A highly personal view of Dickinson’s words and spirit that will find an appreciative audience among the poet’s kindred...
A series of linked passions runs through the famed poet’s life in this fictionalized biography.
Initially, this book seems to be far stranger than it really is: The title suggests a persona and possibly even a locale far outside how readers usually perceive the Belle of Amherst, and the opening chapters include supernatural meetings between the narrator and members of the Dickinson family. But before too long, the book settles down into a readable, though not revolutionary, portrait of the artist’s life and loves. As such, it may appeal particularly to fans of her poetry (some of which is about volcanoes) but perhaps not to readers looking for a weighty biography interwoven with heavily academic analysis of her work. Dickinson was a writer’s writer. She worked, famously, in isolation and uncompromisingly safeguarded the integrity of her words; she reportedly turned down offers of publication, justifiably fearing that her unorthodox form and punctuation would be altered. For her part, Lala-Crist (Nostos, 2001) literally inserts herself as narrator into the action of her novel. It’s clear with every line that she profoundly reveres Dickinson and feels a connection with her that transcends space and time—an intriguing idea, but there’s too little of Lala-Crist’s own personal history to make this a meaningful exploration. In the end, the most significant contribution here is the splicing together of Dickinson’s poetry and her biography, an approach missing, for instance, in Jerome Charyn’s The Secret Life of Emily Dickinson (2011). Readers, especially those already entrenched in Dickinson studies, may not embrace every parallel Lala-Crist makes, but many connections are essential to an understanding of the poet and the person. Lala-Crist also deftly deals with Dickinson’s retreat from society in midlife; she stayed mostly in her own room and saw almost no one but her immediate family. Thanks to Lala-Crist’s empathetic portrayal, the presentation of this odd decision as gradual and organic—as opposed to a fit of passion precipitated by a dramatic event—rings true.
A highly personal view of Dickinson’s words and spirit that will find an appreciative audience among the poet’s kindred spirits.Pub Date: Sept. 23, 2013
ISBN: 978-1470147099
Page Count: 462
Publisher: CreateSpace
Review Posted Online: Nov. 29, 2013
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2014
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
The phrase “tour de force” could have been invented for this audacious novel.
Four men who meet as college roommates move to New York and spend the next three decades gaining renown in their professions—as an architect, painter, actor and lawyer—and struggling with demons in their intertwined personal lives.
Yanagihara (The People in the Trees, 2013) takes the still-bold leap of writing about characters who don’t share her background; in addition to being male, JB is African-American, Malcolm has a black father and white mother, Willem is white, and “Jude’s race was undetermined”—deserted at birth, he was raised in a monastery and had an unspeakably traumatic childhood that’s revealed slowly over the course of the book. Two of them are gay, one straight and one bisexual. There isn’t a single significant female character, and for a long novel, there isn’t much plot. There aren’t even many markers of what’s happening in the outside world; Jude moves to a loft in SoHo as a young man, but we don’t see the neighborhood change from gritty artists’ enclave to glitzy tourist destination. What we get instead is an intensely interior look at the friends’ psyches and relationships, and it’s utterly enthralling. The four men think about work and creativity and success and failure; they cook for each other, compete with each other and jostle for each other’s affection. JB bases his entire artistic career on painting portraits of his friends, while Malcolm takes care of them by designing their apartments and houses. When Jude, as an adult, is adopted by his favorite Harvard law professor, his friends join him for Thanksgiving in Cambridge every year. And when Willem becomes a movie star, they all bask in his glow. Eventually, the tone darkens and the story narrows to focus on Jude as the pain of his past cuts deep into his carefully constructed life.
The phrase “tour de force” could have been invented for this audacious novel.Pub Date: March 10, 2015
ISBN: 978-0-385-53925-8
Page Count: 720
Publisher: Doubleday
Review Posted Online: Dec. 21, 2014
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2015
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
PROFILES
PERSPECTIVES
Genetically engineered dinosaurs run amok in Crichton's new, vastly entertaining science thriller. From the introduction alone—a classically Crichton-clear discussion of the implications of biotechnological research—it's evident that the Harvard M.D. has bounced back from the science-fantasy silliness of Sphere (1987) for another taut reworking of the Frankenstein theme, as in The Andromeda Strain and The Terminal Man. Here, Dr. Frankenstein is aging billionaire John Hammond, whose monster is a manmade ecosystem based on a Costa Rican island. Designed as the world's ultimate theme park, the ecosystem boasts climate and flora of the Jurassic Age and—most spectacularly—15 varieties of dinosaurs, created by elaborate genetic engineering that Crichton explains in fascinating detail, rich with dino-lore and complete with graphics. Into the park, for a safety check before its opening, comes the novel's band of characters—who, though well drawn, double as symbolic types in this unsubtle morality play. Among them are hero Alan Grant, noble paleontologist; Hammond, venal and obsessed; amoral dino-designer Henry Wu; Hammond's two innocent grandchildren; and mathematician Ian Malcolm, who in long diatribes serves as Crichton's mouthpiece to lament the folly of science. Upon arrival, the visitors tour the park; meanwhile, an industrial spy steals some dino embryos by shutting down the island's power—and its security grid, allowing the beasts to run loose. The bulk of the remaining narrative consists of dinos—ferocious T. Rex's, voracious velociraptors, venom-spitting dilophosaurs—stalking, ripping, and eating the cast in fast, furious, and suspenseful set-pieces as the ecosystem spins apart. And can Grant prevent the dinos from escaping to the mainland to create unchecked havoc? Though intrusive, the moralizing rarely slows this tornado-paced tale, a slick package of info-thrills that's Crichton's most clever since Congo (1980)—and easily the most exciting dinosaur novel ever written. A sure-fire best-seller.
Pub Date: Nov. 7, 1990
ISBN: 0394588169
Page Count: 424
Publisher: Knopf
Review Posted Online: Sept. 21, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 1990
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