A feathery feel-good story about triumph over adversity—probably another hit for Berg.
A quadriplegic mother, the 1964 Summer of Freedom and a timely visit from Elvis all come to play in Berg’s latest quick-read tearjerker.
During this historic summer in Mississippi, 13-year-old Diana Dunn is less concerned with black-voter registration (in fact, she’s not quite sure what all the fuss is about) than putting on backyard plays with best friend Suralee, and carving out some kind of independence from a life of caring for her disabled mother. Late in her pregnancy, Diana’s mother Paige contracted polio, and then miraculously gave birth to Diana in an iron lung. Her husband quickly divorced her and offered to adopt their baby, but Paige was made of stronger stuff and insisted on raising Diana herself. After three years in the iron lung, Paige returned home (Diana is raised by caretaker Peacie) paralyzed below the neck, and with a fierce determination to do right by her daughter. The two share a warm, companionable relationship, as Paige rules the roost despite her immobility (Diana obediently offers up a finger for Paige to bite whenever she misbehaves). In fact, Paige is a bit of a wonder—she has a couple of suitors, she paints, writes songs and always has time for backyard sunbathing. No-nonsense Peacie helps care for Paige and Diana, and through her and her boyfriend LaRue, the struggle for civil rights comes to the Dunn household. LaRue has recently learned how to read and has become politicized, despite the Sheriff’s ominous warning not to cause trouble. Diana’s teen worries (kissing for the first time, among them) are soon overshadowed by the difficulties of real life, including LaRue’s imprisonment and the very real potential of social services putting her in foster care. Berg (The Year of Pleasures, 2005, etc.) has the components of a forceful drama in place, but her tale lacks emotional resonance and offers an ending that defies the rest of the novel’s realism.
A feathery feel-good story about triumph over adversity—probably another hit for Berg.Pub Date: April 11, 2006
ISBN: 1-4000-6161-X
Page Count: 208
Publisher: Random House
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 1, 2005
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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
Soft-focus story moves right along with few surprises. This time around, Hannah avoids the soap-opera complications of her...
Another middle-aged mom in a muddle.
After years of false starts and big hopes, Elizabeth’s ruggedly handsome husband Jack, a former football star, just landed a spot as a sportscaster on national news. He still loves her, even though much younger women are giving him come-hither looks. Heck, he doesn’t want to betray the love of his life after she helped him kick drugs and stuck by him even when he was a struggling has-been. And won’t it seem hypocritical if he fools around with his sexy assistant while he does in-depth reporting on a rape case involving a famous basketball center? Well, he fools around anyway. Elizabeth, nicknamed Birdie, knows nothing of this, but she withdraws from Jack when her hard-drinking, salt-of-the-earth father has a stroke and dies. Now no one will call her “sugar beet” ever again. Time to return home to Tennessee and contend with Anita, the sort-of-evil stepmother so trashy she wears pink puffy slippers all day long. Naturally, it turns out that Anita actually has a heart of gold and knows a few things about Birdie’s dead mother that were hushed up for years. Mom was an artist, just like Birdie, and an old scandal comes to light as Anita unrolls a vibrant canvas that portrays her secret lover. Perhaps, Birdie muses, her mother died of heartbreak, never having followed her true love or developed her talent. Has she, too, compromised everything she holds dear? Hoping to find out, Birdie joins a support group that promises to reconnect confused women with their passion. She and Jack separate, prompting a how-dare-you fit from their grown daughters. Will Birdie fly her empty nest? Will she go back to college for a degree in art? Will her brooding watercolors ever sell?
Soft-focus story moves right along with few surprises. This time around, Hannah avoids the soap-opera complications of her previous tales (Summer Island, 2001, etc.).Pub Date: July 1, 2002
ISBN: 0-345-45071-X
Page Count: 352
Publisher: Ballantine
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 15, 2002
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