A well-portrayed streak of emotional growth runs through this man’s journey from bookish undergraduate to business leader.
Part coming-of-age tale, part dark-side-of-business exposé, this novel chronicles an immigrant experience.
Majid Khan, who’s studying math at Cambridge in the 1970s, is more comfortable with numbers than people. He plans on becoming an insurance actuary, but it’s through Cambridge Union debates that he makes his mark and meets the fellow students who make a profound impact on his life. Ellen Evan is the first and only girl he takes an interest in, and Nick Knights brings out Majid’s competitive side, both in debates and after graduation, when Nick and Majid end up on the management fast track at the same firm. As his relationship with Ellen continues, Majid, who makes frequent references to the fact that he was almost considered autistic as a child, grows more comfortable with the fuzzier, more emotional side of life—something the author symbolizes by having Majid suddenly develop a sense of smell after being without it from birth. His professional life takes off at the same time, with the firm’s executives pushing Majid out of his comfort zone and into a place of prominence. He realizes he could one day see himself as a CEO, if only to ensure that Nick doesn’t get the position. When Majid tries to push the firm to meet the new British regulatory requirements (which, along with the country’s 1980s privatization plans and the intricacies of estate agencies, may be somewhat opaque to American readers), it’s evident that trouble lies ahead, especially when Majid, who has already seen his relationship with Ellen disintegrate, is pushed out of the company. Majid’s ethical man–vs.–corporate corruption battle makes for a compelling storyline, though it can at times get bogged down in the minutiae of financial products and management training exercises. On the other hand, his relationship with Ellen, especially as he sets wedding dates several years in the future and lets them slip by, may leave readers wondering if Majid will ever make it out of his extended adolescence.
A well-portrayed streak of emotional growth runs through this man’s journey from bookish undergraduate to business leader.Pub Date: Nov. 7, 2012
ISBN: 978-0957026636
Page Count: 290
Publisher: DDKM (DADU, DEVI, KAARTU, MOOCHI) Publishing Ltd
Review Posted Online: Feb. 18, 2013
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 15, 2013
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
Briskly written soap with down-to-earth types, mostly without the lachrymose contrivances of Hannah’s previous titles...
Sisters in and out of love.
Meghann Dontess is a high-powered matrimonial lawyer in Seattle who prefers sex with strangers to emotional intimacy: a strategy bound to backfire sooner or later, warns her tough-talking shrink. It’s advice Meghann decides to ignore, along with the memories of her difficult childhood, neglectful mother, and younger sister. Though she managed to reunite Claire with Sam Cavenaugh (her father but not Meghann’s) when her mother abandoned both girls long ago, Meghann still feels guilty that her sister’s life doesn’t measure up, at least on her terms. Never married, Claire ekes out a living running a country campground with her dad and is raising her six-year-old daughter on her own. When she falls in love for the first time with an up-and-coming country musician, Meghann is appalled: Bobby Austin is a three-time loser at marriage—how on earth can Claire be so blind? Bobby’s blunt explanation doesn’t exactly satisfy the concerned big sister, who busies herself planning Claire’s dream wedding anyway. And, to relieve the stress, she beds various guys she picks up in bars, including Dr. Joe Wyatt, a neurosurgeon turned homeless drifter after the demise of his beloved wife Diane (whom he euthanized). When Claire’s awful headache turns out to be a kind of brain tumor known among neurologists as a “terminator,” Joe rallies. Turns out that Claire had befriended his wife on her deathbed, and now in turn he must try to save her. Is it too late? Will Meghann find true love at last?
Briskly written soap with down-to-earth types, mostly without the lachrymose contrivances of Hannah’s previous titles (Distant Shores, 2002, etc.). Kudos for skipping the snifflefest this time around.Pub Date: May 1, 2003
ISBN: 0-345-45073-6
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Ballantine
Review Posted Online: June 24, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2003
A first novel, this is also a first person account of Scout's (Jean Louise) recall of the years that led to the ending of a mystery, the breaking of her brother Jem's elbow, the death of her father's enemy — and the close of childhood years. A widower, Atticus raises his children with legal dispassion and paternal intelligence, and is ably abetted by Calpurnia, the colored cook, while the Alabama town of Maycomb, in the 1930's, remains aloof to their divergence from its tribal patterns. Scout and Jem, with their summer-time companion, Dill, find their paths free from interference — but not from dangers; their curiosity about the imprisoned Boo, whose miserable past is incorporated in their play, results in a tentative friendliness; their fears of Atticus' lack of distinction is dissipated when he shoots a mad dog; his defense of a Negro accused of raping a white girl, Mayella Ewell, is followed with avid interest and turns the rabble whites against him. Scout is the means of averting an attack on Atticus but when he loses the case it is Boo who saves Jem and Scout by killing Mayella's father when he attempts to murder them. The shadows of a beginning for black-white understanding, the persistent fight that Scout carries on against school, Jem's emergence into adulthood, Calpurnia's quiet power, and all the incidents touching on the children's "growing outward" have an attractive starchiness that keeps this southern picture pert and provocative. There is much advance interest in this book; it has been selected by the Literary Guild and Reader's Digest; it should win many friends.
Pub Date: July 11, 1960
ISBN: 0060935464
Page Count: 323
Publisher: Lippincott
Review Posted Online: Oct. 7, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 1960
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BOOK REVIEW
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
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