Another tale—but a fun one—about a plucky mountain woman who finds success in the big city.
A young Appalachian woman escapes to Chicago during the Jazz Age in this historical romance.
Nineteen-year-old Grace Langdon is the only girl in a large family in the Appalachian town of Stones Mill, Virginia. Her mother alternates between coldness and abusiveness while her miner father is just plain mean and violent. Gracie is saved by her love of books—Jane Eyre, in particular—and her best friend and cousin, Ollie. Gracie thinks she has little interest in marrying until her childhood friend Charlie Hillard returns to Stones Mill for his father’s final days. Despite her initial attraction, she soon realizes that Charlie is a mean drunk like her father and tries to warn smitten Ollie away from him. When Gracie’s father orders her to marry Charlie, she flees to her older brother and sister-in-law, Jack and Alice, in Chicago. As she builds a new life, she becomes involved with Jack and Alice’s friends and neighbors, the Shaws. Henry, the older brother, carries scars—both physical and psychological—from the Great War while his younger sibling has a sunnier personality. Attracted to Henry, despite his occasional dark nature, Gracie embarks on a musical and dance career in the Shaws’ nightclub. Her budding romance with Henry is threatened by her own mistrust of men, Charlie’s refusal to accept her rejection, and an unthinkable accident. Hawkins (The Tempest: A Gisborne Novel, 2014, etc.) skillfully evokes both the mountain and urban settings. But Gracie’s ability to quickly adapt to a surprisingly privileged life in Chicago after her humble upbringing seems unlikely. And some problems with characterization mar the otherwise enjoyable story. Jack morphs from an indulgent, cosmopolitan urbanite to an overprotective warden, with some bumbling new-father syndrome thrown in. Henry’s dark side—inspired by Gracie’s devotion to Rochester—is also occasionally troubling (someone should warn her that a moody rich guy is fundamentally the same as a moody poor guy), while the stereotype of the abusive Appalachian man is becoming a bit trite. At over 350 pages, the story drags, with increasingly improbable obstacles tormenting the lovebirds.
Another tale—but a fun one—about a plucky mountain woman who finds success in the big city.Pub Date: Feb. 14, 2018
ISBN: N/A
Page Count: 403
Publisher: Amazon Digital Services, Inc.
Review Posted Online: Jan. 23, 2018
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
The emotions run high, the conversations run deep, and the relationships ebb and flow with grace.
When tragedy strikes, a mother and daughter forge a new life.
Morgan felt obligated to marry her high school sweetheart, Chris, when she got pregnant with their daughter, Clara. But she secretly got along much better with Chris’ thoughtful best friend, Jonah, who was dating her sister, Jenny. Now her life as a stay-at-home parent has left her feeling empty but not ungrateful for what she has. Jonah and Jenny eventually broke up, but years later they had a one-night stand and Jenny got pregnant with their son, Elijah. Now Jonah is back in town, engaged to Jenny, and working at the local high school as Clara’s teacher. Clara dreams of being an actress and has a crush on Miller, who plans to go to film school, but her father doesn't approve. It doesn’t help that Miller already has a jealous girlfriend who stalks him via text from college. But Clara and Morgan’s home life changes radically when Chris and Jenny are killed in an accident, revealing long-buried secrets and forcing Morgan to reevaluate the life she chose when early motherhood forced her hand. Feeling betrayed by the adults in her life, Clara marches forward, acting both responsible and rebellious as she navigates her teenage years without her father and her aunt, while Jonah and Morgan's relationship evolves in the wake of the accident. Front-loaded with drama, the story leaves plenty of room for the mother and daughter to unpack their feelings and decide what’s next.
The emotions run high, the conversations run deep, and the relationships ebb and flow with grace.Pub Date: Dec. 10, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-5420-1642-1
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Montlake Romance
Review Posted Online: Oct. 13, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 1, 2019
BOOK TO SCREEN
BOOK TO SCREEN
A tasty, if not always tasteful, tale of supernatural mayhem that fans of King and Crichton alike will enjoy.
Are we not men? We are—well, ask Bigfoot, as Brooks does in this delightful yarn, following on his bestseller World War Z(2006).
A zombie apocalypse is one thing. A volcanic eruption is quite another, for, as the journalist who does a framing voice-over narration for Brooks’ latest puts it, when Mount Rainier popped its cork, “it was the psychological aspect, the hyperbole-fueled hysteria that had ended up killing the most people.” Maybe, but the sasquatches whom the volcano displaced contributed to the statistics, too, if only out of self-defense. Brooks places the epicenter of the Bigfoot war in a high-tech hideaway populated by the kind of people you might find in a Jurassic Park franchise: the schmo who doesn’t know how to do much of anything but tries anyway, the well-intentioned bleeding heart, the know-it-all intellectual who turns out to know the wrong things, the immigrant with a tough backstory and an instinct for survival. Indeed, the novel does double duty as a survival manual, packed full of good advice—for instance, try not to get wounded, for “injury turns you from a giver to a taker. Taking up our resources, our time to care for you.” Brooks presents a case for making room for Bigfoot in the world while peppering his narrative with timely social criticism about bad behavior on the human side of the conflict: The explosion of Rainier might have been better forecast had the president not slashed the budget of the U.S. Geological Survey, leading to “immediate suspension of the National Volcano Early Warning System,” and there’s always someone around looking to monetize the natural disaster and the sasquatch-y onslaught that follows. Brooks is a pro at building suspense even if it plays out in some rather spectacularly yucky episodes, one involving a short spear that takes its name from “the sucking sound of pulling it out of the dead man’s heart and lungs.” Grossness aside, it puts you right there on the scene.
A tasty, if not always tasteful, tale of supernatural mayhem that fans of King and Crichton alike will enjoy.Pub Date: June 16, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-9848-2678-7
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Del Rey/Ballantine
Review Posted Online: Feb. 9, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2020
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK TO SCREEN
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