Broadcaster Richardson, billed as Canada's Garrison Keillor, suffers from the literary humorist's bane: He shoots for whimsy, but ends up wallowing in clichÇ. The novel, an elaboration of segments broadcast on CBC Radio, explores the background, opinions, and experiences of eccentric twin brothers who maintain a bed and breakfast on an island near Vancouver. An inheritance from their auto-mechanic mother, Virgil and Hector's stressless house sports a hefty library of books that Richardson deems worthwhile: Proust, Kingsley Amis, Iris Murdoch, A.S. Byatt, A.A. Milne. The boys have remained bachelors into their 50s—though Hector has a girlfriend, Altona Winkler, who writes for the scandalous local newspaper, Occasional Rumor. They live quietly with a cat named Waffle and a parrot named Mrs. Rochester, taking in guests who recount their impressions and stories in the brothers' guestbook. Richardson alternates sketches narrated by Hector or Virgil with guest accounts, each of which is identified as a ``Brief Life'': A woman recalls how she got her cocker spaniel; a lawyer reports on a harrowing New Age Weekend; a guest complains about Mrs. Rochester's cursing. The brothers' tales are less cloying, but they often seem phoned-in. ``The Top Ten Authors Over Ten Years at the Bachelor Brothers' B&B'' (Margaret Atwood, Anthony Trollope) and ``Virgil's List of Books for When You're Feeling Low'' (M.F.K. Fisher shares space with Vikram Seth) are two examples of Richardson's annoying list-making habit; there are stories about fanciful eggcups and a meditation on the subtle arts of reading and writing in bed. Flip-flopping in this manner puts enormous pressure on Richardson to be funny, which he almost never is, mainly because he's driven to celebrate the merits of a dowdy domestic life. Included are even some bad poetry and a muffin recipe. By and large, a collection of cloying cuteness and failed wit.
Pub Date: Sept. 10, 1996
ISBN: 0-312-14546-2
Page Count: 160
Publisher: St. Martin's
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 1996
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Wacky plot keeps the pages turning and enduring schmaltzy romantic sequences.
Sisters work together to solve a child-abandonment case.
Ellie and Julia Cates have never been close. Julia is shy and brainy; Ellie gets by on charm and looks. Their differences must be tossed aside when a traumatized young girl wanders in from the forest into their hometown in Washington. The sisters’ professional skills are put to the test. Julia is a world-renowned child psychologist who has lost her edge. She is reeling from a case that went publicly sour. Though she was cleared of all wrongdoing, Julia’s name was tarnished, forcing her to shutter her Beverly Hills practice. Ellie Barton is the local police chief in Rain Valley, who’s never faced a tougher case. This is her chance to prove she is more than just a fading homecoming queen, but a scarcity of clues and a reluctant victim make locating the girl’s parents nearly impossible. Ellie places an SOS call to her sister; she needs an expert to rehabilitate this wild-child who has been living outside of civilization for years. Confronted with her professional demons, Julia once again has the opportunity to display her talents and salvage her reputation. Hannah (The Things We Do for Love, 2004, etc.) is at her best when writing from the girl’s perspective. The feral wolf-child keeps the reader interested long after the other, transparent characters have grown tiresome. Hannah’s torturously over-written romance passages are stale, but there are surprises in store as the sisters set about unearthing Alice’s past and creating a home for her.
Wacky plot keeps the pages turning and enduring schmaltzy romantic sequences.Pub Date: March 1, 2006
ISBN: 0-345-46752-3
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Ballantine
Review Posted Online: June 24, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2005
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
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