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WARRIOR

Name: WARRIOR
Author: Brent Green
ISBN: 978-0-692-36629-5

THE LIFE AND LESSONS OF A MAN WHO BEAT CANCER FOR 57 YEARS

by Brent Green ‧ RELEASE DATE: Sept. 10, 2018

A study of one man’s determination to defeat fear, weakness, and cancer.

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An exercise physiologist and sport psychologist responds to his lifelong disease struggles with intense athleticism and risk-taking in this fictionalized biography.

Mark is 8 years old when he has his first surgery for neurogenic sarcoma, a type of cancer that produces recurring tumors throughout the body. His doctors tell him that the lump is “gone forever,” which is only the first of many medical failures in treating Mark’s rare disease. Hopeful and determined, Mark throws himself into physical activity, a pattern that persists throughout his life. Haunted by the constant specter of impending mortality, he cheats death over and over by pushing himself to feats of daring—jumping off a nine-story bridge, setting a scuba-diving record for time underwater, sky diving. When, at 65, he receives the dire diagnosis of innumerable tumors that finalizes his death sentence, he enters hospice care. There, he continues to insist on life and dignity through relentless physical exertion, timing his walks down the halls with his IV pole in tow. The novel recounts the life and experiences of Mark Crooks, a friend and mentor of Green’s (Questions of the Spirit, 2017, etc.). The author has created a memorable protagonist in Mark, driven and resolute yet deeply vulnerable. Mark’s obsession with his own physical fitness and his occasional disdain for those less disciplined make him somewhat unsympathetic at times. But the image of the 8-year-old Mark, “angry” and “lonely,” building himself up with barbells after his first surgery, gives insight into the development of his single-minded character. Also notable are the chapters like “Nemesis” that are written from the point of view of the cancer. While it is intriguing to see the protagonist’s perception of the disease, lines such as “I hate Mark, every fiber of his being…I loathe the life force bubbling through his arteries and veins and the meticulously complicated wiring of his muscles with nerves” seem a convoluted way to express his anger about his illness. But the book ends on a note of defiant joy followed by an afterword in which Green eloquently describes his relationship with the real Mark.

A study of one man’s determination to defeat fear, weakness, and cancer.

Pub Date: Sept. 10, 2018

ISBN: 978-0-692-36629-5

Page Count: 200

Publisher: Brent Green & Associates, Inc.

Review Posted Online: July 24, 2018

Review Program: Kirkus Indie

Categories:

GENERAL FICTION

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CARRIE

by Stephen King ‧ RELEASE DATE: April 8, 1974

King handles his first novel with considerable accomplishment and very little hokum—it's only too easy to believe that these...

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Figuratively and literally shattering moments of hoRRRRRipilication in Chamberlain, Maine where stones fly from the sky rather than from the hands of the villagers (as they did in "The Lottery," although the latter are equal to other forms of persecution).

All beginning when Carrie White discovers a gift with telekinetic powers (later established as a genetic fact), after she menstruates in full ignorance of the process and thinks she is bleeding to death while the other monsters in the high school locker room bait and bully her mercilessly. Carrie is the only child of a fundamentalist freak mother who has brought her up with a concept of sin which no blood of the Lamb can wash clean. In addition to a sympathetic principal and gym teacher, there's one girl who wishes to atone and turns her date for the spring ball over to Carrie who for the first time is happy, beautiful and acknowledged as such. But there will be hell to pay for this success—not only her mother but two youngsters who douse her in buckets of fresh-killed pig blood so that Carrie once again uses her "wild talent," flexes her mind and a complete catastrophe (explosion and an uncontrolled fire) virtually destroys the town.

King handles his first novel with considerable accomplishment and very little hokum—it's only too easy to believe that these youngsters who once ate peanut butter now scrawl "Carrie White eats shit." But as they still say around here, "Sit a spell and collect yourself."

Pub Date: April 8, 1974

ISBN: 0385086954

Page Count: 216

Publisher: Doubleday

Review Posted Online: Sept. 26, 2011

Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 1974

Categories:

GENERAL FICTION

- BOOK REVIEW
OTHER WORLDS THAN THESE
by Stephen King & Peter Straub

- BOOK REVIEW
NEVER FLINCH
by Stephen King

- BOOK REVIEW
YOU LIKE IT DARKER
by Stephen King

- PERSPECTIVES
Appreciations: Carrie Turns 40

- SEEN & HEARD
Stephen King Used ‘Carrie’ Advance To Support Mom

- BOOK TO SCREEN
New ‘Carrie’ Series in the Works at Amazon

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TO KILL A MOCKINGBIRD

by Harper Lee ‧ RELEASE DATE: July 11, 1960

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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.