Where Izzi's Prowlers (1991) was operatic in its emotional intensity, his newest crime thriller is more soap operatic—a relentlessly grim farce about mobsters, madmen, and the family ties that bind. That Izzi is off his usual stride is apparent right from the strained start, seemingly grafted from a pulp psychothriller, that finds Edna Rose, a victim of parental sexual abuse now grown into an obese bag-lady with bucks, fantasizing about the day she'll confront her hero—fast-rising TV-star Babe Hill—and seduce him. But Edna's showdown with Babe lies many pages away, and before it Izzi tracks two others whose ``tribal secrets'' are shredding their lives. The more peripheral is sleazy Jerome Spinell, whose first appearance sees him nearly thrown from the 45th floor of an L.A. hotel by henchmen of his brother Milo, a Chicago godfather. Milo's beef is that he invested, on producer Jerome's advice, $1.5 million in Babe's TV-pilot Street Babe, which scored record ratings—and now Babe is telling the Spinells to take a hike. For Babe's struggle with his own family—the bleeding heart of the novel- -reveals his hatred of mobsters and hinges on childhood savageries inflicted on him by his mobster-dad, Johnny Hilliard, and mom. The two family melodramas connect when Milo, by threatening to kill Johnny, tries to blackmail Babe into signing for a TV series; and crazy Edna joins the fray when she throws herself at Babe just when one of Babe's brothers, a scene-stealing psychopath, decides to kidnap his star-sibling for ransom. But here comes Babe's soul- tribe—wife Kelly and cop/best-pal Tim—riding to the rescue.... Izzi's poignancies and many sharp vignettes of the criminal life are overwhelmed by his contrived plot and his self-absorbed hero: Here's a thriller that aims to tackle important issues but winds up, despite moments of real power, being mostly self- important.
Pub Date: Sept. 15, 1992
ISBN: 0-553-07361-3
Page Count: 384
Publisher: Bantam
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 1992
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
A strict report, worthy of sympathy.
A violent surfacing of adolescence (which has little in common with Tarkington's earlier, broadly comic, Seventeen) has a compulsive impact.
"Nobody big except me" is the dream world of Holden Caulfield and his first person story is down to the basic, drab English of the pre-collegiate. For Holden is now being bounced from fancy prep, and, after a vicious evening with hall- and roommates, heads for New York to try to keep his latest failure from his parents. He tries to have a wild evening (all he does is pay the check), is terrorized by the hotel elevator man and his on-call whore, has a date with a girl he likes—and hates, sees his 10 year old sister, Phoebe. He also visits a sympathetic English teacher after trying on a drunken session, and when he keeps his date with Phoebe, who turns up with her suitcase to join him on his flight, he heads home to a hospital siege. This is tender and true, and impossible, in its picture of the old hells of young boys, the lonesomeness and tentative attempts to be mature and secure, the awful block between youth and being grown-up, the fright and sickness that humans and their behavior cause the challenging, the dramatization of the big bang. It is a sorry little worm's view of the off-beat of adult pressure, of contemporary strictures and conformity, of sentiment….
A strict report, worthy of sympathy.Pub Date: June 15, 1951
ISBN: 0316769177
Page Count: -
Publisher: Little, Brown
Review Posted Online: Nov. 2, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 1951
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