Readers will get a mildly informative look at the money-drenched world of finance but may be hard-pressed to finish this...
A dreary look into the inner life of a cash-rich, joy-poor Manhattan financial analyst, courtesy of second-novelist Sernovitz (Great American Plain, 2001).
Chris Kelch earns $500K a year at Freshler Feld as the company’s fifth-ranked analyst, age 28. His understanding of the market—though in bleak moments he concedes that no one understands it—and his ability to make others move huge sums of money around give him a sense of power and pleasure rivaled by nothing else. He spends his scant personal time being patronizing to his adorably well-bred girlfriend (self-obsessed Kelch ignores her work-life) and sparring with his rivals/friends at the office, while trying to keep as much space as possible between himself and his mother and sister in Rockford, Illinois. In his childhood, Kelch’s single mother struggled financially. Now, his sister’s husband works at a plant, and in reaction Kelch money-grubs. Generally, the narrator relies on mean cultural stereotypes more than character development: there’s an uptight Asian guy and an arrogant Jew, while the author somehow imagines that Kelch’s midwestern roots make him intrinsically nice despite his apparent lack of heart. Out one night, Kelch meets an erstwhile novelist-cum-journalist, and, to impress his girlfriend, agrees to meet the writer later. Well, after Kelch tells all over a few beers, his ordinary life (Kafka with cash) is blown out of the water when the mousy journalist/novelist writes a vicious and brilliant exposé about “Scott” and his job (though the harsh/heartfelt article may provide the book’s best pages). Horrified, Kelch is certain everyone knows. Indeed, his long-dormant dad calls about the piece, and it seems Kelch’s arrogant, well-educated assistant is gunning for his job. Grim. Paycheck-driven Kelch does some agonized introspection and begins to Plan for Life After Freshler Feld, but there are some surprises in store for Kelch at story’s end.
Readers will get a mildly informative look at the money-drenched world of finance but may be hard-pressed to finish this otherwise sluggish tale.Pub Date: Sept. 13, 2002
ISBN: 0-8050-6778-7
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Henry Holt
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2002
Suspenseful, full of incident, and not obviously necessary.
Atwood goes back to Gilead.
The Handmaid’s Tale (1985), consistently regarded as a masterpiece of 20th-century literature, has gained new attention in recent years with the success of the Hulu series as well as fresh appreciation from readers who feel like this story has new relevance in America’s current political climate. Atwood herself has spoken about how news headlines have made her dystopian fiction seem eerily plausible, and it’s not difficult to imagine her wanting to revisit Gilead as the TV show has sped past where her narrative ended. Like the novel that preceded it, this sequel is presented as found documents—first-person accounts of life inside a misogynistic theocracy from three informants. There is Agnes Jemima, a girl who rejects the marriage her family arranges for her but still has faith in God and Gilead. There’s Daisy, who learns on her 16th birthday that her whole life has been a lie. And there's Aunt Lydia, the woman responsible for turning women into Handmaids. This approach gives readers insight into different aspects of life inside and outside Gilead, but it also leads to a book that sometimes feels overstuffed. The Handmaid’s Tale combined exquisite lyricism with a powerful sense of urgency, as if a thoughtful, perceptive woman was racing against time to give witness to her experience. That narrator hinted at more than she said; Atwood seemed to trust readers to fill in the gaps. This dynamic created an atmosphere of intimacy. However curious we might be about Gilead and the resistance operating outside that country, what we learn here is that what Atwood left unsaid in the first novel generated more horror and outrage than explicit detail can. And the more we get to know Agnes, Daisy, and Aunt Lydia, the less convincing they become. It’s hard, of course, to compete with a beloved classic, so maybe the best way to read this new book is to forget about The Handmaid’s Tale and enjoy it as an artful feminist thriller.
Suspenseful, full of incident, and not obviously necessary.Pub Date: Sept. 10, 2019
ISBN: 978-0-385-54378-1
Page Count: 432
Publisher: Nan A. Talese
Review Posted Online: Sept. 3, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2019
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
This book sings with the terrible silence of dead civilizations in which once there was valor.
Written with quiet dignity that builds to a climax of tragic force, this book about the dissolution of an African tribe, its traditions, and values, represents a welcome departure from the familiar "Me, white brother" genre.
Written by a Nigerian African trained in missionary schools, this novel tells quietly the story of a brave man, Okonkwo, whose life has absolute validity in terms of his culture, and who exercises his prerogative as a warrior, father, and husband with unflinching single mindedness. But into the complex Nigerian village filters the teachings of strangers, teachings so alien to the tribe, that resistance is impossible. One must distinguish a force to be able to oppose it, and to most, the talk of Christian salvation is no more than the babbling of incoherent children. Still, with his guns and persistence, the white man, amoeba-like, gradually absorbs the native culture and in despair, Okonkwo, unable to withstand the corrosion of what he, alone, understands to be the life force of his people, hangs himself. In the formlessness of the dying culture, it is the missionary who takes note of the event, reminding himself to give Okonkwo's gesture a line or two in his work, The Pacification of the Primitive Tribes of the Lower Niger.
This book sings with the terrible silence of dead civilizations in which once there was valor.Pub Date: Jan. 23, 1958
ISBN: 0385474547
Page Count: 207
Publisher: McDowell, Obolensky
Review Posted Online: April 23, 2013
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 1958
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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