Colorful characters that, unfortunately, don’t develop.
Drury (A Dream Away, 2011) uses the Occupy protests as his novel’s backdrop in this quiet family tragedy.
After a somewhat dry prologue, the novel jumps to life as we meet Parker and Katrina Boyce, a young married couple that has recently moved to Florida from California. He’s a psychologist, and she’s a busy stay-at-home mom. Katrina is the victim of a carjacking, and before the couple gets a chance to celebrate her survival, Parker is shot in the chest by the drug-addicted ex-girlfriend of one of his patients, Roy Calhoun. While Parker recovers in the hospital, Katrina starts an affair with a police detective. It’s not long after this that the Boyces see the size of their household increase. Parker’s mother moves in, and Roy becomes a live-in property caretaker until a house fire forces the Boyces to temporarily live in an apartment. That’s when Katrina’s younger sister comes to stay with them. She begins dating Roy, and the two attend various Occupy protests. Roy, who served in Afghanistan, suffers from PTSD, which is triggered by the charged atmosphere of the protests. While there are some action-packed scenes, this is a character-driven novel. Conflict is minimal and the big events seem to have little lasting effect on the characters, even the big final tragedy only manages to derail the life of a single character. The novel’s theme seems to be that things tend to stay the same. The engaging writing style and the shifts in point of view mean the book flows swiftly along. However, the lack of character growth may frustrate some readers.
Colorful characters that, unfortunately, don’t develop.Pub Date: May 10, 2012
ISBN: 978-1475011395
Page Count: 300
Publisher: CreateSpace
Review Posted Online: Aug. 31, 2012
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
Authentic insights into the day-to-day operations of a psychiatric institute, told in broad strokes.
A group of doctors and patients at a psychiatric hospital scramble through each day in this meandering sequel (Kinzua State: Earthshine, 2010).
Dr. Jerome Masonheimer, a psychologist at Kinzua State Hospital, has just been assigned an overly ambitious intern, Elsa Heinzelman, and a new patient, Garner Overton, a smart manipulator with a history of anti-social behavior. In absorbingly tight prose, narrator Masonheimer exposes the intricacies of the psychiatric institution, including the dangerous outcomes when the eager Elsa underestimates the intelligence of its most formidable patient. This storyline alone would have sufficed in Geiger’s capable hands, but the staggering number of characters and hodgepodge of subplots—many worthwhile—could provide fodder for books of their own. Masonheimer conducts a poetry group where a diverse cast of minds meet, including Ophelia, a 22-year-old anorexic self-mutilator; Harvey, a boisterous rambler who “mills about with paranoid, paleologic thinking”; Lincoln, a Native American who communicates with spirits; and Cora Ruth, a depressed senior who has lost her family. Geiger, a psychologist for over 30 years, uses these poetry gatherings as glimpses into each patient’s broken psyche, but this gem-filled tangent competes for space with other goings-on, such as the saving of the campus greenhouse or the machinations of the hospital’s Historical Preservation Committee. Violent outbursts, consequences of understaffing and administrative biases play important roles in Kinzua State’s more than 100-year history; Geiger zealously explores each issue, to the novel’s detriment. What’s missing, however, is a turning point for its narrator. This is Masonheimer’s tale, yet little is revealed about him. When chaos erupts between his intern and Overton, he displays his psychological finesse, but Geiger holds him at a tangible distance from the reader, for reasons unknown. The wealth of subject matter holds many promising possibilities for sequels.
Authentic insights into the day-to-day operations of a psychiatric institute, told in broad strokes.Pub Date: Feb. 26, 2012
ISBN: 978-1467930277
Page Count: 352
Publisher: CreateSpace
Review Posted Online: June 26, 2012
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
An unabashed, candid memoir that continually entertains and educates.
Lutwick recounts being 22 years old and finding love while based at a Fijian outpost of the Peace Corps.
It was 1968, and Lutwick had graduated from the University of Michigan with an MBA. Unable to find work in corporate America, the author stumbled into the Peace Corps. He was sent to Fiji, where he faced an unlikely battle of his own: a taboo love affair. At that time in the Fiji Islands, an Indian woman caught having sexual relations with a non-Indian man, or any man other than her husband, could face death at the hands of her own people. Despite the risks, Lutwick fell in love with Rani, an Indian woman who worked in the same office. They carried on an illicit affair, beating the odds of social convention. In his beautifully written memoir, Lutwick interweaves hilarious childhood anecdotes with sadder commentaries of his life. His parents died within two years of each other, leaving him orphaned at the age of 10. Jewish, he also endured anti-Semitic bullying until he fought back one day, hurling his offender across a classroom and into the blackboard. He relays these memories with neither bitterness nor self-serving pity—just a good dose of humor and intelligence. The author balances these reflections with those of an older self navigating first love within the confines of unwritten, but strict, cultural decrees. Meanwhile, he shares thoughtful insight into Fiji’s exotic history and society, as seen by an ineffectual, scrappy Peace Corps volunteer with a lot to learn. Lutwick is also not shy about detailing his hedonistic mindset as a 22-year-old. The ridiculous lengths that he and his friend go to get high—ingesting huge amounts of nutmeg, for example—are off-the-charts hysterical.
An unabashed, candid memoir that continually entertains and educates.Pub Date: May 21, 2012
ISBN: 978-1935925118
Page Count: 266
Publisher: Peace Corps Writers
Review Posted Online: July 30, 2012
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 2012
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
© Copyright 2025 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Follow
Popular in this Genre
We can’t wait for you to join Kirkus!
It’s free and takes less than 10 seconds!
Already have an account? Log in.
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
Welcome Back!
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
