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NEWFANGLED

Name: NEWFANGLED
Author: Debra Monroe
ISBN: 0-684-81905-8

by Debra Monroe ‧ RELEASE DATE: Feb. 1, 1998

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An incisive, if at times overly complex, view of the disintegration of a modern family—in a first novel from the author of two story collections (A Wild, Cold State, 1995, etc.). Maidie, twice divorced and in her mid-30s, is the newly hired curator of the Museum of Domestic History and Home Economy (soon to be renamed the Women's History Museum) in Tucson. Having walked out on her abusive last husband, Maidie views the new job as a fresh start. Ironically enough, she is a sociologist specializing in family dynamics, despite the fact that she hasn't come close to creating an ordinary family of her own. Her mother, raised motherless herself, abandoned Maidie and her two sisters as children, leaving the young girls in the care of their father and the kindly old couple next door to their home in Minnesota. Memories of the past, of her failed romances, and of the extended families that converge on those recollections intrude on Maidie's current life, coloring the fresh start she hoped to make. In her first days in Tucson, meanwhile, she meets the sexy, if much older, Rex, who rents antiques from the museum for film props, and she also inadvertently becomes part of the large extended family that takes up much of the neighborhood she lives in. As Maidie slips into this new tribe, spending a lot of her time with the clan's eccentric matriarch, she begins to feel restless, then finds herself yearning for yet another new start—somewhere else. When a phone call from her mother, whom she hasn't spoken with in over 20 years, beckons her to California, Maidie is finally compelled to face her complex and conflicted feelings about families and independence. Overburdened with flashbacks, which slow the pace, but a debut that nonetheless raises pertinent questions about the fate of modern-day families, and offers some answers in an agreeably sardonic tone. (Author tour)

Pub Date: Feb. 1, 1998

ISBN: 0-684-81905-8

Page Count: 320

Publisher: Simon & Schuster

Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 15, 1997

Categories:

GENERAL FICTION

- BOOK REVIEW
IT TAKES A WORRIED WOMAN
by Debra Monroe

- BOOK REVIEW
MY UNSENTIMENTAL EDUCATION
by Debra Monroe

- BOOK REVIEW
ON THE OUTSKIRTS OF NORMAL
by Debra Monroe

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BETWEEN SISTERS

by Kristin Hannah ‧ RELEASE DATE: May 1, 2003

Briskly written soap with down-to-earth types, mostly without the lachrymose contrivances of Hannah’s previous titles...

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Sisters in and out of love.

Meghann Dontess is a high-powered matrimonial lawyer in Seattle who prefers sex with strangers to emotional intimacy: a strategy bound to backfire sooner or later, warns her tough-talking shrink. It’s advice Meghann decides to ignore, along with the memories of her difficult childhood, neglectful mother, and younger sister. Though she managed to reunite Claire with Sam Cavenaugh (her father but not Meghann’s) when her mother abandoned both girls long ago, Meghann still feels guilty that her sister’s life doesn’t measure up, at least on her terms. Never married, Claire ekes out a living running a country campground with her dad and is raising her six-year-old daughter on her own. When she falls in love for the first time with an up-and-coming country musician, Meghann is appalled: Bobby Austin is a three-time loser at marriage—how on earth can Claire be so blind? Bobby’s blunt explanation doesn’t exactly satisfy the concerned big sister, who busies herself planning Claire’s dream wedding anyway. And, to relieve the stress, she beds various guys she picks up in bars, including Dr. Joe Wyatt, a neurosurgeon turned homeless drifter after the demise of his beloved wife Diane (whom he euthanized). When Claire’s awful headache turns out to be a kind of brain tumor known among neurologists as a “terminator,” Joe rallies. Turns out that Claire had befriended his wife on her deathbed, and now in turn he must try to save her. Is it too late? Will Meghann find true love at last?

Briskly written soap with down-to-earth types, mostly without the lachrymose contrivances of Hannah’s previous titles (Distant Shores, 2002, etc.). Kudos for skipping the snifflefest this time around.

Pub Date: May 1, 2003

ISBN: 0-345-45073-6

Page Count: 400

Publisher: Ballantine

Review Posted Online: June 24, 2010

Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2003

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

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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.