Raises more questions than it answers, but Subercaseaux (Michelle, 2006, etc.) is able to keep the reader engaged through...
An intriguing novel that raises issues of truth-telling, domestic deception and metafictional subterfuge.
Clara Griffin is in her mid-40s and dying of cancer. Her husband, Clemente, suggests that she keep a journal of her thoughts as a way of dealing with her impending death. The novel alternates between Clara’s notebook and Clemente’s reading of the entries; however, he discovers more than he wants to—sort of. The first entry recounts Clara’s passionate tryst with her lover, Lionel, who dies of a heart attack after a strenuous sexual encounter with her. When Clemente reads the journal, he’s convinced that Clara is using the jottings to make up a fantasy life because her current life is so painful…but he’s not altogether persuaded that Clara is making things up. His first thought is bewilderment that Clara invented a lover “to whom she had the audacity to give the name of a real person,” for Lionel is a business acquaintance of Clemente’s. Clemente himself has for many years been having an affair with Eliana, an affair he smugly thought he’d kept hidden from his wife, but in her journal Clara makes clear both her knowledge of the affair and her contempt for her husband, whose life of boredom and routine has been a source of anguish for her. Clemente eventually becomes suspicious that Clara has planted the notebook specifically so he can find it, but he remains tormented by its contents and starts to feel “jealousy, impotence, and…rage.” Is she toying with Clemente by fictionalizing events from her life? Or does she convey fundamental truths by disguising and manipulating their reality? Or is she indeed fantasizing a life to compensate for the diminishment of her own?
Raises more questions than it answers, but Subercaseaux (Michelle, 2006, etc.) is able to keep the reader engaged through the depth and intensity of her characters.Pub Date: Aug. 1, 2008
ISBN: 978-1-59051-288-3
Page Count: 224
Publisher: Other Press
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 2008
BOOK REVIEW
Wacky plot keeps the pages turning and enduring schmaltzy romantic sequences.
Sisters work together to solve a child-abandonment case.
Ellie and Julia Cates have never been close. Julia is shy and brainy; Ellie gets by on charm and looks. Their differences must be tossed aside when a traumatized young girl wanders in from the forest into their hometown in Washington. The sisters’ professional skills are put to the test. Julia is a world-renowned child psychologist who has lost her edge. She is reeling from a case that went publicly sour. Though she was cleared of all wrongdoing, Julia’s name was tarnished, forcing her to shutter her Beverly Hills practice. Ellie Barton is the local police chief in Rain Valley, who’s never faced a tougher case. This is her chance to prove she is more than just a fading homecoming queen, but a scarcity of clues and a reluctant victim make locating the girl’s parents nearly impossible. Ellie places an SOS call to her sister; she needs an expert to rehabilitate this wild-child who has been living outside of civilization for years. Confronted with her professional demons, Julia once again has the opportunity to display her talents and salvage her reputation. Hannah (The Things We Do for Love, 2004, etc.) is at her best when writing from the girl’s perspective. The feral wolf-child keeps the reader interested long after the other, transparent characters have grown tiresome. Hannah’s torturously over-written romance passages are stale, but there are surprises in store as the sisters set about unearthing Alice’s past and creating a home for her.
Wacky plot keeps the pages turning and enduring schmaltzy romantic sequences.Pub Date: March 1, 2006
ISBN: 0-345-46752-3
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Ballantine
Review Posted Online: June 24, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2005
Genetically engineered dinosaurs run amok in Crichton's new, vastly entertaining science thriller. From the introduction alone—a classically Crichton-clear discussion of the implications of biotechnological research—it's evident that the Harvard M.D. has bounced back from the science-fantasy silliness of Sphere (1987) for another taut reworking of the Frankenstein theme, as in The Andromeda Strain and The Terminal Man. Here, Dr. Frankenstein is aging billionaire John Hammond, whose monster is a manmade ecosystem based on a Costa Rican island. Designed as the world's ultimate theme park, the ecosystem boasts climate and flora of the Jurassic Age and—most spectacularly—15 varieties of dinosaurs, created by elaborate genetic engineering that Crichton explains in fascinating detail, rich with dino-lore and complete with graphics. Into the park, for a safety check before its opening, comes the novel's band of characters—who, though well drawn, double as symbolic types in this unsubtle morality play. Among them are hero Alan Grant, noble paleontologist; Hammond, venal and obsessed; amoral dino-designer Henry Wu; Hammond's two innocent grandchildren; and mathematician Ian Malcolm, who in long diatribes serves as Crichton's mouthpiece to lament the folly of science. Upon arrival, the visitors tour the park; meanwhile, an industrial spy steals some dino embryos by shutting down the island's power—and its security grid, allowing the beasts to run loose. The bulk of the remaining narrative consists of dinos—ferocious T. Rex's, voracious velociraptors, venom-spitting dilophosaurs—stalking, ripping, and eating the cast in fast, furious, and suspenseful set-pieces as the ecosystem spins apart. And can Grant prevent the dinos from escaping to the mainland to create unchecked havoc? Though intrusive, the moralizing rarely slows this tornado-paced tale, a slick package of info-thrills that's Crichton's most clever since Congo (1980)—and easily the most exciting dinosaur novel ever written. A sure-fire best-seller.
Pub Date: Nov. 7, 1990
ISBN: 0394588169
Page Count: 424
Publisher: Knopf
Review Posted Online: Sept. 21, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 1990
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