Less compelling on Shakespeare himself than on his age; but in its evocation of the laissez-faire sexual and economic mores...
Cook (The Sidewalk Hilton, 1994, etc.; a.k.a. Bruce Alexander) lends his mystery skills to this self-portrait of a callow, bisexual, slightly homicidal young Shakespeare as an eager ingénue who manages to better himself without caring overmuch about those who fall by the wayside.
Things start with Will chatting away in his old age (52), prosperous and bored in Stratford, troubled only by an old village biddy. Speaking in an uninflected, unintrospective voice devoid of the brilliance and fury of the Bard, Old Will traces Young Will’s departure from sleepy Stratford after a dalliance with a male schoolteacher and an accidental-on-purpose pushing of his best friend into a raging river during an argument. Untroubled by conscience, though he is a closet Catholic, Will does hack work for a traveling troupe, hits London as a player with a knack for words and for finding patrons, falls in love with Christopher Marlowe, even moves in with him (and also steals characters from him—best here is the portrait of Will and Kit as young sodomites who, when they aren’t buggering or boozing, write and bluster in the same room). Will experiences the great events of his time—court intrigues, the Spanish Armada, persecution of Catholics, plague, the competition and growth of theater companies, even the murder of Marlowe (Will himself wields the dagger in this version)—all in a sort of absent-minded monotone that successfully humanizes the mysterious and elusive figure yet makes it impossible to associate him with the glories of Elizabethan English. That may actually have been Cook’s plan—to show Will as a vessel or conduit of his experiences—but the device leaves a dull and disappointing aftertaste.
Less compelling on Shakespeare himself than on his age; but in its evocation of the laissez-faire sexual and economic mores of Elizabethan society, Cook’s tale has the ring of psychological truth.Pub Date: Oct. 13, 2004
ISBN: 0-312-33573-3
Page Count: 416
Publisher: Truman Talley/St. Martin’s
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 2004
Still, a respectful and absorbing page-turner.
Hannah’s new novel is an homage to the extraordinary courage and endurance of Frenchwomen during World War II.
In 1995, an elderly unnamed widow is moving into an Oregon nursing home on the urging of her controlling son, Julien, a surgeon. This trajectory is interrupted when she receives an invitation to return to France to attend a ceremony honoring passeurs: people who aided the escape of others during the war. Cut to spring, 1940: Viann has said goodbye to husband Antoine, who's off to hold the Maginot line against invading Germans. She returns to tending her small farm, Le Jardin, in the Loire Valley, teaching at the local school and coping with daughter Sophie’s adolescent rebellion. Soon, that world is upended: The Germans march into Paris and refugees flee south, overrunning Viann’s land. Her long-estranged younger sister, Isabelle, who has been kicked out of multiple convent schools, is sent to Le Jardin by Julien, their father in Paris, a drunken, decidedly unpaternal Great War veteran. As the depredations increase in the occupied zone—food rationing, systematic looting, and the billeting of a German officer, Capt. Beck, at Le Jardin—Isabelle’s outspokenness is a liability. She joins the Resistance, volunteering for dangerous duty: shepherding downed Allied airmen across the Pyrenees to Spain. Code-named the Nightingale, Isabelle will rescue many before she's captured. Meanwhile, Viann’s journey from passive to active resistance is less dramatic but no less wrenching. Hannah vividly demonstrates how the Nazis, through starvation, intimidation and barbarity both casual and calculated, demoralized the French, engineering a community collapse that enabled the deportations and deaths of more than 70,000 Jews. Hannah’s proven storytelling skills are ideally suited to depicting such cataclysmic events, but her tendency to sentimentalize undermines the gravitas of this tale.
Still, a respectful and absorbing page-turner.Pub Date: Feb. 3, 2015
ISBN: 978-0-312-57722-3
Page Count: 448
Publisher: St. Martin's
Review Posted Online: Nov. 19, 2014
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2014
BOOK TO SCREEN
SEEN & HEARD
BOOK TO SCREEN
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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