Bittersweet coming-of-age tale with flashes of wit and an especially sympathetic heroine.
A young woman gets the chance to confront the now world-famous rock star who broke her heart 13 years ago, and who went on to write a series of deeply personal songs about her.
Back in Croton Falls, Vt., Jake Sharpe was a teen dream: beautiful, talented, with an aching vulnerability and an unhappy home life. After adoring him for much of high school, Kate Hollis finally gets her man, and the two are inseparable until Jake takes off for L.A. shortly before graduation—without saying goodbye. A devastated Kate tries to get over her loss, but finds it exceedingly difficult as Jake’s music career takes off, with his songs about their young love becoming modern classics. So when her childhood best friend Laura calls to alert her that Jake has come home to do a TV special, Kate puts her grown-up life in Charleston on hold and heads to Croton Falls, in an effort to make Jake “regret his entire existence.” At her parent’s house, Kate revisits all the memories, good and bad, that led her to this moment, including her dad’s mental breakdown and her mom’s subsequent affair, which brought Kate and Jake even closer. And, yep, he wrote about that, too. She then schemes her way onto Jake’s shoot, and catches his eye, setting the stage for the apology—and sexy reunion—that Kate has long been waiting for. Turns out that Jake has never gotten over her either, and the rekindling of their romance feels like fate, with Jake trying to make up for lost time. He whisks his muse to his New York penthouse, and the two share some blissful moments until the mayhem of his celebrity existence intrudes, causing Kate to question whether Jake has changed too much—or too little. This third effort from McLaughlin and Kraus (Citizen Girl, 2004, etc.) is spot-on in its depiction of Kate and Laura’s early girlish hysteria, and quickly overcomes a certain cleverness for its own sake to tell a moving story of teenage passion.
Bittersweet coming-of-age tale with flashes of wit and an especially sympathetic heroine.Pub Date: June 5, 2007
ISBN: 978-1-4165-4013-7
Page Count: 288
Publisher: Atria
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2007
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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