by Jade Keller ‧ RELEASE DATE: N/A
An intriguing fictional look at Third World sex workers with an underdeveloped protagonist.
Keller offers a debut novel about the life of a Thai prostitute.
Young Ae Lin grows up in a poor community in Thailand, and her family’s concerns primarily revolve around having enough food to eat. Any hope for a better life seems a distant dream, so it comes as a surprise when Ae Lin is told that she is being sent away with her so-called uncle Jook to attend an expensive school far away from home. She bids farewell to her family, who bought her a special dress for the occasion. However, Uncle Jook, “a man of sour temper and even fouler breath,” has no intention of sending Ae Lin to any school. Instead, he ushers her quickly and painfully into a new life as a prostitute. Although she’s initially shocked and humiliated, she eventually settles into the daily existence of a sex worker at a bar run by her stern Auntie. She lives with a group of girls from similar backgrounds who do their best to survive their often chaotic, violent profession. The novel intersperses these scenes with those of the modern-day Ae Lin, who escaped her life as a prostitute and now runs a small café; she seeks spiritual guidance to help her escape the emotional pain of her past. When her sister arrives to tell her that their father is dying, Ae Lin must reconcile with her past, her present and the family she left behind. The book effectively examines the prostitutes’ difficult lives, outlining the terror, boredom, sisterhood and despair of their daily routines. However, readers may find it difficult to firmly grasp Ae Lin’s inner life; the earlier part of her story, in particular, does little to establish her as a memorable character among the many other unfortunate women. Overall, despite Ae Lin’s poignant desire to escape prostitution, the novel doesn’t quite manage to bring her to life as a unique individual.
An intriguing fictional look at Third World sex workers with an underdeveloped protagonist.Pub Date: N/A
ISBN: N/A
Page Count: 262
Publisher: Dog Ear Publisher
Review Posted Online: April 6, 2014
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
Share your opinion of this book
by Susan Count ‧ RELEASE DATE: N/A
A short, simple, and sweet tale about two friends and a horse.
A novel tells the story of two spirited girls who set out to save a lame foal in 1952.
Mary, age 12, lacks muscle control of her legs and must use a wheelchair. Her life is constantly interrupted by trips with her widower father to assorted doctors, all of whom have failed to help her. Mary tolerates the treatments, hoping to one day walk unassisted, but her true passion involves horses. Possessing a library filled with horse books, she loves watching and drawing the animals at a neighboring farm. She longs to own one herself. But her father, overprotective due to her disability and his own lingering grief over Mary’s dead mother, makes her keep her distance. Mary befriends Laura, the emotionally neglected daughter of the wealthy neighboring farm owners, and the two share secret buggy rides. Both girls are attracted to Illusion, a beautiful red bay filly on the farm. Mary learns that Illusion is to be put down by a veterinarian because of a lame leg. Horrified, she decides to talk to the barn manager about the horse (“Isn’t it okay for her to live even if she’s not perfect? I think she deserves a chance”). Soon, Mary and Laura attempt to raise money to save Illusion. At the same time, Mary begins to gain control of her legs thanks to water therapy and secret therapeutic riding with Laura. There is indeed a great deal of poignancy in a story of a girl with a disability fighting to defend the intrinsic value of a lame animal. But this book, the first installment of the Dream Horse Adventure Series, would be twice as touching if Mary interacted with Illusion more. In the tale’s opening, she watches the foal from afar, but she actually spends very little time with the filly she tries so hard to protect. This turns out to be a strange development given the degree to which the narrative relies on her devotion. Count (Selah’s Sweet Dream, 2015) draws Mary and Laura in broad but believable strokes, defined mainly by their unrelenting pluckiness in the face of adversity. While the work tackles disability, death, and grief, Mary’s and Laura’s environments are so idyllic and their optimism and perseverance so remarkable that the story retains an aura of uncomplicated gentleness throughout.
A short, simple, and sweet tale about two friends and a horse.Pub Date: N/A
ISBN: N/A
Page Count: -
Publisher: Hastings Creations Group
Review Posted Online: Oct. 15, 2016
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
Share your opinion of this book
More by Susan Count
BOOK REVIEW
by Susan Count
BOOK REVIEW
by Susan Count
BOOK REVIEW
by Susan Count
by Katie Keridan ‧ RELEASE DATE: Nov. 2, 2018
Therapeutic, moving verse from a promising new talent.
Awards & Accolades
Our Verdict
GET IT
Keridan’s poetry testifies to the pain of love and loss—and to the possibility of healing in the aftermath.
The literary critic Geoffrey Hartman once wrote that literature—and poetry, in particular—can help us “read the wound” of trauma. That is, it can allow one to express and explain one’s deepest hurts when everyday language fails. Keridan appears to have a similar understanding of poetry. She writes in “Foreword,” the opening work of her debut collection, that “pain frequently uses words as an escape route / (oh, how I know).” Many words—and a great deal of pain—escape in this volume, but the result is healing: “the ending is happy / the beginning was horrific / so let’s start there.” The book, then, tracks the process of recovery in the wake of suffering, and often, this suffering is brought on by romantic relationships gone wrong. An early untitled poem opens, “I die a little / taking pieces of me to feed the fire / that keeps him warm / you don’t notice that it’s a slow death / when you’re disappearing little by little.” The author’s imagery here—of the self fueling the dying fire of love—is simultaneously subtle and wrenching. But the poem’s message, amplified elsewhere in the book, is clear: We go wrong if we destructively give ourselves over to others, and healing comes only when we turn our energies back to our own good. Later poems, therefore, reveal that self-definition often equals strength. The process is painful but salutary; when “you’re left unprotected / surrounded by chaos with nothing you / can depend on / except yourself / and that’s when you gather the pieces / of the life you lost / and use them to build the life you want.” The “life you want” is an elusive goal, and the author knows that the path to self-definition is fraught with peril—but her collection may give strength to those who walk it.
Therapeutic, moving verse from a promising new talent.Pub Date: Nov. 2, 2018
ISBN: 978-1-72770-538-6
Page Count: 196
Publisher: CreateSpace
Review Posted Online: Jan. 9, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 15, 2019
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
Share your opinion of this book
© Copyright 2024 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Hey there, book lover.
We’re glad you found a book that interests you!
We can’t wait for you to join Kirkus!
It’s free and takes less than 10 seconds!
Already have an account? Log in.
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
Welcome Back!
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
Don’t fret. We’ll find you.