A third novel from film/TV actress Kagan (Blue Heaven, 1996, etc.), who this time out transforms now-prosaic subject matter—an adopted woman in search of her birth parents—into an erotic, albeit tragic, romance of love lost and finally regained. It’s 1959, and Jenny Jaffe shares an all-consuming passion with Will McDonald, a California drifter who has jail time under his belt and an eagle tattooed on his chest—just the kind of boy a nice 17-year-old Jewish girl should avoid. His raw sex appeal initially attracts her, but it’s his utter devotion that captures her heart. Jenny becomes pregnant, and the couple decide to elope. Jenny waits at the appointed time—but Will never shows up. What follows are a couple of botched suicide attempts by Jenny, a home for “wayward girls” in Los Angeles, a lovely baby given away, and a life forever haunted by the memory of her lost Will. The story next picks up the adult life of Claudia, the child Jenny gave up, raised in L.A. by an affluent Catholic couple. Claudia’s dreams of the “other mother” plague her, especially since the birth of her own daughter. With the help of a detective, she tracks Jenny to New York, though with great trepidation—largely because of the repercussions the reunion may have on her parents. Jenny, it turns out, has made a life as a dancer but now, in her 50s and locked in a loveless marriage, is somewhat adrift. Claudia also goes in search of Will, and discovers him living quietly on a ranch at the base of the Sierra Nevadas. Married five times, Will has never forgotten Jenny (there’s a good reason for his long-ago no-show), and now finally, with the help of their own grown daughter, reconciliation seems a possibility. In all, and against the odds, a passionate and emotionally charged tale. (Film rights to United Artists/Frank Mancuso; Literary Guild alternate selection; author tour)
Pub Date: May 1, 1998
ISBN: 0-688-15745-9
Page Count: 256
Publisher: Morrow/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 1998
Briskly written soap with down-to-earth types, mostly without the lachrymose contrivances of Hannah’s previous titles...
Sisters in and out of love.
Meghann Dontess is a high-powered matrimonial lawyer in Seattle who prefers sex with strangers to emotional intimacy: a strategy bound to backfire sooner or later, warns her tough-talking shrink. It’s advice Meghann decides to ignore, along with the memories of her difficult childhood, neglectful mother, and younger sister. Though she managed to reunite Claire with Sam Cavenaugh (her father but not Meghann’s) when her mother abandoned both girls long ago, Meghann still feels guilty that her sister’s life doesn’t measure up, at least on her terms. Never married, Claire ekes out a living running a country campground with her dad and is raising her six-year-old daughter on her own. When she falls in love for the first time with an up-and-coming country musician, Meghann is appalled: Bobby Austin is a three-time loser at marriage—how on earth can Claire be so blind? Bobby’s blunt explanation doesn’t exactly satisfy the concerned big sister, who busies herself planning Claire’s dream wedding anyway. And, to relieve the stress, she beds various guys she picks up in bars, including Dr. Joe Wyatt, a neurosurgeon turned homeless drifter after the demise of his beloved wife Diane (whom he euthanized). When Claire’s awful headache turns out to be a kind of brain tumor known among neurologists as a “terminator,” Joe rallies. Turns out that Claire had befriended his wife on her deathbed, and now in turn he must try to save her. Is it too late? Will Meghann find true love at last?
Briskly written soap with down-to-earth types, mostly without the lachrymose contrivances of Hannah’s previous titles (Distant Shores, 2002, etc.). Kudos for skipping the snifflefest this time around.Pub Date: May 1, 2003
ISBN: 0-345-45073-6
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Ballantine
Review Posted Online: June 24, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2003
Coelho's placebo has racked up impressive sales in Brazil and Europe. Americans should flock to it like gulls.
Coelho is a Brazilian writer with four books to his credit. Following Diary of a Magus (1992—not reviewed) came this book, published in Brazil in 1988: it's an interdenominational, transcendental, inspirational fable—in other words, a bag of wind.
The story is about a youth empowered to follow his dream. Santiago is an Andalusian shepherd boy who learns through a dream of a treasure in the Egyptian pyramids. An old man, the king of Salem, the first of various spiritual guides, tells the boy that he has discovered his destiny: "to realize one's destiny is a person's only real obligation." So Santiago sells his sheep, sails to Tangier, is tricked out of his money, regains it through hard work, crosses the desert with a caravan, stops at an oasis long enough to fall in love, escapes from warring tribesmen by performing a miracle, reaches the pyramids, and eventually gets both the gold and the girl. Along the way he meets an Englishman who describes the Soul of the World; the desert woman Fatima, who teaches him the Language of the World; and an alchemist who says, "Listen to your heart" A message clings like ivy to every encounter; everyone, but everyone, has to put in their two cents' worth, from the crystal merchant to the camel driver ("concentrate always on the present, you'll be a happy man"). The absence of characterization and overall blandness suggest authorship by a committee of self-improvement pundits—a far cry from Saint- Exupery's The Little Prince: that flagship of the genre was a genuine charmer because it clearly derived from a quirky, individual sensibility.
Coelho's placebo has racked up impressive sales in Brazil and Europe. Americans should flock to it like gulls.Pub Date: July 1, 1993
ISBN: 0-06-250217-4
Page Count: 192
Publisher: N/A
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 1993
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
BOOK TO SCREEN
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