A treat for those who heart dogs, an allergy attack for those who don’t.
Single lady of a certain age who knows just about everyone celebrates her life with small dogs.
Gossip columnist Adams follows up The Gift of Jazzy (2003), a bestselling memoir about her beloved, pint-sized canine companion, with this grief-laced sequel. Turns out the titular hero of Adams’s first book expired, and much of the present text features her protracted keening about Jazzy’s demise. Soon, however, he’s replaced by Juicy, who is in due time joined by Jazzy Junior. These two dogs become Adams’s babies; indeed, as is the wont of countless canine-obsessed humans, she frequently muddles the distinctions between them and human offspring. The dogs are, in her opinion, far superior to any other sort of companion, particularly the male sort. She takes them everywhere, from Gucci to church to a castle in France. They have play dates and parties with other four-legged objects of affection. They are free to pee on anything and anyone to whom they take a fancy, and they have quite a selection from which to choose: Adams’s Yorkies have met countless notable New Yorkers: Barbara Walters, Shirley MacLaine, Susan Sarandon, Henry Kissinger. Friends of Adams, Joan Rivers and Judge Judy among them, think she needs a man, but what guy could ever hope to compete with these twin bundles of furry joy? In the pooches’ thrall, our venerable author, a sort of distaff Joe Franklin, remains clever and witty. A sizeable audience of the like-minded will enjoy all the carrying on, though it may prove tediously excessive to those who don’t know a Yorkshire terrier from a Yorkshire pudding.
A treat for those who heart dogs, an allergy attack for those who don’t.Pub Date: March 7, 2006
ISBN: 0-312-32377-8
Page Count: 240
Publisher: St. Martin's
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2006
BOOK REVIEW
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
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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.
Pub Date: Feb. 23, 1955
ISBN: 0670717797
Page Count: -
Publisher: Viking
Review Posted Online: Oct. 25, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 1955
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