause the challenging, the dramatization of the big bang. It is a sorry little worm's view of the off-beat of adult pressure, of contemporary strictures and conformity, of sentiment….
A strict report, worthy of sympathy.Pub Date: June 15, 1951
ISBN: 0316769177
Page Count: -
Publisher: Little, Brown
Review Posted Online: Nov. 2, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 1951
BOOK REVIEW
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
APPRECIATIONS
Genetically engineered dinosaurs run amok in Crichton's new, vastly entertaining science thriller. From the introduction alone—a classically Crichton-clear discussion of the implications of biotechnological research—it's evident that the Harvard M.D. has bounced back from the science-fantasy silliness of Sphere (1987) for another taut reworking of the Frankenstein theme, as in The Andromeda Strain and The Terminal Man. Here, Dr. Frankenstein is aging billionaire John Hammond, whose monster is a manmade ecosystem based on a Costa Rican island. Designed as the world's ultimate theme park, the ecosystem boasts climate and flora of the Jurassic Age and—most spectacularly—15 varieties of dinosaurs, created by elaborate genetic engineering that Crichton explains in fascinating detail, rich with dino-lore and complete with graphics. Into the park, for a safety check before its opening, comes the novel's band of characters—who, though well drawn, double as symbolic types in this unsubtle morality play. Among them are hero Alan Grant, noble paleontologist; Hammond, venal and obsessed; amoral dino-designer Henry Wu; Hammond's two innocent grandchildren; and mathematician Ian Malcolm, who in long diatribes serves as Crichton's mouthpiece to lament the folly of science. Upon arrival, the visitors tour the park; meanwhile, an industrial spy steals some dino embryos by shutting down the island's power—and its security grid, allowing the beasts to run loose. The bulk of the remaining narrative consists of dinos—ferocious T. Rex's, voracious velociraptors, venom-spitting dilophosaurs—stalking, ripping, and eating the cast in fast, furious, and suspenseful set-pieces as the ecosystem spins apart. And can Grant prevent the dinos from escaping to the mainland to create unchecked havoc? Though intrusive, the moralizing rarely slows this tornado-paced tale, a slick package of info-thrills that's Crichton's most clever since Congo (1980)—and easily the most exciting dinosaur novel ever written. A sure-fire best-seller.
Pub Date: Nov. 7, 1990
ISBN: 0394588169
Page Count: 424
Publisher: Knopf
Review Posted Online: Sept. 21, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 1990
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