MISDEMEANOR MAN

Name: MISDEMEANOR MAN
Author: Dylan Schaffer
ISBN: 1-58234-460-4

by Dylan Schaffer ‧ RELEASE DATE: June 12, 2004

First-timer Schaffer, a public defender, packs too much writing into too little space—but it’s fun, nonetheless, making a...

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A case of public indecency escalates to capital murder while the music of Barry Manilow plays on.

De-frocked CPA and recovering alcoholic Harold Dunn is the latest case for public defender Gordon Seegerman. Dunn was arrested in a department store for flashing an eight-year-old girl and a hooker, a seedy little crime that for some reason has him locked up in tightest security. Seegerman, who was hoping for a little time off the job to prepare for his band’s performance in front of his idol, Barry Manilow, finds the nerdy little criminal unwilling to plead anything but innocent. Worse, the DA on the case is Seegerman’s ex-girlfriend Silvie and she’s out for blood. She wants Dunn locked up big time. With the help of his band’s bass player Terry, Gordon starts poking into Dunn’s pathetic background, which includes a prior exposure ten years earlier in Portland when he was still on the sauce. Shortly after interviewing one the hookers, who turns out to be kind of sympathetic to Dunn, turns up strangled, and Dunn, whose excessively high bail was mysteriously met, has disappeared. Further sleuthing leads Gordon and Terry through the thickets of the biggest homeless charity in the city (a barely disguised Oakland) where Dunn kept the books, an organization with ties to the powerful including Silvie’s husband. Between the investigation and the rehearsals, Seegerman spends time with his dad, a cop whose spectacular career was ended by early-onset Alzheimer’s, a threat that now hangs over the son. There is a possible flirtation with a mysterious beauty, but it seems to go nowhere. As the evidence piles up on the murder, Dunn continues to want a jury trial on the flashing. Thank goodness for those inspiring Manilow songs, Seegerman’s only real comfort.

First-timer Schaffer, a public defender, packs too much writing into too little space—but it’s fun, nonetheless, making a good case for both Manilow and Oakland.

Pub Date: June 12, 2004

ISBN: 1-58234-460-4

Page Count: 304

Publisher: Bloomsbury

Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010

Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2004

Categories:

GENERAL FICTION

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LIFE, DEATH AND BIALYS
by Dylan Schaffer

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I RIGHT THE WRONGS
by Dylan Schaffer

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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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THE WOMEN
by Kristin Hannah

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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.