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ARC LIGHT

Name: ARC LIGHT
Author: Eric L. Harry
ISBN: 0-671-88048-9

by Eric L. Harry ‧ RELEASE DATE: Sept. 1, 1994

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Harry's first novel is all gloom and doom, an appropriate tone for his World War III scenario. When US President Livingston receives a tip that Russia will bomb China, he informs the Chinese, who then bomb Moscow, where General Zorin, a zealous patriot, has temporarily overthrown the government. Believing the attack to be a US initiative, Zorin launches a counterstrike against US military bases. In the tense moments before the missiles strike, Livingston gives in to military pressure and retaliates, fueling a war featuring biological, chemical, and possibly nuclear weapons. Zorin's coup is ended by the Russians, but his firing plan remains in effect: If provoked, nuclear submarines will fire upon 304 American cities. Livingston, whose decency and common sense have become political liabilities, is impeached and succeeded by his ``California Enviroweenie'' veep, who has become an opportunistic warmonger. Livingston's last supporter among the White House staff is Greg Lambert, the bright young national security advisor who may be able to negotiate with the few peace-seeking Russian statesmen. The bloody, conventional land battles feature David Chandler, the weekend reservist who leads an armored battalion in an invasion of Moscow in his first combat experience; and Marine Lance Corporal Terrence Monk, whose squadron faces an opposed landing on the eastern Russian shore. Descriptions of the physiological responses to nuclear and chemical warfare are jarring, but the secondary effects are surprising, too. After nuclear devastation in some US locations, the government contends with an economic depression caused by fearful workers who have fled the cities and sit glued to CNN and the Weather Channel. A grim tale which so successfully evokes the bleakness and terror of an impending world war that it could depress contemplative readers while titillating those just out for techno- thrills.

Pub Date: Sept. 1, 1994

ISBN: 0-671-88048-9

Page Count: 628

Publisher: Simon & Schuster

Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010

Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 1994

Categories:

GENERAL FICTION

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BETWEEN SISTERS

by Kristin Hannah ‧ RELEASE DATE: May 1, 2003

Briskly written soap with down-to-earth types, mostly without the lachrymose contrivances of Hannah’s previous titles...

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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

Categories:

GENERAL FICTION

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by Kristin Hannah

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by Kristin Hannah

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by Kristin Hannah

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THE ALCHEMIST

by Paulo Coelho & translated by Margaret Jull Costa ‧ RELEASE DATE: July 1, 1993

Coelho's placebo has racked up impressive sales in Brazil and Europe. Americans should flock to it like gulls.

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Coelho is a Brazilian writer with four books to his credit. Following Diary of a Magus (1992—not reviewed) came this book, published in Brazil in 1988: it's an interdenominational, transcendental, inspirational fable—in other words, a bag of wind.

The story is about a youth empowered to follow his dream. Santiago is an Andalusian shepherd boy who learns through a dream of a treasure in the Egyptian pyramids. An old man, the king of Salem, the first of various spiritual guides, tells the boy that he has discovered his destiny: "to realize one's destiny is a person's only real obligation." So Santiago sells his sheep, sails to Tangier, is tricked out of his money, regains it through hard work, crosses the desert with a caravan, stops at an oasis long enough to fall in love, escapes from warring tribesmen by performing a miracle, reaches the pyramids, and eventually gets both the gold and the girl. Along the way he meets an Englishman who describes the Soul of the World; the desert woman Fatima, who teaches him the Language of the World; and an alchemist who says, "Listen to your heart" A message clings like ivy to every encounter; everyone, but everyone, has to put in their two cents' worth, from the crystal merchant to the camel driver ("concentrate always on the present, you'll be a happy man"). The absence of characterization and overall blandness suggest authorship by a committee of self-improvement pundits—a far cry from Saint- Exupery's The Little Prince: that flagship of the genre was a genuine charmer because it clearly derived from a quirky, individual sensibility.

Coelho's placebo has racked up impressive sales in Brazil and Europe. Americans should flock to it like gulls.