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LOSING NORMAL

Name: LOSING NORMAL
Author: Francis Moss
ISBN: 978-1-73279-102-2

by Francis Moss ‧ RELEASE DATE: N/A

A well-plotted story that gives a voice to an offbeat protagonist.

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In this novel by former TV writer Moss (The Rosenberg Espionage Case, 1999, etc.), a teenager with Asperger’s syndrome exposes a devastating corporate-technology secret.

Alex attends Mason Middle School, where he finds it a struggle not to cause occasional disruptions. Then, one day, an experimental, educational computer program, developed by the creators of Calliope—the “world’s most powerful super-computer”—causes him and other kids with special needs to have fits. After a monitor explodes during a test run, Alex sees what he thinks are “fruit flies” whenever he passes a Calliope screen. Concerned for his health, his mother takes him to Calliope headquarters for additional testing. But while they’re there, she appears to be hypnotized by Calliope tech, leaving Alex in the hands of the company’s scientists. Luckily, his classmate Sara Cohen is concerned about his school absences and tracks him down. Later, when the teens join a group of renegade bookstore owners and fight against supercomputer “Sophie,” they stumble upon a greater issue. Kids who cause trouble go to Calliope “Wellness Camp”; and soon Alex and Sara are shuffled into the re-education program. Moss, who wrote for such TV shows as Buck Rogers in the 25th Century and She-Ra: Princess of Power, employs a first-person voice that’s very close to that of the narrator of Mark Haddon’s 2003 novel, The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time. The author’s attentiveness to technical details brings to mind Ernest Cline’s Ready Player One (2011), although the dystopia in this novel is more fascist in tone. The story’s overall pace is fast and focused. However, it might have been better if Moss slowed things down during certain important scenes, as when Alex and Sara witness a murder. The surplus of side characters can be confusing, particularly during the final battle. Still, readers will likely be too engaged with the plot to be overly concerned.

A well-plotted story that gives a voice to an offbeat protagonist.

Pub Date: N/A

ISBN: 978-1-73279-102-2

Page Count: 238

Publisher: Pedernales Publishing

Review Posted Online: Sept. 12, 2018

Review Program: Kirkus Indie

Categories:

GENERAL FICTION

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TO KILL A MOCKINGBIRD

by Harper Lee ‧ RELEASE DATE: July 11, 1960

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A first novel, this is also a first person account of Scout's (Jean Louise) recall of the years that led to the ending of a mystery, the breaking of her brother Jem's elbow, the death of her father's enemy — and the close of childhood years. A widower, Atticus raises his children with legal dispassion and paternal intelligence, and is ably abetted by Calpurnia, the colored cook, while the Alabama town of Maycomb, in the 1930's, remains aloof to their divergence from its tribal patterns. Scout and Jem, with their summer-time companion, Dill, find their paths free from interference — but not from dangers; their curiosity about the imprisoned Boo, whose miserable past is incorporated in their play, results in a tentative friendliness; their fears of Atticus' lack of distinction is dissipated when he shoots a mad dog; his defense of a Negro accused of raping a white girl, Mayella Ewell, is followed with avid interest and turns the rabble whites against him. Scout is the means of averting an attack on Atticus but when he loses the case it is Boo who saves Jem and Scout by killing Mayella's father when he attempts to murder them. The shadows of a beginning for black-white understanding, the persistent fight that Scout carries on against school, Jem's emergence into adulthood, Calpurnia's quiet power, and all the incidents touching on the children's "growing outward" have an attractive starchiness that keeps this southern picture pert and provocative. There is much advance interest in this book; it has been selected by the Literary Guild and Reader's Digest; it should win many friends.

Pub Date: July 11, 1960

ISBN: 0060935464

Page Count: 323

Publisher: Lippincott

Review Posted Online: Oct. 7, 2011

Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 1960

Categories:

GENERAL FICTION

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DISTANT SHORES

by Kristin Hannah ‧ RELEASE DATE: July 1, 2002

Soft-focus story moves right along with few surprises. This time around, Hannah avoids the soap-opera complications of her...

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Another middle-aged mom in a muddle.

After years of false starts and big hopes, Elizabeth’s ruggedly handsome husband Jack, a former football star, just landed a spot as a sportscaster on national news. He still loves her, even though much younger women are giving him come-hither looks. Heck, he doesn’t want to betray the love of his life after she helped him kick drugs and stuck by him even when he was a struggling has-been. And won’t it seem hypocritical if he fools around with his sexy assistant while he does in-depth reporting on a rape case involving a famous basketball center? Well, he fools around anyway. Elizabeth, nicknamed Birdie, knows nothing of this, but she withdraws from Jack when her hard-drinking, salt-of-the-earth father has a stroke and dies. Now no one will call her “sugar beet” ever again. Time to return home to Tennessee and contend with Anita, the sort-of-evil stepmother so trashy she wears pink puffy slippers all day long. Naturally, it turns out that Anita actually has a heart of gold and knows a few things about Birdie’s dead mother that were hushed up for years. Mom was an artist, just like Birdie, and an old scandal comes to light as Anita unrolls a vibrant canvas that portrays her secret lover. Perhaps, Birdie muses, her mother died of heartbreak, never having followed her true love or developed her talent. Has she, too, compromised everything she holds dear? Hoping to find out, Birdie joins a support group that promises to reconnect confused women with their passion. She and Jack separate, prompting a how-dare-you fit from their grown daughters. Will Birdie fly her empty nest? Will she go back to college for a degree in art? Will her brooding watercolors ever sell?

Soft-focus story moves right along with few surprises. This time around, Hannah avoids the soap-opera complications of her previous tales (Summer Island, 2001, etc.).