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GRAVEYARD PEACHES

Name: GRAVEYARD PEACHES
Author: Celeste De Blasis
ISBN: 0-312-06362-8

A CALIFORNIA MEMOIR

by Celeste De Blasis ‧ RELEASE DATE: Nov. 1, 1991

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In a memoir whose principal appeal lies in its detailed recapturing of a bygone place and era, best-selling historical novelist De Blasis (A Season of Swans, 1989, etc.) describes growing up on her family's ranch in the high desert of Southern California. Founded by De Blasis's grandparents in the 1920's, the farm and horse ranch, about a hundred miles from L.A., later received paying guests such as J.B. Priestley, Henry Fonda, and Herman Mankiewicz. The grandmother ran her dining room as artistic salon. De Blasis describes, in no particular order, the children's adventures, the omnipresent natural world, the extended family, the help, the Catholic school, the trips to Europe, the sense of independence that her upbringing fostered and how she became a writer. This rambling remembrance tends toward the self- congratulatory. De Blasis will not eat peaches from trees that grow in graveyards, calls her childhood invention of an Indian character ``prophetic,'' and regrets that her grandmother, a published memoirist, tried to compete with her as a novelist: ``I had not used any of her publishing connections when I started out...but I did ask my agent to read Grandma's manuscript.'' Her prose quickens when she brings her family and a beloved landscape to life. Her brother died young, his passing part of a chronicle of loss that includes vanishing wildlife and open space as the ranch, like the rest of Southern California, became residential subdivision. We could, however, have been spared the fates of favorite pets. Early on, De Blasis describes finding an Indian artifact at an archaeological dig on the ranch. ``Nothing has ever made me feel the continuity of the best in human kind as keenly as I did when I held that crystal drill in my hand—small, exquisite, shaped equally for beauty and for use.'' With more precise editing and shaping, her memoir could have better realized her theme of moving backward in time. (Eight pages of photographs—not seen.)

Pub Date: Nov. 1, 1991

ISBN: 0-312-06362-8

Page Count: 224

Publisher: St. Martin's

Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 1, 1991

Categories:

GENERAL NONFICTION

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NUTCRACKER

by E.T.A. Hoffmann ‧ RELEASE DATE: Oct. 28, 1996

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This is not the Nutcracker sweet, as passed on by Tchaikovsky and Marius Petipa. No, this is the original Hoffmann tale of 1816, in which the froth of Christmas revelry occasionally parts to let the dark underside of childhood fantasies and fears peek through. The boundaries between dream and reality fade, just as Godfather Drosselmeier, the Nutcracker's creator, is seen as alternately sinister and jolly. And Italian artist Roberto Innocenti gives an errily realistic air to Marie's dreams, in richly detailed illustrations touched by a mysterious light. A beautiful version of this classic tale, which will captivate adults and children alike. (Nutcracker; $35.00; Oct. 28, 1996; 136 pp.; 0-15-100227-4)

Pub Date: Oct. 28, 1996

ISBN: 0-15-100227-4

Page Count: 136

Publisher: Harcourt

Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 1996

Categories:

GENERAL NONFICTION

- BOOK REVIEW
THE NUTCRACKER AND THE MOUSE KING
by E.T.A. Hoffmann ; adapted by Natalie Andrewson ; illustrated by Natalie Andrewson

- BOOK REVIEW
THE NUTCRACKER
by E.T.A. Hoffmann & illustrated by Julie Paschkis

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TO THE ONE I LOVE THE BEST

EPISODES FROM THE LIFE OF LADY MENDL (ELSIE DE WOLFE)

by Ludwig Bemelmans ‧ RELEASE DATE: Feb. 23, 1955

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An extravaganza in Bemelmans' inimitable vein, but written almost dead pan, with sly, amusing, sometimes biting undertones, breaking through. For Bemelmans was "the man who came to cocktails". And his hostess was Lady Mendl (Elsie de Wolfe), arbiter of American decorating taste over a generation. Lady Mendl was an incredible person,- self-made in proper American tradition on the one hand, for she had been haunted by the poverty of her childhood, and the years of struggle up from its ugliness,- until she became synonymous with the exotic, exquisite, worshipper at beauty's whrine. Bemelmans draws a portrait in extremes, through apt descriptions, through hilarious anecdote, through surprisingly sympathetic and understanding bits of appreciation. The scene shifts from Hollywood to the home she loved the best in Versailles. One meets in passing a vast roster of famous figures of the international and artistic set. And always one feels Bemelmans, slightly offstage, observing, recording, commenting, illustrated.