Debut fiction about a hayseed true-crime writer who's in upstate New York to cover a sensational murder trial. He uncovers more than he bargained for in his attempt to fit together the pieces of the victim's life—and ends up falling for the defendant. Before Amerasian Lenore Serian, ``the Black Widow,'' went on trial for killing her volcanic artist husband Bram and torching Arcadia, his sprawling studio, Owen Byrne was writing unpublished short stories in moments stolen from working his family's struggling Kansas ranch. But his agent naturally agrees to send him to Stoatsberg, New York, to gather material for a book on the trial. Owen's wide-eyed innocence gives first-novelist North the opportunity for a primer on all the legal procedures, and if you've never attended a trial or read a book about one, you'll have something to do while you're waiting for Owen—who feels a mysterious kinship to unlovely Bram—to nose out the evidence that draws him into the defense circle's confidence and wins him an exclusive interview with Lenore. Next, building on his information from her and a growing network of contacts, he'll uncover further, darker secrets about Bram's childhood in Kansas (yep, Kansas) with his monstrously abusive father and his adoptive brother Al, who kept returning to Bram's life but mysteriously disappeared after his death; his rescue (or was it an abduction?) of Lenore from Thailand during his tour of Vietnam; and his triumphant years in New York as an unexpectedly gifted sculptor and painter. Meanwhile, Owen will develop problems of his own: Haunted Lenore, who seems to be trying to exorcise Bram from Arcadia, is blowing hot and cold on their torrid romance; and newshound Holly Danielson, stung by his rejection of her own overtures, has smeared the affair all over the tabloids. Painstaking but uniquely uninvolving courtroom scenes, a wildly improbable hero and heroine, and a climactic series of revelations that will surprise only pre-law sophomores.
Pub Date: Sept. 8, 1993
ISBN: 0-525-93634-3
Page Count: 544
Publisher: Dutton
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 1993
The best-selling author of tearjerkers like Angel Falls (2000) serves up yet another mountain of mush, topped off with...
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
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.
Pub Date: July 11, 1960
ISBN: 0060935464
Page Count: 323
Publisher: Lippincott
Review Posted Online: Oct. 7, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 1960
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
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