Think of it as ``War and Commerce.'' In this sprawling third installment in film director Kazan's story of Stavros Topouzoglou, following America America (1962) and The Anatolian (1982), rug merchant Stavros finds business opportunities in the 1919 Greek invasion of Anatolia and war with Turkey. Stavros, now middle-aged, returns to his Anatolian roots with his brother Michaelis as the Greek army is driving the Turks out of Smyrna, the first stage of a Greater Greece campaign. This ``creature of the bazaar'' knows now is the time to buy Turkish rugs cheap for export to New York. Traveling into the interior, buying nonstop, Stavros is also looking for a wife for his new home in Smyrna, and quirky, fearless Thomna seems to fit the bill. She wants a ticket to America, Stavros wants a good breeder; it will be a pragmatic union. But now Stavros behaves quite unpragmatically; ignoring news of Greek military reversals and his New York boss's order to shut down their operation, he continues dangerous purchasing missions behind enemy lines and a stormy on/off relationship with Thomna. As the patriot supersedes the businessman, so the war replaces Stavros's ambitions as the engine driving the novel. Increasingly Stavros becomes Kazan's cat's-paw, eavesdropping on King Constantine, running errands for the archbishop, as the Greek army collapses and the Turks, burning Smyrna, drive the Anatolians into the sea. The lonely figure at the end seems less a casualty of his own conflicts than a servant who has performed one too many narrative chores. Kazan's treatment of Greeks and Turks is evenhanded. He uses a broad canvas, including generals and hamals (Turkey's untouchables), while keeping the bourgeoisie in the foreground. Yet the faltering storyline and Stavros's loss of authority result in a work that, despite powerful set pieces, generates more heat than light.
Pub Date: May 11, 1994
ISBN: 0-679-42565-9
Page Count: 480
Publisher: Knopf
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 1994
BOOK REVIEW
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.
Pub Date: July 11, 1960
ISBN: 0060935464
Page Count: 323
Publisher: Lippincott
Review Posted Online: Oct. 7, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 1960
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
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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