A taut, compelling family tale.
A debut novel mixes high school drama, teen romance, and a strong thread of mystery and thriller.
New kids are a big deal in the quiet town of Millington Valley. All the more so when they’re as eye-catching as Molly Hanover, who makes a splash when she arrives in her senior year of high school and begins going out with football star Wade Thornton. Wade’s friendships fray, especially with his best friend and teammate, Tommy “Legs”; cheerleaders like Missi Reynolds harass Molly over her newfound happiness; and her mother’s landlord hangs around, becoming more than a little creepy. But when Molly is about to tell Wade and her mother, Ann, about the worst of what’s really been happening to her, the rush of emotion and Wade’s nasty drinking habit put them in a terrible accident. Molly wakes to discover scars weighing on her once-beautiful features while holes and suspicions eat at her memory. With her memory in pieces and her injuries severe, matters only seem to be getting worse for her, Ann, and Wade. If no one can put together what Molly was so desperate—and afraid—to tell her loved ones, disaster will be just around the next bend. With strong prose and pacing, the pages turn quickly and easily. Ann’s need to provide a good life for her daughter; Molly’s insecurities and love of words; and Wade’s fraught relationship with his town, team, and alcohol all feel genuine and well-conceived. That said, Christie’s story can feel light on detail at times. Wade’s initial, intense feelings for Molly are well-conveyed, but their relationship doesn’t have quite enough space, communication, and context to grow and deepen. The same goes for Molly, whose feelings when dealing with bullying and harassment are clear and palpable, but who has almost no time to process the worst of what happens to her before the accident seals her memory. It’s also worth noting that few of the secondary players really seem to have lives outside of their dealings with the protagonists. That said, the central characters’ story has plenty to make it worthwhile, and many readers are sure to feel at home with this intriguing book despite any shortcomings.
A taut, compelling family tale.Pub Date: Jan. 25, 2018
ISBN: 978-1-61296-940-4
Page Count: -
Publisher: Black Rose Writing
Review Posted Online: Oct. 30, 2017
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
BOOK REVIEW
A strict report, worthy of sympathy.
A violent surfacing of adolescence (which has little in common with Tarkington's earlier, broadly comic, Seventeen) has a compulsive impact.
"Nobody big except me" is the dream world of Holden Caulfield and his first person story is down to the basic, drab English of the pre-collegiate. For Holden is now being bounced from fancy prep, and, after a vicious evening with hall- and roommates, heads for New York to try to keep his latest failure from his parents. He tries to have a wild evening (all he does is pay the check), is terrorized by the hotel elevator man and his on-call whore, has a date with a girl he likes—and hates, sees his 10 year old sister, Phoebe. He also visits a sympathetic English teacher after trying on a drunken session, and when he keeps his date with Phoebe, who turns up with her suitcase to join him on his flight, he heads home to a hospital siege. This is tender and true, and impossible, in its picture of the old hells of young boys, the lonesomeness and tentative attempts to be mature and secure, the awful block between youth and being grown-up, the fright and sickness that humans and their behavior cause the challenging, the dramatization of the big bang. It is a sorry little worm's view of the off-beat of adult pressure, of contemporary strictures and conformity, of sentiment….
A strict report, worthy of sympathy.Pub Date: June 15, 1951
ISBN: 0316769177
Page Count: -
Publisher: Little, Brown
Review Posted Online: Nov. 2, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 1951
BOOK REVIEW
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
APPRECIATIONS
Genetically engineered dinosaurs run amok in Crichton's new, vastly entertaining science thriller. From the introduction alone—a classically Crichton-clear discussion of the implications of biotechnological research—it's evident that the Harvard M.D. has bounced back from the science-fantasy silliness of Sphere (1987) for another taut reworking of the Frankenstein theme, as in The Andromeda Strain and The Terminal Man. Here, Dr. Frankenstein is aging billionaire John Hammond, whose monster is a manmade ecosystem based on a Costa Rican island. Designed as the world's ultimate theme park, the ecosystem boasts climate and flora of the Jurassic Age and—most spectacularly—15 varieties of dinosaurs, created by elaborate genetic engineering that Crichton explains in fascinating detail, rich with dino-lore and complete with graphics. Into the park, for a safety check before its opening, comes the novel's band of characters—who, though well drawn, double as symbolic types in this unsubtle morality play. Among them are hero Alan Grant, noble paleontologist; Hammond, venal and obsessed; amoral dino-designer Henry Wu; Hammond's two innocent grandchildren; and mathematician Ian Malcolm, who in long diatribes serves as Crichton's mouthpiece to lament the folly of science. Upon arrival, the visitors tour the park; meanwhile, an industrial spy steals some dino embryos by shutting down the island's power—and its security grid, allowing the beasts to run loose. The bulk of the remaining narrative consists of dinos—ferocious T. Rex's, voracious velociraptors, venom-spitting dilophosaurs—stalking, ripping, and eating the cast in fast, furious, and suspenseful set-pieces as the ecosystem spins apart. And can Grant prevent the dinos from escaping to the mainland to create unchecked havoc? Though intrusive, the moralizing rarely slows this tornado-paced tale, a slick package of info-thrills that's Crichton's most clever since Congo (1980)—and easily the most exciting dinosaur novel ever written. A sure-fire best-seller.
Pub Date: Nov. 7, 1990
ISBN: 0394588169
Page Count: 424
Publisher: Knopf
Review Posted Online: Sept. 21, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 1990
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