by Fiston Mwanza Mujila ; translated by Roland Glasser ‧ RELEASE DATE: Sept. 15, 2015
One’s admiration for the novel will be highly influenced by one’s tolerance for experimental, relatively plotless fiction.
Stylistically quirky and unorthodox fiction from Africa.
Perhaps contrary to one’s expectations, the title refers not to a British streetcar but to a seedy nightclub in an unnamed African country referred to only as the City-State. Tram 83 is the locus of those driven by ambition, desire, greed, or pleasure—and in this underworld we meet quite a cast of characters. Gathering at this disreputable watering hole are “inadvertent musicians and elderly prostitutes and prestidigitators and Pentecostal preachers and students resembling mechanics and doctors conducting diagnoses in nightclubs and young journalists already retired and transvestites…”—and the list goes on for more than 40 entries. The women who go to Tram 83, all of whom “struggle fiercely against ageing,” range from the “baby-chicks” (younger than 16), the “single-mamas” (between 20 and 40), and the “ageless-women” (41 and older). Mujila also has a propensity for allegory, as is clear by the names he assigns those involved in the narrative. Lucien, an aspiring author, is one of the named characters, but more typical are types like the General, Mortal Combat, Requiem, and the Diva. While the novel has several narrative threads, Mujila is not working in the George Eliot tradition of realistic fiction. Instead, incidents lurch from one thing to another—sexual encounters to blackmail to the mineral-rich Hope mine. Much of the dialogue is repetitious and antiphonal, as recurring phrases such as "Do you have the time?" and "I hate foreplay" help create and define the atmosphere at the nightclub.
One’s admiration for the novel will be highly influenced by one’s tolerance for experimental, relatively plotless fiction.Pub Date: Sept. 15, 2015
ISBN: 978-1-941920-04-6
Page Count: 200
Publisher: Deep Vellum
Review Posted Online: June 27, 2015
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2015
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by Kristin Hannah ‧ RELEASE DATE: March 1, 2006
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
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by J.D. Salinger ‧ RELEASE DATE: June 15, 1951
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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