The cleverness and vitality of this narrative made it a bestseller in Israel, as it should be here. Mazya describes one...
This darkly funny first novel by Israeli playwright Mazya combines the suspense of a murder mystery with the absurdity of a Woody Allen movie.
The narrator/hero is Ilan Ben Nathan, a dithering, self-critical professor of astrophysics who at 48 rashly marries a sexy beauty of 25. The narrative voice is captivating—surprising considering that the professor is an ungrateful mama’s boy. (“I can always dump everything I spare others on [my mother] which is her only good point,” he candidly observes.) There’s good evidence that he has become a slacker at work and, until the moment he snaps, humiliatingly ineffectual in encounters with his wife’s intimidatingly virile lover, whom Ilan forlornly describes as resembling Nick Nolte. Nevertheless, Ilan’s honesty, curiosity and weary concern for his fellow beings endear him to the reader, as when he sees toddlers at a nursery school, “standing pressed to the fence, waiting for their mothers to come and fetch them, worn out and helpless at the end of a day of exhausting survival.” The charm of this work lies in the author’s adroit use of her powers to observe and analyze human behavior. As her characters grapple with one another, she is aware of what each seeks to gain: The play of short-lived emotions—the impulse toward self-pity, or generosity, or resignation, or anger—bring her narrative to life. Capable of the subtlest poignancy at one moment, Mazya shocks us with the most savage humor the next—but always with a gleeful sense of the power of human beings to astonish one another with their ingenuity, their passion, their foolishness.
The cleverness and vitality of this narrative made it a bestseller in Israel, as it should be here. Mazya describes one brilliant character as “original without being eccentric.” It’s praise she deserves herself.Pub Date: March 15, 2006
ISBN: 1-933372-08-7
Page Count: 224
Publisher: Europa Editions
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 2006
This ran in the S.E.P. and resulted in more demands for the story in book form than ever recorded. Well, here it is and it is a honey. Imagine ten people, not knowing each other, not knowing why they were invited on a certain island house-party, not knowing their hosts. Then imagine them dead, one by one, until none remained alive, nor any clue to the murderer. Grand suspense, a unique trick, expertly handled.
Pub Date: Feb. 21, 1939
ISBN: 0062073478
Page Count: 272
Publisher: Dodd, Mead
Review Posted Online: Sept. 20, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 1939
SEEN & HEARD
An anodyne visit with Tricia and her friends and enemies hung on a thin mystery.
Too much free time leads a New Hampshire bookseller into yet another case of murder.
Now that Tricia Miles has Pixie Poe and Mr. Everett practically running her bookstore, Haven’t Got a Clue, she finds herself at loose ends. Her wealthy sister, Angelica, who in the guise of Nigela Ricita has invested heavily in making Stoneham a bookish tourist attraction, is entering the amateur competition for the Great Booktown Bake-Off. So Tricia, who’s recently taken up baking as a hobby, decides to join her and spends a lot of time looking for the perfect cupcake recipe. A visit to another bookstore leaves Tricia witnessing a nasty argument between owner Joyce Widman and next-door neighbor Vera Olson over the trimming of tree branches that hang over Joyce’s yard—also overheard by new town police officer Cindy Pearson. After Tricia accepts Joyce’s offer of some produce from her garden, they find Vera skewered by a pitchfork, and when Police Chief Grant Baker arrives, Joyce is his obvious suspect. Ever since Tricia moved to Stoneham, the homicide rate has skyrocketed (Poisoned Pages, 2018, etc.), and her history with Baker is fraught. She’s also become suspicious about the activities at Pets-A-Plenty, the animal shelter where Vera was a dedicated volunteer. Tricia’s offered her expertise to the board, but president Toby Kingston has been less than welcoming. With nothing but baking on her calendar, Tricia has plenty of time to investigate both the murder and her vague suspicions about the shelter. Plenty of small-town friendships and rivalries emerge in her quest for the truth.
An anodyne visit with Tricia and her friends and enemies hung on a thin mystery.Pub Date: Aug. 13, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-9848-0272-9
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Berkley
Review Posted Online: May 26, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 2019
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