Heavy family angst from screenwriter DiPego (Keeper of the City, 1997), who manages to pack his latest tale with enough madness, sex, submerged resentment, and secret fears to stock several soap operas for a full season. Narrator Claude Cheever—Cheevey to us and everyone else—is right on the cusp of 20: still living with Mom and Dad, working nights at Dad's television store, looking for a girlfriend, and eager to grow up. ``I'm turning twenty in two weeks. It's a difficult maneuver . . . so much more is expected of a twenty-year old.'' Like most teenagers, Cheevey sees life as an endless procession of days in which nothing ever happens, but soon enough the wind changes with a vengeance and nearly blows the house down. Out of nowhere, Cheevey's mother announces that she's divorcing his father and moving to France—next week. His sister Mari's delusions are developing into full-fledged schizophrenia, though Cheevey's anal brother-in-law Bob refuses to take note. And Mari's friend Dash seems to want to seduce Cheevey but can't get her act together, so Cheevey seduces the considerably older Lauren (girlfriend of his of big brother Phil) instead. Throughout all of this, no one except Cheevey and Mari seems aware of what's going on, much less willing to talk about it: Cheevey is unable to convince his own brother to come to his birthday party, and his father can't even be bothered to call Mari to tell her about the divorce. As usual, a tragic and senseless death is the only thing that suffices to shake everyone out of their slumber, but here the death serves more as a convenient close of events rather than any indication of some new beginning. The Montagues and Capulets might have learned from their mistakes, but the Cheevers seem simply sad. Quickly tedious and finally shallow.
Pub Date: April 1, 1996
ISBN: 0-316-18549-3
Page Count: 288
Publisher: Little, Brown
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 1996
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
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
Briskly written soap with down-to-earth types, mostly without the lachrymose contrivances of Hannah’s previous titles...
Sisters in and out of love.
Meghann Dontess is a high-powered matrimonial lawyer in Seattle who prefers sex with strangers to emotional intimacy: a strategy bound to backfire sooner or later, warns her tough-talking shrink. It’s advice Meghann decides to ignore, along with the memories of her difficult childhood, neglectful mother, and younger sister. Though she managed to reunite Claire with Sam Cavenaugh (her father but not Meghann’s) when her mother abandoned both girls long ago, Meghann still feels guilty that her sister’s life doesn’t measure up, at least on her terms. Never married, Claire ekes out a living running a country campground with her dad and is raising her six-year-old daughter on her own. When she falls in love for the first time with an up-and-coming country musician, Meghann is appalled: Bobby Austin is a three-time loser at marriage—how on earth can Claire be so blind? Bobby’s blunt explanation doesn’t exactly satisfy the concerned big sister, who busies herself planning Claire’s dream wedding anyway. And, to relieve the stress, she beds various guys she picks up in bars, including Dr. Joe Wyatt, a neurosurgeon turned homeless drifter after the demise of his beloved wife Diane (whom he euthanized). When Claire’s awful headache turns out to be a kind of brain tumor known among neurologists as a “terminator,” Joe rallies. Turns out that Claire had befriended his wife on her deathbed, and now in turn he must try to save her. Is it too late? Will Meghann find true love at last?
Briskly written soap with down-to-earth types, mostly without the lachrymose contrivances of Hannah’s previous titles (Distant Shores, 2002, etc.). Kudos for skipping the snifflefest this time around.Pub Date: May 1, 2003
ISBN: 0-345-45073-6
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Ballantine
Review Posted Online: June 24, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2003
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