NECTAR

Name: NECTAR
Author: David C. Fickett
ISBN: 0-765-30174-1

by David C. Fickett ‧ RELEASE DATE: May 1, 2001

A gothic plot with literary ambitions—but also with a protagonist whose chillingly monstrous behavior makes sympathy out of...

bookshelf

A sluggishly paced debut, Maine-set, tells what price a woman is prepared to pay to keep the family farm—a price that includes lies, betrayal, and even murder.

Chapters are prefaced with quotes from beekeeping lore to underline the role of central character Regina Merritt Gilley, a woman of strong appetites and will whose Maine is not a picturesque tourist destination but a place of dark forests, long winters, and pervasive poverty where farmers struggle to wrest livings from poor soil. The story opens in 1956, as Caleb Gilley (one of the narrators) helps Regina bury Duffy, the old man who has lived with Ginny all Caleb’s life and whom Caleb thinks may be his real father. Ginny recalls her own childhood on the farm, back when her father sexually abuses two older sisters until one fights back and hits him with a shovel. Ginny also recalls her great pride at being entrusted with her father’s hives, and how over the years she was to grow into an outstanding beekeeper. At school, she falls in love with classmate Duffy, but, determined to find a man wealthy enough to improve the farm, marries Harry Gilley, an affluent visitor. She gives birth to two daughters and tricks her ailing father into believing the elder girl is a boy so that he’ll leave the farm to “him” in his will. Over the years, Harry becomes an alcoholic, Ginny barters sex for money, lies to her children, and murders a man whose presence is inconvenient—all to make sure that the farm remains hers. Still, Duffy is the only man she’s loved, and, mourning him, she finally tells Caleb the surprising truth about his parentage.

A gothic plot with literary ambitions—but also with a protagonist whose chillingly monstrous behavior makes sympathy out of the question.

Pub Date: May 1, 2001

ISBN: 0-765-30174-1

Page Count: 320

Publisher: Forge

Review Posted Online: June 24, 2010

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 15, 2002

Categories:

GENERAL FICTION

bookshelf

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...

bookshelf

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

- BOOK REVIEW
THE WOMEN
by Kristin Hannah

- BOOK REVIEW
THE FOUR WINDS
by Kristin Hannah

- BOOK REVIEW
THE GREAT ALONE
by Kristin Hannah

bookshelf

TO KILL A MOCKINGBIRD

by Harper Lee ‧ RELEASE DATE: July 11, 1960

bookshelf

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.