The return of the tin man, retired USAF Brigadier General Patrick McLanahan, Brown’s chief hero among those who have saved the world from China’s invasion of the Philippines in Sky Masters, of Taiwan in both Fatal Terrain and The Tin Man (1998), and in various novels saved Europe from a war between Lithuania and Byelorussia, Europe from invasion by Russia, and been on hand for Gulf War II. Bestseller Brown’s technothrillers never involve small stakes. The man himself is civilian director of a high-tech company making cutting-edge advances in strategic devices for the armed services. Battle Born kicks off the Second Korean War when a joint US/South Korean—Japanese aerial war game goes awry as South Korean pilots break away and give a supportive attack on Communist forces facing a massive popular uprising. Not long after, the South Koreans come into possession of two North Korean thermonuclear gravity bombs. Will Asia ignite WWIII? Will Dale Brown? As it happens, technospecialist McLanahan has been training a hot-shot group of young pilots who simmer to save the world should North Korea boldly attack South Korea, which in itself means that, yes, China will come the aid of a fellow Communist nation and Brown & McLanahan be right at home fending off the Chinese Air Force. Meanwhile, how will he romance Lt. Col. Rebecca Catherine Furness, and how will the new EB-1 Megafortress with its amazing LADAR (laser radar) navigation device come into play? Chockablock technotalk lifts skyward on plottoblast as Brown flips on all the electrosensors seeking the next Danger! Danger! Danger! signal. (Note: Brown names as US Vice President one Ellen Christine Whiting just as New Jersey Governor Christine Whitman gets touted for the VP slot with George W. Bush. Now that’s futurific.)
Pub Date: Nov. 9, 1999
ISBN: 0-553-11123-X
Page Count: 384
Publisher: Bantam
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 1, 2000
Briskly written soap with down-to-earth types, mostly without the lachrymose contrivances of Hannah’s previous titles...
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
Coelho's placebo has racked up impressive sales in Brazil and Europe. Americans should flock to it like gulls.
Coelho is a Brazilian writer with four books to his credit. Following Diary of a Magus (1992—not reviewed) came this book, published in Brazil in 1988: it's an interdenominational, transcendental, inspirational fable—in other words, a bag of wind.
The story is about a youth empowered to follow his dream. Santiago is an Andalusian shepherd boy who learns through a dream of a treasure in the Egyptian pyramids. An old man, the king of Salem, the first of various spiritual guides, tells the boy that he has discovered his destiny: "to realize one's destiny is a person's only real obligation." So Santiago sells his sheep, sails to Tangier, is tricked out of his money, regains it through hard work, crosses the desert with a caravan, stops at an oasis long enough to fall in love, escapes from warring tribesmen by performing a miracle, reaches the pyramids, and eventually gets both the gold and the girl. Along the way he meets an Englishman who describes the Soul of the World; the desert woman Fatima, who teaches him the Language of the World; and an alchemist who says, "Listen to your heart" A message clings like ivy to every encounter; everyone, but everyone, has to put in their two cents' worth, from the crystal merchant to the camel driver ("concentrate always on the present, you'll be a happy man"). The absence of characterization and overall blandness suggest authorship by a committee of self-improvement pundits—a far cry from Saint- Exupery's The Little Prince: that flagship of the genre was a genuine charmer because it clearly derived from a quirky, individual sensibility.
Coelho's placebo has racked up impressive sales in Brazil and Europe. Americans should flock to it like gulls.Pub Date: July 1, 1993
ISBN: 0-06-250217-4
Page Count: 192
Publisher: N/A
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 1993
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
BOOK TO SCREEN
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