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AFTER LUCY

Name: AFTER LUCY
Author: Daniel Jones
ISBN: 0-688-17456-6

by Daniel Jones ‧ RELEASE DATE: April 1, 2000

comes between.

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A compassionate, quietly compelling debut from prizewinning short-story writer Jones, about a young husband attempting

to come to terms with his grief after his wife's death, while helping their two children do the same. Trying to pick up the pieces in Pittsburgh following Lucy's death from breast cancer, Porter can't face returning to his graphic-design job, for which he’d abandoned a promising start as a painter when the first of his kids was born. On impulse, he trades in Lucy's Mazda for a gaily painted camper truck and plans a cross-country trip with Kaylie and Ben, as much to escape his domineering in-laws as to have an adventure. On the road one step ahead of his mother-in-law, who disapproves of the trip and the vehicle, Porter and the kids stop their first night at an Indiana campground, the flyer for which they found in the truck. But morning brings revelations: their campground is a gathering place for Deadheads, and the camper’s previous owner had left his girlfriend there, then ran off with someone else. Taking in the tepees and tie-dyes, Porter and family are initially dismayed, but with the help of Delilah, the jilted, pregnant girlfriend, they soon find their way around and begin to relax—which is good, because their truck's transmission is shot. When Porter relaxes a bit too much, however, with the help of some killer weed supplied by the Deadhead mechanic, he fails to get back to the camper, and Kaylie calls Grandma on the cell phone in a panic. His in-laws flying to the rescue, Porter realizes the adventure is over, yet as he and Delilah nurse the truck back to Pittsburgh, the children having been airlifted to safety, the tentative outline of a new beginning for everyone emerges. Equally funny and full of grief's nuances, with just a few abrupt transitions: a moving story of love and loss and all that

comes between.

Pub Date: April 1, 2000

ISBN: 0-688-17456-6

Page Count: 304

Publisher: Morrow/HarperCollins

Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010

Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2000

Categories:

GENERAL FICTION

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SUMMER ISLAND

by Kristin Hannah ‧ RELEASE DATE: March 1, 2001

The best-selling author of tearjerkers like Angel Falls (2000) serves up yet another mountain of mush, topped off with...

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Talk-show queen takes tumble as millions jeer.

Nora Bridges is a wildly popular radio spokesperson for family-first virtues, but her loyal listeners don't know that she walked out on her husband and teenaged daughters years ago and didn't look back. Now that a former lover has sold racy pix of naked Nora and horny himself to a national tabloid, her estranged daughter Ruby, an unsuccessful stand-up comic in Los Angeles, has been approached to pen a tell-all. Greedy for the fat fee she's been promised, Ruby agrees and heads for the San Juan Islands, eager to get reacquainted with the mom she plans to betray. Once in the family homestead, nasty Ruby alternately sulks and glares at her mother, who is temporarily wheelchair-bound as a result of a post-scandal car crash. Uncaring, Ruby begins writing her side of the story when she's not strolling on the beach with former sweetheart Dean Sloan, the son of wealthy socialites who basically ignored him and his gay brother Eric. Eric, now dying of cancer and also in a wheelchair, has returned to the island. This dismal threesome catch up on old times, recalling their childhood idylls on the island. After Ruby's perfect big sister Caroline shows up, there's another round of heartfelt talk. Nora gradually reveals the truth about her unloving husband and her late father's alcoholism, which led her to seek the approval of others at the cost of her own peace of mind. And so on. Ruby is aghast to discover that she doesn't know everything after all, but Dean offers her subdued comfort. Happy endings await almost everyone—except for readers of this nobly preachy snifflefest.

The best-selling author of tearjerkers like Angel Falls (2000) serves up yet another mountain of mush, topped off with syrupy platitudes about life and love.

Pub Date: March 1, 2001

ISBN: 0-609-60737-5

Page Count: 336

Publisher: Crown

Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2001

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.