by Jackie Townsend ‧ RELEASE DATE: Feb. 22, 2012
A realistic, moving chronicle of the evolving relationship between sisters.
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Two sisters travel a rocky path to self-fulfillment—watching some movies along the way—in this reflective debut novel.
Betty and Jamie, red-haired siblings just a year apart in age, don’t exactly share a sisterly bond. In an early scene, 9-year-old Betty wishes her younger sister “would pirouette right through the pane glass window.” Seconds later, Jamie injures herself in a fall, and Betty lets her writhe in pain for several minutes before calling for help. It’s an event that sets the tone for the sisters’ future relationship—there’s love between them, but it’s tempered by misunderstandings, jealousy and failures to connect. A difficult home life doesn’t make things easier: Their father is a frustrated actor turned therapist, their mother an ambitious career woman who leaves her husband for another man as her daughters enter adolescence. These formative experiences leave a deep impression, which is apparent as the sisters grow older and make decisions about motherhood, careers and romance. A complex relationship with their moody, troubled mom haunts them, and neither sibling can forgive her failings. Betty copes by overcompensating, embracing her maternal instinct (she has three children) and designing a line of baby clothes. Jamie’s relationship to motherhood is more complicated. Cancer treatments appear to have left her infertile, and her husband is adamant he doesn’t want children. The novel is episodic and shifts between the recent and more distant past. A different film provides the structure for each chapter to indicate both the era and the circumstances of the sisters’ lives—Little Darlings during their teen years in the early 1980s, Breaking the Waves in the mid-’90s when Betty sacrifices her dreams to support her husband’s career. Some of these references work better than others; readers may be more familiar with The Wizard of Oz or Hitchcock’s Vertigo than the less-memorable 1998 film Primary Colors, and the summary of movie plots occasionally distracts from the larger story. From Betty’s infidelity to a shocking revelation from Jamie’s husband, the sisters have plenty of their own drama without heading to the movies. But they grow wiser as they age, a trajectory that expands the novel’s emotional scope.
A realistic, moving chronicle of the evolving relationship between sisters.Pub Date: Feb. 22, 2012
ISBN: 978-0983791508
Page Count: 376
Publisher: Ripetta Press
Review Posted Online: May 2, 2012
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2012
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
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by William Poe ‧ RELEASE DATE: Nov. 16, 2015
Downbeat but often engaging poems and stories.
A slim volume of largely gay-themed writings with pessimistic overtones.
Poe (Simple Simon, 2013, etc.) divides this collection of six short stories and 34 poems into five sections: “Art,” “Death,” “Relationship,” “Being,” and “Reflection.” Significantly, a figurative death at the age of 7 appears in two different poems, in which the author uses the phrase “a pretended life” to refer to the idea of hiding one’s true nature and performing socially enforced gender roles. This is a well-worn trope, but it will be powerful and resonant for many who have struggled with a stigmatized identity. In a similar vein, “Imaginary Tom” presents the remnants of a faded relationship: “Now we are imaginary friends, different in each other’s thoughts, / I the burden you seek to discard, / you the lover I created from the mist of longing.” Once in a while, short story passages practically leap off of the page, such as this evocative description of a seedy establishment in Lincoln, Nebraska: “It was a dimly lit bar that smelled of rodent piss, with barstools that danced on uneven legs and made the patrons wonder if they were drunker than they thought.” In “Valéry’s Ride,” Poe examines the familial duties that often fall to unmarried and childless people, keeping them from forming meaningful bonds with others. In this story, after the double whammy of Hurricanes Katrina and Rita hits Louisiana, Valéry’s extended family needs him more than ever; readers will likely root for the gay protagonist as he makes the difficult decision to strike out on his own. Not all of Poe’s main characters are gay; the heterosexual title character in “Mrs. Calumet’s Workspace,” for instance, pursues employment in order to escape the confines of her home and a passionless marriage. Working as a bookkeeper, she attempts to carve out a space for herself, symbolized by changes in her work area. Still, this story echoes the recurring theme of lives unlived due to forces often beyond one’s control.
Downbeat but often engaging poems and stories.Pub Date: Nov. 16, 2015
ISBN: 978-1-5168-3693-2
Page Count: 120
Publisher: CreateSpace
Review Posted Online: March 5, 2016
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
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by J.C. Salazar ‧ RELEASE DATE: Aug. 1, 2018
A volume of poetry that shines when focused on the author’s experiences of race and culture.
A collection speaks in part to the poet’s Mexican-American heritage.
In these multifaceted poems, Mexico-born, Houston-raised Salazar (Of Dreams and Thorns, 2017) explores general human themes like love and war in addition to specific experiences as a person of color. The book begins with a sensual meditation on desire, featuring luscious descriptions of a lover, from lips “moist like youth” to the body’s “softest velvet” slopes. The poems shift to odes to cultural icons like the Tejano star Selena and Mexican-German painter Frida Kahlo as well as occasion pieces honoring his brother’s 40th birthday and a friend’s mother’s memorial service. The author hits his stride when he delves into identity. In “I Am Not Brown,” he contemplates the societal implications of skin tone and his inability to fit into the rigid category of Caucasian or Latino. “For white and black and brown alike / Are slaves to history’s brush strokes,” he writes. “Grateful for the Work,” perhaps Salazar’s loveliest poem, catalogs the day of a laborer, starting with an early morning awakening and following him as he toils in 100-degree heat, enjoys tacos from his lunch pail, buys beverages from a child’s lemonade stand, and returns home to an equally hard-working wife. The author then makes an abrupt turn toward Syria in a series of poems that condemn that country’s president, Bashar Hafez al-Assad. They serve as a rallying cry for Syrians and grieve for the murdered masses. Salazar’s closing poem, “Sons of Bitches,” is a clunky rant about a 20-year-old immigrant shot in the head by a U.S. Customs and Border Patrol agent. The gratuitous violence and political theologizing are ill at ease with the intimate, personal experiences that preceded them, such as the fablelike “A Mexican is Made of This,” in which Salazar beautifully describes the “rainbows, bronze, backbone, butterflies” that his people embody.
A volume of poetry that shines when focused on the author’s experiences of race and culture.Pub Date: Aug. 1, 2018
ISBN: 978-0-9991496-3-8
Page Count: 166
Publisher: Bronze Diamond Productions
Review Posted Online: Sept. 27, 2018
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
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