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GRETA SMART FIGURES IT OUT

Name: GRETA SMART FIGURES IT OUT
Author: Diane Dunning
ISBN: 978-0985038151

by Diane Dunning ‧ RELEASE DATE: Dec. 31, 2013

A lightweight tale with a supporting cast that’s more appealing than the heroine.

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A New Yorker searches for a new boyfriend in Dunning’s (The River Secrets, 2013) novel.

Twenty-seven-year-old Greta Smart manages projects at Waxler & Braun in Manhattan after having relocated from the Midwest. Although she has a circle of devoted friends, she’s painfully aware of her lack of a significant other, especially when she compares herself with her pal Briana, a bartender, who no sooner breaks up with one boyfriend than she has another. One day, after a lengthy liquid lunch, Greta returns to work inebriated and pressured to quickly prepare a presentation. Things don’t go well, putting her on the outs with the client and her boss, and she loses the upper hand to a smarmy co-worker. Soon afterward, Greta meets the successful but self-satisfied Californian Henry Mann, who’s in town briefly for a convention, and she finds herself both drawn to and repelled by him. Since he’s not local, a future with him seems unlikely, but from time to time, she still thinks about him. When Greta’s beloved grandmother falls ill, she drives home to Michigan to visit with her father and brother and make peace with her prickly mother. Despite the book’s catchy title and snappy cover art, the text is afflicted by excessive telling and little showing. The most enjoyable passages are when those in Greta’s orbit take center stage, and readers may find that her thorny mother and easygoing friend Briana are more intriguing characters. Greta wonders why she’s a singleton, but her frequent dismissive, prejudicial assessments of others (“nerd,” “weirdo,” “clod”) may be one explanation. Instead of sharing in a friend’s happiness, she is “galled” and questions why people around her are better off than she is. Readers may be meant to glean that she has an aha moment while visiting her ailing Gran, but this emotional truth never quite hits the page.

A lightweight tale with a supporting cast that’s more appealing than the heroine.

Pub Date: Dec. 31, 2013

ISBN: 978-0985038151

Page Count: 200

Publisher: CreateSpace

Review Posted Online: Feb. 4, 2014

Review Program: Kirkus Indie

Categories:

GENERAL FICTION

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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...

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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

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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.