A gritty, realistic, and sometimes preachy final installment in the late Carroll's Vietnam War trilogy (North S.A.R., 1991; Ghostwriter One, 1993). In the spring of 1975, Navy pilots Tim Boyle and Santy are sent to Saigon to help coordinate the evacuation of the Americans and their South Vietnamese friends. As North Vietnamese forces approach, the city is nearly paralyzed with fear. Santy and Boyle fight the clock, Viet Cong sappers, incompetent superior officers, and the accidents that befall those under the pressures of war. Meanwhile, Navy SEALs Thompson and Dalton are trying to locate one of their own, Tony Butler. Listed as MIA since 1968, Butler has been leading montagnard tribesmen in a guerrilla war against the North. Thompson and Dalton have been in sporadic contact with him, and send him one last message: If you want out, it's now. As Butler heads south to his rendezvous point, Thompson and Dalton make their way north, through the North Vietnamese armies rushing toward the final battle. Back in Saigon, the evacuation resembles a riot, and Carrollin top form herecreates a palpable atmosphere of doom and despair. When Thompson and Dalton finally reach Butler, Boyle and Santy make one last air-borne foray into the jungle. As in his previous novels, Carroll's authentic details immerse you in the action, whether he's describing the landing of a disabled helicopter on an aircraft carrier, or the Saigon crowds storming the US Embassy. But the presence of political message begins to grate: The real villains, we read over and over, are a gutless Congress and a US citizenry lacking moral courage. Strangely, Carroll assigns the presidency little blame. And the military? It's always pure of heart and motive. Still, the intense drama of a nation's collapse, combined with jolting action scenes, carries you through the polemical discourse.
Pub Date: Aug. 1, 1995
ISBN: 0-671-86510-2
Page Count: 432
Publisher: Pocket
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 15, 1995
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Not as thematically ambitious as Whitehead’s earlier work, but a whole lot of fun to read.
Another surprise from an author who never writes the same novel twice.
Though Whitehead has earned considerable critical acclaim for his earlier work—in particular his debut (The Intuitionist, 1999) and its successor (John Henry Days, 2001)—he’ll likely reach a wider readership with his warmest novel to date. Funniest as well, though there have been flashes of humor throughout his writing. The author blurs the line between fiction and memoir as he recounts the coming-of-age summer of 15-year-old Benji Cooper in the family’s summer retreat of New York’s Sag Harbor. “According to the world, we were the definition of paradox: black boys with beach houses,” writes Whitehead. Caucasians are only an occasional curiosity within this idyll, and parents are mostly absent as well. Each chapter is pretty much a self-contained entity, corresponding to a rite of passage: getting the first job, negotiating the mysteries of the opposite sex. There’s an accident with a BB gun and plenty of episodes of convincing someone older to buy beer, but not much really happens during this particular summer. Yet by the end of it, Benji is well on his way to becoming Ben, and he realizes that he is a different person than when the summer started. He also realizes that this time in his life will eventually live only in memory. There might be some distinctions between Benji and Whitehead, though the novelist also spent his youthful summers in Sag Harbor and was the same age as Benji in 1985, when the novel is set. Yet the first-person narrator has the novelist’s eye for detail, craft of character development and analytical instincts for sharp social commentary.
Not as thematically ambitious as Whitehead’s earlier work, but a whole lot of fun to read.Pub Date: April 28, 2009
ISBN: 978-0-385-52765-1
Page Count: 288
Publisher: Doubleday
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2009
BOOK TO SCREEN
Anyone who believes in true love or is simply willing to accept it as the premise of a winding tale will find this debut an...
True love flares between two people, but they find that circumstances always impede it.
On a winter day in London, Laurie spots Jack from her bus home and he sparks a feeling in her so deep that she spends the next year searching for him. Her roommate and best friend, Sarah, is the perfect wing-woman but ultimately—and unknowingly—ends the search by finding Jack and falling for him herself. Laurie’s hasty decision not to tell Sarah is the second painful missed opportunity (after not getting off the bus), but Sarah’s happiness is so important to Laurie that she dedicates ample energy into retraining her heart not to love Jack. Laurie is misguided, but her effort and loyalty spring from a true heart, and she considers her project mostly successful. Perhaps she would have total success, but the fact of the matter is that Jack feels the same deep connection to Laurie. His reasons for not acting on them are less admirable: He likes Sarah and she’s the total package; why would he give that up just because every time he and Laurie have enough time together (and just enough alcohol) they nearly fall into each other’s arms? Laurie finally begins to move on, creating a mostly satisfying life for herself, whereas Jack’s inability to be genuine tortures him and turns him into an ever bigger jerk. Patriarchy—it hurts men, too! There’s no question where the book is going, but the pacing is just right, the tone warm, and the characters sympathetic, even when making dumb decisions.
Anyone who believes in true love or is simply willing to accept it as the premise of a winding tale will find this debut an emotional, satisfying read.Pub Date: Oct. 16, 2018
ISBN: 978-0-525-57468-2
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Crown
Review Posted Online: July 30, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 2018
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK TO SCREEN
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