A poignant coming-of-age story about the bonds of friendship, the heartache of first love and navigating the turbulent waters of marriage and family.
Francis “Fran” Hopkins Draper Jr. grew up in the affluent suburb of Chestnut Hill, Pa., with his older sister Heather, his French, socially conscious mother and kowtowing father. He’s quick to point out that his relatives are “Long Island-lock-jawed, garden variety WASPs, a family whose members were born on third base but thought they’d hit a triple.” Fran and his peers are products of private-school education and his parents view themselves as part of the “impoverished aristocracy.” Groome frames his novel as Fran’s midlife memoir—which Heather cajoles her barely 30-year-old sibling into writing—based on his remarkable life that includes dropping out of Dartmouth, two marriages, a decorated tour in the military, a failed baseball career, a successful business career and an ongoing estrangement from his parents. In particular, Fran recounts his experiences in the summer of 1955. Having just graduated from high school, he and his best friend Potter work a summer job in Quebec. Introduced to a beautiful young woman named Lisette, Fran is immediately smitten by this girl who’s nothing like the shallow debutantes back home. Unfortunately, the love affair is short-lived, as the boys soon return home—where Potter must deal with his girlfriend’s potential pregnancy. Although Potter dodges that bullet, Fran and Lisette aren’t so lucky. Despite their upbringing, Fran and Heather are open-minded and focus on an individual’s character rather than on which side of the tracks they were raised. Their mother finds social standing, breeding and appearances to be of the utmost importance, yet compared to their compatriots, the Drapers are struggling financially—and the hypocrisy isn’t lost on her children. The harder she tries to turn the charade into reality by forcing her children into upper-class roles, the more she alienates them. The author deftly renders a sad portrait of a family being pulled apart by an alcoholic mother in denial. Though the narrative’s beginning is a bit bumpy, Groome quickly finds his stride. Writing in accessible, straight-forward prose, Groome creates a touching fictional memoir to cleverly illustrate a life lesson—without endings, there would be no beginnings. A heartfelt, captivating read, packed with familial politics and strife.
Pub Date: April 1, 2012
ISBN: N/A
Page Count: 217
Publisher: Kurti Publishing
Review Posted Online: July 26, 2011
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
BOOK REVIEW
Suspenseful, frightening, and sometimes poignant—provided the reader has a generously willing suspension of disbelief.
A man walks out of a bar and his life becomes a kaleidoscope of altered states in this science-fiction thriller.
Crouch opens on a family in a warm, resonant domestic moment with three well-developed characters. At home in Chicago’s Logan Square, Jason Dessen dices an onion while his wife, Daniela, sips wine and chats on the phone. Their son, Charlie, an appealing 15-year-old, sketches on a pad. Still, an undertone of regret hovers over the couple, a preoccupation with roads not taken, a theme the book will literally explore, in multifarious ways. To start, both Jason and Daniela abandoned careers that might have soared, Jason as a physicist, Daniela as an artist. When Charlie was born, he suffered a major illness. Jason was forced to abandon promising research to teach undergraduates at a small college. Daniela turned from having gallery shows to teaching private art lessons to middle school students. On this bracing October evening, Jason visits a local bar to pay homage to Ryan Holder, a former college roommate who just received a major award for his work in neuroscience, an honor that rankles Jason, who, Ryan says, gave up on his career. Smarting from the comment, Jason suffers “a sucker punch” as he heads home that leaves him “standing on the precipice.” From behind Jason, a man with a “ghost white” face, “red, pursed lips," and "horrifying eyes” points a gun at Jason and forces him to drive an SUV, following preset navigational directions. At their destination, the abductor forces Jason to strip naked, beats him, then leads him into a vast, abandoned power plant. Here, Jason meets men and women who insist they want to help him. Attempting to escape, Jason opens a door that leads him into a series of dark, strange, yet eerily familiar encounters that sometimes strain credibility, especially in the tale's final moments.
Suspenseful, frightening, and sometimes poignant—provided the reader has a generously willing suspension of disbelief.Pub Date: July 26, 2016
ISBN: 978-1-101-90422-0
Page Count: 352
Publisher: Crown
Review Posted Online: May 3, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 15, 2016
PROFILES
BOOK TO SCREEN
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
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