Appealing characters and storyline, but the real star here is the milieu. Clendenen knows her stuff.
An assiduous, panoramic journey through the art community of New York City in the late '70s.
Part romance, part suspense, Clendenen's debut dives inside the eccentric art world in 1977 New York. Her degree in art history, her work at Sotheby's and Christie's and experience as a journalist covering the art world all color her story of struggling painter Beauregard Ryder. Bo is your boilerplate prototype of the talented, down-on-his-luck painter who just loves to paint. And Bo is flat-broke, an inconvenience that will lead to his ultimate undoing. Desperation pushes him over the edge when he's served an eviction notice and now he's thinking the unthinkable–art forgery–and, paint chips falling where they may, he's soon hip-deep in the sketchy world of fraud. His growing attraction to art critic Megan Trico isn't helping his coverup either. Though she's not savvy to Bo's shady dealings, there certainly are clues that he's involved in some sort of dubious activities. As Megan investigates a stolen-painting case, art-house expert Alistair Cavendish enters the picture, leading to a rather thorny love triangle. All of this plays out against the exciting panorama of galleries and auctions, with much welcome detail on the intricacies of each, along with fascinating information on actual forgeries of the past. The author excels at seamlessly integrating facets of the art world into her narrative, and her characters are interesting, if a bit stereotypical. Though the dialogue is often stilted, and occasionally lifeless, the author's story is an intriguing tale of the art world that moves far beyond the gallery's sparkling lobby.
Appealing characters and storyline, but the real star here is the milieu. Clendenen knows her stuff.Pub Date: March 29, 2004
ISBN: 1-4134-4155-6
Page Count: -
Publisher: N/A
Review Posted Online: May 23, 2010
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
Wacky plot keeps the pages turning and enduring schmaltzy romantic sequences.
Sisters work together to solve a child-abandonment case.
Ellie and Julia Cates have never been close. Julia is shy and brainy; Ellie gets by on charm and looks. Their differences must be tossed aside when a traumatized young girl wanders in from the forest into their hometown in Washington. The sisters’ professional skills are put to the test. Julia is a world-renowned child psychologist who has lost her edge. She is reeling from a case that went publicly sour. Though she was cleared of all wrongdoing, Julia’s name was tarnished, forcing her to shutter her Beverly Hills practice. Ellie Barton is the local police chief in Rain Valley, who’s never faced a tougher case. This is her chance to prove she is more than just a fading homecoming queen, but a scarcity of clues and a reluctant victim make locating the girl’s parents nearly impossible. Ellie places an SOS call to her sister; she needs an expert to rehabilitate this wild-child who has been living outside of civilization for years. Confronted with her professional demons, Julia once again has the opportunity to display her talents and salvage her reputation. Hannah (The Things We Do for Love, 2004, etc.) is at her best when writing from the girl’s perspective. The feral wolf-child keeps the reader interested long after the other, transparent characters have grown tiresome. Hannah’s torturously over-written romance passages are stale, but there are surprises in store as the sisters set about unearthing Alice’s past and creating a home for her.
Wacky plot keeps the pages turning and enduring schmaltzy romantic sequences.Pub Date: March 1, 2006
ISBN: 0-345-46752-3
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Ballantine
Review Posted Online: June 24, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2005
A strict report, worthy of sympathy.
A violent surfacing of adolescence (which has little in common with Tarkington's earlier, broadly comic, Seventeen) has a compulsive impact.
"Nobody big except me" is the dream world of Holden Caulfield and his first person story is down to the basic, drab English of the pre-collegiate. For Holden is now being bounced from fancy prep, and, after a vicious evening with hall- and roommates, heads for New York to try to keep his latest failure from his parents. He tries to have a wild evening (all he does is pay the check), is terrorized by the hotel elevator man and his on-call whore, has a date with a girl he likes—and hates, sees his 10 year old sister, Phoebe. He also visits a sympathetic English teacher after trying on a drunken session, and when he keeps his date with Phoebe, who turns up with her suitcase to join him on his flight, he heads home to a hospital siege. This is tender and true, and impossible, in its picture of the old hells of young boys, the lonesomeness and tentative attempts to be mature and secure, the awful block between youth and being grown-up, the fright and sickness that humans and their behavior cause the challenging, the dramatization of the big bang. It is a sorry little worm's view of the off-beat of adult pressure, of contemporary strictures and conformity, of sentiment….
A strict report, worthy of sympathy.Pub Date: June 15, 1951
ISBN: 0316769177
Page Count: -
Publisher: Little, Brown
Review Posted Online: Nov. 2, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 1951
BOOK REVIEW
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