Some Polish critics are on record as taking these jejeune effusions seriously. They should be beaten soundly with a large...
Disaffected Polish youth rail against collapsed Communism and US materialism—in this blithely abrasive debut novel by a 19-year-old author.
Protagonist-narrator Andrzej “Nails” Robakoski hatches unrealizable business schemes, imagines a “Polish-Russki War” for which he’s the leading dissident spokesman, scores dope with his friends and sexual rivals, and mopes over the loss of his promiscuous, perpetually stoned pregnant girlfriend Magda. Along comes Angela, a posturing poetess who celebrates all that is “natural” (e.g., working for “animal emancipation and liberation”), while tripping with Nails, awkwardly surrendering her virginity, and vomiting a lot (oh, his dog dies, too). Next is Natasha, a strident ur-female who physically abuses Nails for hiding his “blow” from her, then Ala, a contemplative innocent who coyly deflects Nails’s amorous advances, while casually mentioning that she’s been reading this amazing memoir by a teenaged writer named Dorota Maslowska. After several fervent discussions with his penis (which he has named “George”), and a walk on the wild side with his oily friend Lefty, Nails gets into it with some surly motorcycle cops, continuing his downward progression into a fantasized dénouement into which Maslowska reinserts another simulacrum of herself, with yawn-inducing metafictional results. You think the inflamed teenagers in this raucous unintentional farce are alienated? They’re gray-flannel-suited conformists compared to readers who suffer 300 pages of this ego- and phallocentric rant. Yes, some of it is blackly funny—especially the pages in which Ala tries to elevate Nails from serial piggishness. But they’re merely shallow pockets of sanity in a smothering fabric of narrative and rhetorical overkill.
Some Polish critics are on record as taking these jejeune effusions seriously. They should be beaten soundly with a large kielbasa.Pub Date: March 1, 2005
ISBN: 0-8021-7001-3
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Black Cat/Grove
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 15, 2004
BOOK REVIEW
Rather than settle for a coming-of-age or travails-of-immigrants story, Hosseini has folded them both into this searing...
Here’s a real find: a striking debut from an Afghan now living in the US. His passionate story of betrayal and redemption is framed by Afghanistan’s tragic recent past.
Moving back and forth between Afghanistan and California, and spanning almost 40 years, the story begins in Afghanistan in the tranquil 1960s. Our protagonist Amir is a child in Kabul. The most important people in his life are Baba and Hassan. Father Baba is a wealthy Pashtun merchant, a larger-than-life figure, fretting over his bookish weakling of a son (the mother died giving birth); Hassan is his sweet-natured playmate, son of their servant Ali and a Hazara. Pashtuns have always dominated and ridiculed Hazaras, so Amir can’t help teasing Hassan, even though the Hazara staunchly defends him against neighborhood bullies like the “sociopath” Assef. The day, in 1975, when 12-year-old Amir wins the annual kite-fighting tournament is the best and worst of his young life. He bonds with Baba at last but deserts Hassan when the latter is raped by Assef. And it gets worse. With the still-loyal Hassan a constant reminder of his guilt, Amir makes life impossible for him and Ali, ultimately forcing them to leave town. Fast forward to the Russian occupation, flight to America, life in the Afghan exile community in the Bay Area. Amir becomes a writer and marries a beautiful Afghan; Baba dies of cancer. Then, in 2001, the past comes roaring back. Rahim, Baba’s old business partner who knows all about Amir’s transgressions, calls from Pakistan. Hassan has been executed by the Taliban; his son, Sohrab, must be rescued. Will Amir wipe the slate clean? So he returns to the hell of Taliban-ruled Afghanistan and reclaims Sohrab from a Taliban leader (none other than Assef) after a terrifying showdown. Amir brings the traumatized child back to California and a bittersweet ending.
Rather than settle for a coming-of-age or travails-of-immigrants story, Hosseini has folded them both into this searing spectacle of hard-won personal salvation. All this, and a rich slice of Afghan culture too: irresistible.Pub Date: June 2, 2003
ISBN: 1-57322-245-3
Page Count: 368
Publisher: Riverhead
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 2003
SEEN & HEARD
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Doerr captures the sights and sounds of wartime and focuses, refreshingly, on the innate goodness of his major characters.
Doerr presents us with two intricate stories, both of which take place during World War II; late in the novel, inevitably, they intersect.
In August 1944, Marie-Laure LeBlanc is a blind 16-year-old living in the walled port city of Saint-Malo in Brittany and hoping to escape the effects of Allied bombing. D-Day took place two months earlier, and Cherbourg, Caen and Rennes have already been liberated. She’s taken refuge in this city with her great-uncle Etienne, at first a fairly frightening figure to her. Marie-Laure’s father was a locksmith and craftsman who made scale models of cities that Marie-Laure studied so she could travel around on her own. He also crafted clever and intricate boxes, within which treasures could be hidden. Parallel to the story of Marie-Laure we meet Werner and Jutta Pfennig, a brother and sister, both orphans who have been raised in the Children’s House outside Essen, in Germany. Through flashbacks we learn that Werner had been a curious and bright child who developed an obsession with radio transmitters and receivers, both in their infancies during this period. Eventually, Werner goes to a select technical school and then, at 18, into the Wehrmacht, where his technical aptitudes are recognized and he’s put on a team trying to track down illegal radio transmissions. Etienne and Marie-Laure are responsible for some of these transmissions, but Werner is intrigued since what she’s broadcasting is innocent—she shares her passion for Jules Verne by reading aloud 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea. A further subplot involves Marie-Laure’s father’s having hidden a valuable diamond, one being tracked down by Reinhold von Rumpel, a relentless German sergeant-major.
Doerr captures the sights and sounds of wartime and focuses, refreshingly, on the innate goodness of his major characters.Pub Date: May 6, 2014
ISBN: 978-1-4767-4658-6
Page Count: 448
Publisher: Scribner
Review Posted Online: March 5, 2014
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2014
BOOK REVIEW
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