A satisfying tale about a German defendant and an American journalist; an impressive first novel.
A court proceeding in 1952 in South America deals with the long shadow of World War II.
In his debut historical novel, Bergengren gives readers two heroes, Michael Cohen and Johann Richter, and it takes over 400 pages before they can start to trust each other. The tale begins with Richter on trial (actually an extradition hearing) in La Negra, a fictional city high in the Andes. The hearing concerns the actions of the former German army officer during World War II, and even now, the British, the French, and the Israelis all want him. But what is he guilty of, if anything? Cohen, an American journalist, attends the hearing. He was caught in Germany before the war and lost his entire family in Dachau. Later, he would lose his great love, Rachel Stern, in the Israeli War of Independence. Richter saves his love, Elena Stein. (After Germany surrenders, they flee to South America and start a family.) Richter loathed Hitler and the Reich and was bent on assassinating him (after the infamous 1944 attempt failed) and curtailing the war. Years later, agents in MI6 are passing secrets to the Russians (remember Kim Philby and friends?), best represented here by the vile Anders Hardy, Richter’s long-time enemy. Things finally come to a boil in La Negra with MI6, the CIA, and Hardy’s rogues. The appropriate mayhem, set off by a kidnapping, ensues. All this may seem like a hopeless mishmash—many other characters appear in these pages—but Bergengren deftly pulls it off. The densely packed story, mixing the fictional with the historical, features effective pacing—the author takes his time—and solid prose. The flashbacks of Richter in the ’30s and ’40s (supposedly written later by the fictional Cohen), which neatly mesh with the main narrative, are often more gripping than the confrontations in 1952. And ironies abound. Richter is in fact a good German—his father was part of the 1944 plot—and he rescued a Jewish woman from a concentration camp. Cohen feels a “sense of connection” to the ex-officer (“As improbable as it seemed, his own life in some ways mirrored Richter’s”). The denouement ties things up nicely.
A satisfying tale about a German defendant and an American journalist; an impressive first novel.Pub Date: Sept. 28, 2016
ISBN: 978-0-692-60190-7
Page Count: 430
Publisher: Stillwater River Publications
Review Posted Online: March 2, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2018
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
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
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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