An enjoyable, contemplative drive through Middle America and middle age.
In Murray’s debut literary novel, a middle-aged drifter searches for her brother and finds herself.
Isabel “Izzy” O’Hara is a sad woman, and not just because she’s been recently diagnosed with social anxiety disorder and seasonal affective disorder. It’s because she can’t seem to feel at home anywhere, no matter how hard she tries. She loses numerous jobs, turns down a government position, and later believes that government operatives are following her. She receives charity from her distant parents and her more successful friends; her eyesight is failing her, and she doesn’t know why; and worst of all, she misses her brother Tommy, whom she hasn’t seen since he ran away from home 20 years ago. After she’s fired from yet another dull job, Izzy sets off on a journey to find Tommy and begin repairing her dysfunctional family. Along the way, she falls in love with a rockabilly singer who reminds her of her brother, changes her identity, and keeps up a steady drinking habit while searching for a new career. She finds comfort from her mother and her mysteriously ever present friend, Greer, and eventually begins to make peace with her turbulent past. From the first page, the book is full of beautiful descriptions: “It is the vortex of winter, and in Nellie’s Escort, I trundle across interstate I-80,” the book begins. From there, the story moves slowly between Izzy’s internal musings, vivid flashbacks to her childhood, and plenty of rock ’n’ roll song lyrics. Anyone looking for an action-packed adventure story will be disappointed, but those who want to read a thoughtful, character-driven study of aging, family, and the ups and downs of life will likely fall in love—especially if they’re also fans of the Midwest and rock music. The narrative switches between past and present tenses as often as it shifts between past and present events, but not always at the same time, which gets confusing; it also suffers from frequent, though minor, typos. But these are just small bumps on an otherwise smooth road.
An enjoyable, contemplative drive through Middle America and middle age.Pub Date: N/A
ISBN: 978-1-365-38129-4
Page Count: -
Publisher: Lulu
Review Posted Online: Aug. 9, 2016
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
A tasty, if not always tasteful, tale of supernatural mayhem that fans of King and Crichton alike will enjoy.
Are we not men? We are—well, ask Bigfoot, as Brooks does in this delightful yarn, following on his bestseller World War Z(2006).
A zombie apocalypse is one thing. A volcanic eruption is quite another, for, as the journalist who does a framing voice-over narration for Brooks’ latest puts it, when Mount Rainier popped its cork, “it was the psychological aspect, the hyperbole-fueled hysteria that had ended up killing the most people.” Maybe, but the sasquatches whom the volcano displaced contributed to the statistics, too, if only out of self-defense. Brooks places the epicenter of the Bigfoot war in a high-tech hideaway populated by the kind of people you might find in a Jurassic Park franchise: the schmo who doesn’t know how to do much of anything but tries anyway, the well-intentioned bleeding heart, the know-it-all intellectual who turns out to know the wrong things, the immigrant with a tough backstory and an instinct for survival. Indeed, the novel does double duty as a survival manual, packed full of good advice—for instance, try not to get wounded, for “injury turns you from a giver to a taker. Taking up our resources, our time to care for you.” Brooks presents a case for making room for Bigfoot in the world while peppering his narrative with timely social criticism about bad behavior on the human side of the conflict: The explosion of Rainier might have been better forecast had the president not slashed the budget of the U.S. Geological Survey, leading to “immediate suspension of the National Volcano Early Warning System,” and there’s always someone around looking to monetize the natural disaster and the sasquatch-y onslaught that follows. Brooks is a pro at building suspense even if it plays out in some rather spectacularly yucky episodes, one involving a short spear that takes its name from “the sucking sound of pulling it out of the dead man’s heart and lungs.” Grossness aside, it puts you right there on the scene.
A tasty, if not always tasteful, tale of supernatural mayhem that fans of King and Crichton alike will enjoy.Pub Date: June 16, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-9848-2678-7
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Del Rey/Ballantine
Review Posted Online: Feb. 9, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2020
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK TO SCREEN
Amateurish, with a twist savvy readers will see coming from a mile away.
A woman accused of shooting her husband six times in the face refuses to speak.
"Alicia Berenson was thirty-three years old when she killed her husband. They had been married for seven years. They were both artists—Alicia was a painter, and Gabriel was a well-known fashion photographer." Michaelides' debut is narrated in the voice of psychotherapist Theo Faber, who applies for a job at the institution where Alicia is incarcerated because he's fascinated with her case and believes he will be able to get her to talk. The narration of the increasingly unrealistic events that follow is interwoven with excerpts from Alicia's diary. Ah, yes, the old interwoven diary trick. When you read Alicia's diary you'll conclude the woman could well have been a novelist instead of a painter because it contains page after page of detailed dialogue, scenes, and conversations quite unlike those in any journal you've ever seen. " 'What's the matter?' 'I can't talk about it on the phone, I need to see you.' 'It's just—I'm not sure I can make it up to Cambridge at the minute.' 'I'll come to you. This afternoon. Okay?' Something in Paul's voice made me agree without thinking about it. He sounded desperate. 'Okay. Are you sure you can't tell me about it now?' 'I'll see you later.' Paul hung up." Wouldn't all this appear in a diary as "Paul wouldn't tell me what was wrong"? An even more improbable entry is the one that pins the tail on the killer. While much of the book is clumsy, contrived, and silly, it is while reading passages of the diary that one may actually find oneself laughing out loud.
Amateurish, with a twist savvy readers will see coming from a mile away.Pub Date: Feb. 5, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-250-30169-7
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Celadon Books
Review Posted Online: Nov. 3, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 15, 2018
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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