In this third installment of his memoirs, novelist Picano (Like People in History, 1995, etc.) revisits his life amid the fabulous gay crowd in Manhattan and Fire Island during the libertine '70s. Picano begins by describing his life in Manhattan before his first novel was published in 1975, when he was 31. As his success grew, he began gradually to spend more time on Fire Island in the summers and came to feel at home among the other artsy types who frequented the discos and beaches—and who cruised the island's al fresco gay ``meat market.'' Often Picano is incisive about his creative and romantic struggles, and he vividly captures the ebullient mood of gay New York in its pre-AIDS heyday. But scattered through the book are distastefully self- aggrandizing passages in which he asserts his personal and professional merits. For instance, he airily pontificates about the elements of his own childhood he put into one of his characters, ``the truly superior child who operates outside all norms, all conventions: for want of a better word, the genius. . . . I'd revealed a superior talent as a child.'' Picano notes the sales figures of his novels Smart as the Devil (1975) and Eyes (1976) and, as if he's desperate not to be thought a hack, explains how complex and rewarding these books are. Without redeeming irony, he goes on at length about how supremely attractive and desirable he and his two closest friends were considered by the Fire Island smart set. Perhaps most off-putting is Picano's evident conviction that the endless drugged-up days of sex and dancing and more sex during the late '70s added up to some kind of golden age of gay culture. Those who share this conviction are likely to be Picano's most receptive readers. (Author tour)
Pub Date: April 22, 1997
ISBN: 0-571-19913-5
Page Count: 256
Publisher: Faber & Faber/Farrar, Straus and Giroux
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 15, 1997
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
This is not the Nutcracker sweet, as passed on by Tchaikovsky and Marius Petipa. No, this is the original Hoffmann tale of 1816, in which the froth of Christmas revelry occasionally parts to let the dark underside of childhood fantasies and fears peek through. The boundaries between dream and reality fade, just as Godfather Drosselmeier, the Nutcracker's creator, is seen as alternately sinister and jolly. And Italian artist Roberto Innocenti gives an errily realistic air to Marie's dreams, in richly detailed illustrations touched by a mysterious light. A beautiful version of this classic tale, which will captivate adults and children alike. (Nutcracker; $35.00; Oct. 28, 1996; 136 pp.; 0-15-100227-4)
Pub Date: Oct. 28, 1996
ISBN: 0-15-100227-4
Page Count: 136
Publisher: Harcourt
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 1996
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Stricter than, say, Bergen Evans or W3 ("disinterested" means impartial — period), Strunk is in the last analysis...
Privately published by Strunk of Cornell in 1918 and revised by his student E. B. White in 1959, that "little book" is back again with more White updatings.
Stricter than, say, Bergen Evans or W3 ("disinterested" means impartial — period), Strunk is in the last analysis (whoops — "A bankrupt expression") a unique guide (which means "without like or equal").Pub Date: May 15, 1972
ISBN: 0205632645
Page Count: 105
Publisher: Macmillan
Review Posted Online: Oct. 28, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 1972
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