THE CONTORTIONIST’S HANDBOOK

Name: THE CONTORTIONIST’S HANDBOOK
Author: Craig Clevenger
ISBN: 1-931561-15-X

by Craig Clevenger ‧ RELEASE DATE: Sept. 26, 2002

Immaculately detailed and emotionally explosive: this is roiling, riveting stuff, of a piece with stylish, edgy movies like...

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A brisk, savvy debut gives new meaning to the term “identity crisis,” as Clevenger builds a neo-noir cliffhanger from the story of an unusually gifted man whose migraines drive him to drug overdoses—but who then has to reinvent himself to stay one step ahead of his past.

For John Dolan Vincent, the predicament is familiar: Following yet another resuscitation by the EMT and ER personnel, he’s awaiting psychiatric evaluation in a Hollywood hospital to determine whether he’s suicidal. He knows the drill, but he also has another advantage—as far as his minders know, he’s Daniel John Fletcher. When his Evaluator arrives and the questions begin, Johnny knows he has to be credible in order to be released, and once released that he immediately has to manufacture a new identity. As a child, a troubled family and antisocial tendencies, exacerbated by his having a sixth finger on his left hand, hid his phenomenal intelligence and his gifts for math and mimicry. Doing homework for hire and forging his parents’ signatures naturally led to more trouble, until an arrest for forging a prescription gave him a juvenile record and jail time. Now in his 20s, any digging into one of his forged personas—which would be inevitable should he fail one of the suicide evaluations—would unmask him and bring more jail time. More than that, some of his work as a master forger has been for the mob, and what he knows is extremely dangerous to them. Having escaped them in the past, they’ve now found him as Daniel Fletcher—and have come to the hospital to wait for his release. Even worse, Johnny is in love, and Keara’s life hangs in the balance too.

Immaculately detailed and emotionally explosive: this is roiling, riveting stuff, of a piece with stylish, edgy movies like Memento and Requiem For a Dream.

Pub Date: Sept. 26, 2002

ISBN: 1-931561-15-X

Page Count: 201

Publisher: MacAdam/Cage

Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010

Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2002

Categories:

GENERAL FICTION

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BETWEEN SISTERS

by Kristin Hannah ‧ RELEASE DATE: May 1, 2003

Briskly written soap with down-to-earth types, mostly without the lachrymose contrivances of Hannah’s previous titles...

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Sisters in and out of love.

Meghann Dontess is a high-powered matrimonial lawyer in Seattle who prefers sex with strangers to emotional intimacy: a strategy bound to backfire sooner or later, warns her tough-talking shrink. It’s advice Meghann decides to ignore, along with the memories of her difficult childhood, neglectful mother, and younger sister. Though she managed to reunite Claire with Sam Cavenaugh (her father but not Meghann’s) when her mother abandoned both girls long ago, Meghann still feels guilty that her sister’s life doesn’t measure up, at least on her terms. Never married, Claire ekes out a living running a country campground with her dad and is raising her six-year-old daughter on her own. When she falls in love for the first time with an up-and-coming country musician, Meghann is appalled: Bobby Austin is a three-time loser at marriage—how on earth can Claire be so blind? Bobby’s blunt explanation doesn’t exactly satisfy the concerned big sister, who busies herself planning Claire’s dream wedding anyway. And, to relieve the stress, she beds various guys she picks up in bars, including Dr. Joe Wyatt, a neurosurgeon turned homeless drifter after the demise of his beloved wife Diane (whom he euthanized). When Claire’s awful headache turns out to be a kind of brain tumor known among neurologists as a “terminator,” Joe rallies. Turns out that Claire had befriended his wife on her deathbed, and now in turn he must try to save her. Is it too late? Will Meghann find true love at last?

Briskly written soap with down-to-earth types, mostly without the lachrymose contrivances of Hannah’s previous titles (Distant Shores, 2002, etc.). Kudos for skipping the snifflefest this time around.

Pub Date: May 1, 2003

ISBN: 0-345-45073-6

Page Count: 400

Publisher: Ballantine

Review Posted Online: June 24, 2010

Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2003

Categories:

GENERAL FICTION

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TO KILL A MOCKINGBIRD

by Harper Lee ‧ RELEASE DATE: July 11, 1960

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A first novel, this is also a first person account of Scout's (Jean Louise) recall of the years that led to the ending of a mystery, the breaking of her brother Jem's elbow, the death of her father's enemy — and the close of childhood years. A widower, Atticus raises his children with legal dispassion and paternal intelligence, and is ably abetted by Calpurnia, the colored cook, while the Alabama town of Maycomb, in the 1930's, remains aloof to their divergence from its tribal patterns. Scout and Jem, with their summer-time companion, Dill, find their paths free from interference — but not from dangers; their curiosity about the imprisoned Boo, whose miserable past is incorporated in their play, results in a tentative friendliness; their fears of Atticus' lack of distinction is dissipated when he shoots a mad dog; his defense of a Negro accused of raping a white girl, Mayella Ewell, is followed with avid interest and turns the rabble whites against him. Scout is the means of averting an attack on Atticus but when he loses the case it is Boo who saves Jem and Scout by killing Mayella's father when he attempts to murder them. The shadows of a beginning for black-white understanding, the persistent fight that Scout carries on against school, Jem's emergence into adulthood, Calpurnia's quiet power, and all the incidents touching on the children's "growing outward" have an attractive starchiness that keeps this southern picture pert and provocative. There is much advance interest in this book; it has been selected by the Literary Guild and Reader's Digest; it should win many friends.