An enjoyable, sexy, light mystery with likable characters.
An actor and amateur sleuth returns to the Crescent City to deal with a family complication in this second installment of a series.
Jeff Chaussier has been away from New Orleans for the past few years, plying his trade on the Midwestern theater circuit and trying to keep himself distracted from thoughts of Bryna, the girl he left behind: “Really, it was my reluctance to face her hurt and anger that kept me far up the Mississippi.” Now, his mother and Aunt Marie are worried that Jeff’s cousin Cal, Marie’s son, is in some sort of trouble. He is enrolled at a university, is involved in a theatrical production, and may have a girlfriend. But “his behavior had changed and he had become secretive. He kept odd hours and his comings and goings were erratic and hard to chart.” As Jeff begins nosing around, he finds himself immersed in another chaotic and dangerous caper that includes a very tempting gastronomic tour of New Orleans’ hidden treasures. He seeks help and advice from his family and an impressive array of quirky friends, including an ex-Marine and his wife, also a former Marine, who own and perform in a female impersonator club. Everybody seems to know something but no one offers enough clues to solve the Cal puzzle. And, of course, there’s the beautiful Bryna, whom Jeff finally seeks out only to discover her with a baby girl. He assumes she has moved on without him. Add in drug dealers flooding the city with their wares and a mysterious missing young woman, not to mention an abundance of reasonably tasteful bedroom scenes, and the tale delivers plenty of action to keep the novel engaging. While the story has a few loose threads, Sanchez (Lit by Lightning, 2014, etc.) creates appealing characters and vivid images, his prose elevated by a flair for the absurd: “A cigar and a Marine tattoo did not go well with a blonde wig and mascara, but Tommy was between shows.” Still, many female readers are likely to find Jeff’s frequent playful slapping of Bryna’s naked derriere (she always “yelps”) less than amusing.
An enjoyable, sexy, light mystery with likable characters.Pub Date: Sept. 18, 2018
ISBN: 978-1-72380-970-5
Page Count: 267
Publisher: Self
Review Posted Online: Dec. 14, 2019
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
The phrase “tour de force” could have been invented for this audacious novel.
Four men who meet as college roommates move to New York and spend the next three decades gaining renown in their professions—as an architect, painter, actor and lawyer—and struggling with demons in their intertwined personal lives.
Yanagihara (The People in the Trees, 2013) takes the still-bold leap of writing about characters who don’t share her background; in addition to being male, JB is African-American, Malcolm has a black father and white mother, Willem is white, and “Jude’s race was undetermined”—deserted at birth, he was raised in a monastery and had an unspeakably traumatic childhood that’s revealed slowly over the course of the book. Two of them are gay, one straight and one bisexual. There isn’t a single significant female character, and for a long novel, there isn’t much plot. There aren’t even many markers of what’s happening in the outside world; Jude moves to a loft in SoHo as a young man, but we don’t see the neighborhood change from gritty artists’ enclave to glitzy tourist destination. What we get instead is an intensely interior look at the friends’ psyches and relationships, and it’s utterly enthralling. The four men think about work and creativity and success and failure; they cook for each other, compete with each other and jostle for each other’s affection. JB bases his entire artistic career on painting portraits of his friends, while Malcolm takes care of them by designing their apartments and houses. When Jude, as an adult, is adopted by his favorite Harvard law professor, his friends join him for Thanksgiving in Cambridge every year. And when Willem becomes a movie star, they all bask in his glow. Eventually, the tone darkens and the story narrows to focus on Jude as the pain of his past cuts deep into his carefully constructed life.
The phrase “tour de force” could have been invented for this audacious novel.Pub Date: March 10, 2015
ISBN: 978-0-385-53925-8
Page Count: 720
Publisher: Doubleday
Review Posted Online: Dec. 21, 2014
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2015
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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Dated sermonizing on career versus motherhood, and conflict driven by characters’ willed helplessness, sap this tale of...
Lifelong, conflicted friendship of two women is the premise of Hannah’s maudlin latest (Magic Hour, 2006, etc.), again set in Washington State.
Tallulah “Tully” Hart, father unknown, is the daughter of a hippie, Cloud, who makes only intermittent appearances in her life. Tully takes refuge with the family of her “best friend forever,” Kate Mularkey, who compares herself unfavorably with Tully, in regards to looks and charisma. In college, “TullyandKate” pledge the same sorority and major in communications. Tully has a life goal for them both: They will become network TV anchorwomen. Tully lands an internship at KCPO-TV in Seattle and finagles a producing job for Kate. Kate no longer wishes to follow Tully into broadcasting and is more drawn to fiction writing, but she hesitates to tell her overbearing friend. Meanwhile a love triangle blooms at KCPO: Hard-bitten, irresistibly handsome, former war correspondent Johnny is clearly smitten with Tully. Expecting rejection, Kate keeps her infatuation with Johnny secret. When Tully lands a reporting job with a Today-like show, her career shifts into hyperdrive. Johnny and Kate had started an affair once Tully moved to Manhattan, and when Kate gets pregnant with daughter Marah, they marry. Kate is content as a stay-at-home mom, but frets about being Johnny’s second choice and about her unrealized writing ambitions. Tully becomes Seattle’s answer to Oprah. She hires Johnny, which spells riches for him and Kate. But Kate’s buttons are fully depressed by pitched battles over slutwear and curfews with teenaged Marah, who idolizes her godmother Tully. In an improbable twist, Tully invites Kate and Marah to resolve their differences on her show, only to blindside Kate by accusing her, on live TV, of overprotecting Marah. The BFFs are sundered. Tully’s latest attempt to salvage Cloud fails: The incorrigible, now geriatric hippie absconds once more. Just as Kate develops a spine, she’s given some devastating news. Will the friends reconcile before it’s too late?
Dated sermonizing on career versus motherhood, and conflict driven by characters’ willed helplessness, sap this tale of poignancy.Pub Date: Feb. 1, 2008
ISBN: 978-0-312-36408-3
Page Count: 496
Publisher: St. Martin's
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 1, 2007
BOOK TO SCREEN
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