Look beyond its misleading title; this potential sleeper hit has about as much to do with LSD as the French do with Cool...
A young woman’s search for purpose and identity takes her from her stifling, humdrum home in 1950s Cleveland to exhilarating Paris, where anything seems possible, in this novel cum travelogue by French-American expat and literary agent Fuerst.
When Barbara Glass graduates from Western Reserve in the late 1950s, there’s just one thing on her mind: Paris. Unlike the rest of her female contemporaries content with trading in their books for secure secretarial jobs, Tupperware parties and wedding bands, Barbara bucks convention (and her controlling mother’s interests) to embark on a solo adventure to France by boat, in the style of “la fuite en avant—escaping from something through forward movement.” What starts out as a two-week stint turns into more than 10 years in la Ville-Lumières (the City of Lights), as she slowly transforms from country-bumpkin tourist to full-fledged Francophile. Through Barbara’s increasingly enlightened and sophisticated eyes, readers will want to come along for the ride as Barbara “trips” from her first raucous Bastille Day celebration to the Palio horserace in Siena to an Edith Piaf concert at the famous Olympia concert hall to war-torn Algiers during Ramadan. Heartaches—her best friend’s suicide following a bout of postpartum depression and amphetamine withdrawal, a thrilling but ill-advised one-night fling followed by a risky abortion, a long-term and inevitably terminal affair with a married man, her father’s fatal heart attack—are sprinkled in for good measure, adding necessary depth and meaning to what could otherwise seem like a fluff piece about a privileged college girl’s adventures and misadventures abroad. Told in first-person and including details similar to Fuerst’s life (like her protagonist, Fuerst is from “the Mistake by the Lake” and spent more than 20 years living in Paris), it’s hard not to imagine the book as a quasi-memoir, especially since the descriptions of smells, sounds and sights teem with such life and verve so as to suggest firsthand experience. As an added bonus, Fuerst balances out the narrative with three chapters that give a sociological overview of the Silent Generation (Barbara’s generation and, presumably, the author’s). While these interruptions initially seem out of place within the confines of the story, the topics covered provide interesting cultural references (wool bathing suits, the publication of the Kinsey Report, Levittown) and insights into a generation that is often overshadowed or misunderstood.
Look beyond its misleading title; this potential sleeper hit has about as much to do with LSD as the French do with Cool Whip.Pub Date: June 11, 2012
ISBN: 978-0615617459
Page Count: 282
Publisher: Dolmen Books
Review Posted Online: July 20, 2012
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
In more ways than one, a tale about young creatures testing their wings; a moving, entertaining winner.
A fifth-grade New Orleans girl discovers a mysterious chrysalis containing an unexpected creature in this middle-grade novel.
Jacquelyn Marie Johnson, called Jackie, is a 10-year-old African-American girl, the second oldest and the only girl of six siblings. She’s responsible, smart, and enjoys being in charge; she likes “paper dolls and long division and imagining things she had never seen.” Normally, Jackie has no trouble obeying her strict but loving parents. But when her potted snapdragon acquires a peculiar egg or maybe a chrysalis (she dubs it a chrysalegg), Jackie’s strong desire to protect it runs up against her mother’s rule against plants in the house. Jackie doesn’t exactly mean to lie, but she tells her mother she needs to keep the snapdragon in her room for a science project and gets permission. Jackie draws the chrysalegg daily, waiting for something to happen as it gets larger. When the amazing creature inside breaks free, Jackie is more determined than ever to protect it, but this leads her further into secrets and lies. The results when her parents find out are painful, and resolving the problem will take courage, honesty, and trust. Dumas (Jaden Toussaint, the Greatest: Episode 5, 2017, etc.) presents a very likable character in Jackie. At 10, she’s young enough to enjoy playing with paper dolls but has a maturity that even older kids can lack. She’s resourceful, as when she wants to measure a red spot on the chrysalegg; lacking calipers, she fashions one from her hairpin. Jackie’s inward struggle about what to obey—her dearest wishes or the parents she loves—is one many readers will understand. The book complicates this question by making Jackie’s parents, especially her mother, strict (as one might expect to keep order in a large family) but undeniably loving and protective as well—it’s not just a question of outwitting clueless adults. Jackie’s feelings about the creature (tender and responsible but also more than a little obsessive) are similarly shaded rather than black-and-white. The ending suggests that an intriguing sequel is to come.
In more ways than one, a tale about young creatures testing their wings; a moving, entertaining winner.Pub Date: Nov. 11, 2017
ISBN: 978-1-943169-32-0
Page Count: 212
Publisher: Plum Street Press
Review Posted Online: Feb. 22, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 15, 2018
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
A YA novel that treats its subject and its readers with respect while delivering an engaging story.
In the ninth book in the Bluford young-adult series, a young Latino man walks away from violence—but at great personal cost.
In a large Southern California city, 16-year-old Martin Luna hangs out on the fringes of gang life. He’s disaffected, fatherless and increasingly drawn into the orbit of the older, rougher Frankie. When a stray bullet kills Martin’s adored 8-year-old brother, Huero, Martin seems to be heading into a life of crime. But Martin’s mother, determined not to lose another son, moves him to another neighborhood—the fictional town of Bluford, where he attends the racially diverse Bluford High. At his new school, the still-grieving Martin quickly makes enemies and gets into trouble. But he also makes friends with a kind English teacher and catches the eye of Vicky, a smart, pretty and outgoing Bluford student. Martin’s first-person narration supplies much of the book’s power. His dialogue is plain, but realistic and believable, and the authors wisely avoid the temptation to lard his speech with dated and potentially embarrassing slang. The author draws a vivid and affecting picture of Martin’s pain and confusion, bringing a tight-lipped teenager to life. In fact, Martin’s character is so well drawn that when he realizes the truth about his friend Frankie, readers won’t feel as if they are watching an after-school special, but as though they are observing the natural progression of Martin’s personal growth. This short novel appears to be aimed at urban teens who don’t often see their neighborhoods portrayed in young-adult fiction, but its sophisticated characters and affecting story will likely have much wider appeal.
A YA novel that treats its subject and its readers with respect while delivering an engaging story.Pub Date: Jan. 1, 2004
ISBN: 978-1591940173
Page Count: 152
Publisher: Townsend Press
Review Posted Online: Jan. 26, 2013
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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