by Doug Cooper ‧ RELEASE DATE: Aug. 13, 2013
A buoyant but overly earnest story of one man’s willingness to sacrifice everything in the name of self-discovery.
A disgraced teacher embarks on a bacchanalian journey to find himself.
On the surface, Brad Shepard’s life appears quite successful and fulfilling. He has a challenging, rewarding job teaching math to middle school kids; he also has his youth, a strong relationship with his parents and some caring friends. But when a tragedy befalls his classroom, Brad loses more than his job; he loses his sense of self. Rudderless for the first time in his life, he accepts an invitation to spend the summer in the Lake Erie island resort town of Put-in-Bay, Ohio. There, he quickly falls in with an eclectic cast of characters united by a singular desire to party. What follows is a booze- and drug-fueled odyssey during which Brad attempts to discover—or perhaps rediscover—his most authentic self. Although it’s tempting to read Brad’s angst as little more than bourgeois despair over a loss of respectability, Cooper’s earnest, often humorous prose keeps Brad’s quest light without sacrificing its poignancy. Still, readers may cringe at some of the more treacly passages; for example, after Brad repeatedly fails to convince others (and himself) that his time in Put-In-Bay is simply an opportunity to regroup, his realization coalesces a bit too neatly: “Maybe I had to become who I’m not to understand who I truly am.” His meandering summer near the site of the Battle of Lake Erie, which established the present-day borders of the United States and Canada, serves as a tidy background for his contentious but ultimately hopeful personal struggle. The stakes, like Brad, may be high, but they fail to galvanize a sense of anxiety in the text. Instead, readers are left with a lingering tedium, as the cycle of booze, drugs and sex repeats ad nauseam. A second tragedy serves to finally bring Brad back from the brink of despair, but for Brad, and readers, salvation arrives just in the nick of time.
A buoyant but overly earnest story of one man’s willingness to sacrifice everything in the name of self-discovery.Pub Date: Aug. 13, 2013
ISBN: 978-1626340046
Page Count: 253
Publisher: Greenleaf Book Group Press
Review Posted Online: April 16, 2014
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
Share your opinion of this book
by William Poe ‧ RELEASE DATE: Nov. 16, 2015
Downbeat but often engaging poems and stories.
A slim volume of largely gay-themed writings with pessimistic overtones.
Poe (Simple Simon, 2013, etc.) divides this collection of six short stories and 34 poems into five sections: “Art,” “Death,” “Relationship,” “Being,” and “Reflection.” Significantly, a figurative death at the age of 7 appears in two different poems, in which the author uses the phrase “a pretended life” to refer to the idea of hiding one’s true nature and performing socially enforced gender roles. This is a well-worn trope, but it will be powerful and resonant for many who have struggled with a stigmatized identity. In a similar vein, “Imaginary Tom” presents the remnants of a faded relationship: “Now we are imaginary friends, different in each other’s thoughts, / I the burden you seek to discard, / you the lover I created from the mist of longing.” Once in a while, short story passages practically leap off of the page, such as this evocative description of a seedy establishment in Lincoln, Nebraska: “It was a dimly lit bar that smelled of rodent piss, with barstools that danced on uneven legs and made the patrons wonder if they were drunker than they thought.” In “Valéry’s Ride,” Poe examines the familial duties that often fall to unmarried and childless people, keeping them from forming meaningful bonds with others. In this story, after the double whammy of Hurricanes Katrina and Rita hits Louisiana, Valéry’s extended family needs him more than ever; readers will likely root for the gay protagonist as he makes the difficult decision to strike out on his own. Not all of Poe’s main characters are gay; the heterosexual title character in “Mrs. Calumet’s Workspace,” for instance, pursues employment in order to escape the confines of her home and a passionless marriage. Working as a bookkeeper, she attempts to carve out a space for herself, symbolized by changes in her work area. Still, this story echoes the recurring theme of lives unlived due to forces often beyond one’s control.
Downbeat but often engaging poems and stories.Pub Date: Nov. 16, 2015
ISBN: 978-1-5168-3693-2
Page Count: 120
Publisher: CreateSpace
Review Posted Online: March 5, 2016
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
Share your opinion of this book
by J.C. Salazar ‧ RELEASE DATE: Aug. 1, 2018
A volume of poetry that shines when focused on the author’s experiences of race and culture.
A collection speaks in part to the poet’s Mexican-American heritage.
In these multifaceted poems, Mexico-born, Houston-raised Salazar (Of Dreams and Thorns, 2017) explores general human themes like love and war in addition to specific experiences as a person of color. The book begins with a sensual meditation on desire, featuring luscious descriptions of a lover, from lips “moist like youth” to the body’s “softest velvet” slopes. The poems shift to odes to cultural icons like the Tejano star Selena and Mexican-German painter Frida Kahlo as well as occasion pieces honoring his brother’s 40th birthday and a friend’s mother’s memorial service. The author hits his stride when he delves into identity. In “I Am Not Brown,” he contemplates the societal implications of skin tone and his inability to fit into the rigid category of Caucasian or Latino. “For white and black and brown alike / Are slaves to history’s brush strokes,” he writes. “Grateful for the Work,” perhaps Salazar’s loveliest poem, catalogs the day of a laborer, starting with an early morning awakening and following him as he toils in 100-degree heat, enjoys tacos from his lunch pail, buys beverages from a child’s lemonade stand, and returns home to an equally hard-working wife. The author then makes an abrupt turn toward Syria in a series of poems that condemn that country’s president, Bashar Hafez al-Assad. They serve as a rallying cry for Syrians and grieve for the murdered masses. Salazar’s closing poem, “Sons of Bitches,” is a clunky rant about a 20-year-old immigrant shot in the head by a U.S. Customs and Border Patrol agent. The gratuitous violence and political theologizing are ill at ease with the intimate, personal experiences that preceded them, such as the fablelike “A Mexican is Made of This,” in which Salazar beautifully describes the “rainbows, bronze, backbone, butterflies” that his people embody.
A volume of poetry that shines when focused on the author’s experiences of race and culture.Pub Date: Aug. 1, 2018
ISBN: 978-0-9991496-3-8
Page Count: 166
Publisher: Bronze Diamond Productions
Review Posted Online: Sept. 27, 2018
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
Share your opinion of this book
More by J.C. Salazar
BOOK REVIEW
by J.C. Salazar
© Copyright 2024 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Hey there, book lover.
We’re glad you found a book that interests you!
We can’t wait for you to join Kirkus!
It’s free and takes less than 10 seconds!
Already have an account? Log in.
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
Welcome Back!
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
Don’t fret. We’ll find you.