An insightful, sometimes witty look at the life of a seasoned Navy pilot.
Zimberoff’s debut drama is the story of a veteran combat fighter pilot’s life in the U.S. Navy, both on and off an aircraft carrier.
Cmdr. Eric “Spyder” Greene meets young aviators Lt. Steve “Rolls” Royce and Lt. Junior Grade Grace “Drone” Miller at a naval officers’ club. Spyder, a Top Gun graduate, tells the others about his career, beginning with his arrival at the Miramar Naval Air Station in San Diego. The occasionally insolent senior officer seems to prefer a time when women weren’t on carriers, much to Drone’s chagrin; his tales include downtime with strippers or prostitutes. But Spyder also tells of the camaraderie among fellow pilots before ultimately returning to the story that apparently started the conversation: the tragic loss of several of his squadron mates. The author, a Top Gun graduate like his protagonist, relays his expertise through intelligent, perceptive narration. Typically, readers can use context to understand the unfamiliar jargon—an “OK 3-wire,” for instance, is a good landing on the carrier. Zimberoff, however, doesn’t immediately spell out most acronyms, of which there are many; an accompanying glossary is definitely helpful, but readers will either have to peruse it prior to the main text or repeatedly flip to the end while reading. Obnoxious Spyder is a fascinating character; his unfiltered statements, especially regarding women, cause Drone to at one point leave and miss a sizable part of his story. But good humor keeps him from becoming wholly unlikable: He acknowledges the debauchery of Wog Day, an initiation for sailors (it entails a large amount of rancid liquids), and he amusingly refers to some women as “femists” before Drone corrects him. Spyder devotes a lot of time to the pilots’ recreations—including a stop in Australia, where he spent a few days and nights with a girl he met in a bar—but he also delves into intense flight experiences: e.g., a dogfight with Soviet jets near Vietnam and a downed jet in the carrier’s landing area that prevented airborne planes from landing despite their being disturbingly low on fuel. Overall, Spyder’s distinctive accounts resemble a short story collection more than a standard novel, but that makes it no less entertaining.
An insightful, sometimes witty look at the life of a seasoned Navy pilot.Pub Date: July 25, 2014
ISBN: 978-1492881810
Page Count: 248
Publisher: CreateSpace
Review Posted Online: Aug. 26, 2014
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 1, 2014
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
The phrase “tour de force” could have been invented for this audacious novel.
Four men who meet as college roommates move to New York and spend the next three decades gaining renown in their professions—as an architect, painter, actor and lawyer—and struggling with demons in their intertwined personal lives.
Yanagihara (The People in the Trees, 2013) takes the still-bold leap of writing about characters who don’t share her background; in addition to being male, JB is African-American, Malcolm has a black father and white mother, Willem is white, and “Jude’s race was undetermined”—deserted at birth, he was raised in a monastery and had an unspeakably traumatic childhood that’s revealed slowly over the course of the book. Two of them are gay, one straight and one bisexual. There isn’t a single significant female character, and for a long novel, there isn’t much plot. There aren’t even many markers of what’s happening in the outside world; Jude moves to a loft in SoHo as a young man, but we don’t see the neighborhood change from gritty artists’ enclave to glitzy tourist destination. What we get instead is an intensely interior look at the friends’ psyches and relationships, and it’s utterly enthralling. The four men think about work and creativity and success and failure; they cook for each other, compete with each other and jostle for each other’s affection. JB bases his entire artistic career on painting portraits of his friends, while Malcolm takes care of them by designing their apartments and houses. When Jude, as an adult, is adopted by his favorite Harvard law professor, his friends join him for Thanksgiving in Cambridge every year. And when Willem becomes a movie star, they all bask in his glow. Eventually, the tone darkens and the story narrows to focus on Jude as the pain of his past cuts deep into his carefully constructed life.
The phrase “tour de force” could have been invented for this audacious novel.Pub Date: March 10, 2015
ISBN: 978-0-385-53925-8
Page Count: 720
Publisher: Doubleday
Review Posted Online: Dec. 21, 2014
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2015
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
PROFILES
PERSPECTIVES
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
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