A heavy dose of schadenfreude: This very slick black comedy traces the gnarled roots of a family tree with an equal measure...
In a kind of literary Hall of Mirrors set in post-communist Berlin, second-novelist Bailey (Idioglossia, not reviewed) portrays two brothers who have come together reluctantly and without enthusiasm to make peace after a near-lifetime of deception and jealousy.
Erich Brandt is no newcomer to Berlin, but he enjoyed the isolation of the city before The Wall came down and can’t quite acclimate himself to the go-go atmosphere of the new order. A painter of some note but no success, Erich makes his living as the proprietor of an art gallery/café and has more or less washed his hands of any cultural pretensions. Divorced, successful, and middle-aged, he is not prepared for the shock of his brother Max’s attempt at suicide. A photographer and womanizer, Max has lived in London for many years and has always served as something of a reproach to Erich, who secretly envies Max simultaneously for his success and for his lack of care over it. After Max tries to kill himself, Erich brings him back to Berlin to stay with him and sets about the awkward task of learning to talk to a brother he’d abandoned many years before. There are old wounds and new: Max slept with Erich’s then-wife, Ursula, many years ago, and Erich is now embarrassed by the trashy success of his and Ursula’s daughter Nina (a kind of German Karen Finley who strips and copulates in public). Max wanders through his old hometown (now unrecognizable to him) like a drunken ghost and manages to uncover the fundamental deceptions that surround nearly every member and friend of his family. This proves a nice diversion—until Max discovers that some deceptions of his own are up for examination as well.
A heavy dose of schadenfreude: This very slick black comedy traces the gnarled roots of a family tree with an equal measure of affection and disgust.Pub Date: Nov. 15, 2004
ISBN: 0-552-99863-X
Page Count: 393
Publisher: Black Swan
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2004
The best-selling author of tearjerkers like Angel Falls (2000) serves up yet another mountain of mush, topped off with...
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
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
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