Fourteen years and three novels after Hearts, Wolitzer picks up precisely where she left off: widowed Linda Reismann, 27, is pulling into Los Angeles in her Mustang; Robin, her bratty adolescent stepdaughter, is asleep on the back seat. Skillfully interweaving a plot recap for those who missed the earlier volume, the author hurtles her characters through time into 1992. Rodney King and Reginald Denny are beaten, stores are destroyed by the riots, Clinton hits the campaign trail. The fact that Linda remains 27 and Robin 13 may startle some readers of the 1980 novel, but both characters are so genuine here that it scarcely matters. Wolitzer (who has also written several YA novels) captures the teenager brilliantly. Walking into a gourmet take-out shop for a snack, Robin finds only vegetable chips: ``They tasted a lot like regular potato chips, and the seltzer wasn't bad either. But what a rip-off.'' Passages such as this also indicate the major conflict that fuels the novel: the discrepancies between wealth and poverty, enchantment and delusion, for which LA's tinsel-town atmosphere provides the perfect setting. Deftly, quietly, characters milk each other emotionally and physically, yet amid it all some desperately and at times foolishly cling to love. Despite an onslaught of difficulties—everything from a car crash and a robbery/murder to a carefully engineered custody threat—Wolitzer guides readers at a slow, even pace, always allowing time for poetic description. Little asides that in some novels interfere with the pace here blend in seamlessly, for example, Linda's memory of a high school friend. Actions and reactions get sentimental at times, and a major plot development is tied up too easily, but the majority of readers will be too caught up in the characters' day-to-day frustrations and accomplishments for such nit-picking. (Literary Guild alternate selection; $50,000 ad/promo; author tour)
Pub Date: May 2, 1994
ISBN: 0-06-118007-6
Page Count: 384
Publisher: HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 1994
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Florian’s seventh collection of verse is also his most uneven; though the flair for clever rhyme that consistently lights up his other books, beginning with Monster Motel (1993), occasionally shows itself—“Hello, my name is Dracula/My clothing is all blackula./I drive a Cadillacula./I am a maniacula”—too many of the entries are routine limericks, putdowns, character portraits, rhymed lists that fall flat on the ear, or quick quips: “It’s hard to be anonymous/When you’re a hippopotamus.” Florian’s language and simple, thick-lined cartoons illustrations are equally ingenuous, and he sticks to tried-and-true subjects, from dinosaurs to school lunch, but the well of inspiration seems dry; revisit his hilarious Bing Bang Boing (1994) instead. (index) (Poetry. 8-10)
Pub Date: April 1, 1999
ISBN: 0-15-202084-5
Page Count: 158
Publisher: Harcourt
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 1999
Anna may learn to laugh with, instead of at, Grey, but the constant lampooning leaves the reader numb.
Can a young, preternaturally successful corporate executive overcome his 50 shameful secrets to find true love?
Andrew Shaffer (Great Philosophers who Failed at Love, 2011), writing as Merkin, skewers both E. L. James’ Fifty Shades of Grey and Stephanie Meyer’s Twilight in his debut novel. Both series are certainly ripe for parody, yet Shaffer misses a real opportunity by indulging in easy, crude jokes, rather than incisive satire. Shaffer’s Anna Steal, like James’ Anastasia Steele and Meyer’s Bella Swan, suffers from a relentless interior monologue. Unfortunately, she offers little in the way of thought or advice, but instead wonders how elevators work and gulps in awe of Mr. Grey. Anna meets Grey while interviewing him for Boardroom Hotties, the magazine her too-often-hung-over roommate writes for, and the attraction is instantaneous. Grey quickly seeks to acquire Anna, dazzling her with his wealth by purchasing Wal-Mart just to give her the afternoon off for a date, buying Washington State University just to relieve her of taking tests, flying her about in his fighter jets and helicopters, ordering two of everything on the room-service menu, and whisking her away to a private island. Yet Grey has “dangerous” secrets. Unlike Edward Cullen, who was a lethal vampire, or Christian Grey, who sought the perfect submissive for his domination, Earl Grey indulges in rather tame danger. His secrets include a fondness for spanking, swimming in silver thongs, dressing up as an elf, and decorating with black velvet paintings. Warning Anna about his kinky sexuality, he introduces her to his Room of Doom, where they play Bards, Dragons, Sorcery and Magick. More a Master of Dungeons and Dragons than BDSM, Grey shocks Anna not with his deviance but his self-delusions.
Anna may learn to laugh with, instead of at, Grey, but the constant lampooning leaves the reader numb.Pub Date: July 31, 2012
ISBN: 978-0-306-82199-8
Page Count: 224
Publisher: Da Capo
Review Posted Online: July 21, 2012
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2012
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