Woodson still has one foot in the young adult world of her earlier novels (I Hadn't Meant to Tell You This, p. 782, etc.) with this dreamy, sometimes too spare story of an African-American girl growing up in Brooklyn from 1966 to 1978. Early on, the unnamed narrator's older sister, Angel, claims that with a little effort their family could be like the Brady Bunch, but the text slowly reveals how far that is from the truth. Angel and her sister have three brothers: Troy, a gay teenager who goes to Vietnam to prove his manhood; Carlos, who is sexually abusive from an early age; and Cory, who is apparently the son of their mother and another man. The narrator's cool observation of her own emerging sexuality and the sexual behavior of those around her is the most appealing aspect here. Woodson has an infallible ear for dialogue among children, in particular the way they talk (often with naive brilliance) about sex. During a playground discussion in which young girls touch edgily on the subject of sexual abuse, one who tries to speak concretely about her experience is cut off: `` `So what?' someone says. `Like it don't happen to everybody?' '' In another episode, the ten-year-old narrator and a friend named Olga straddle each other in a basement to get ``the feeling,'' until Catholic Olga realizes with horror that they're carrying on next to an altar. Chapters build on each other, but the information provided is too scanty to really create any depth. In its absence, Woodson attempts to goose the narrative with dramatic incidents, or events that on the surface seem harmless but have danger rumbling underneath. The wistful tone is not enough to sustain momentum, since it is never entirely clear what these characters want. Ultimately, these are finely written vignettes that just miss meshing into something more forceful. A photograph that fades too quickly.
Pub Date: Jan. 9, 1995
ISBN: 0-525-93721-8
Page Count: 144
Publisher: Dutton
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 1, 1994
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
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
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