An engaging, if sometimes-blunt, novel about race relations, arrogance, and local politics.
An ambitious lawyer returns to his hometown to overthrow the local administration in Radford’s debut legal novel.
Attorney Daniel Riley is back in rural Goshen County, Georgia, after several years away, in the hope of becoming county commissioner. To do so, he’ll have to take down the long-serving incumbent, Leon Darby, who owns the massive tobacco company at the center of the county’s Woeconomy. It’s a position that gives Darby immense power—and inspires immense resentment among the local farmers. Daniel’s old high school debate teammate, the altruistic and newly wealthy lawyer Michael Drummond, thinks that Darby is vulnerable as a candidate. Daniel has always dreamed of holding office, but he’s tried and failed before, and his wife, Amber, is opposed to the idea of his trying again. Daniel soon finds that he may be more out of step with the conservative locals than he’d anticipated. Michael, who’s African-American, is ambivalent about the white Daniel’s return; he’s put in more work in the county than Daniel has, but the racism of the local electorate would make it difficult for him to successfully run. As the two men set to work, they not only confront an amoral, entrenched opponent with unanticipated resources—they also must deal with their own clashing personalities, which drove them apart years ago. Radford’s prose is light and descriptive, particularly when evoking the landscape of Goshen County, which features “miles and miles of farmland, seemingly never-ending fields of tall, ripening tobacco stalks, weeks from harvest, punctuated occasionally by a driveway or fence line. The stalks obscured the horizon in all directions, a rich green palette on either side of the grey line of road.” That said, the novel lacks subtlety in both its characterizations and its politics, although it does talk straightforwardly about race and how it affects every aspect of Goshen County life. It makes some points in heavy-handed ways, and some aspects of the plot drift into melodrama. Despite this, the story remains compelling, and the pages fly by.
An engaging, if sometimes-blunt, novel about race relations, arrogance, and local politics.Pub Date: Sept. 6, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-5439-7792-9
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Biscuette Books
Review Posted Online: Aug. 20, 2019
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
Heartfelt, yes, but pretty routine.
Life lessons.
Angie Malone, the youngest of a big, warm Italian-American family, returns to her Pacific Northwest hometown to wrestle with various midlife disappointments: her divorce, Papa’s death, a downturn in business at the family restaurant, and, above all, her childlessness. After several miscarriages, she, a successful ad exec, and husband Conlan, a reporter, befriended a pregnant young girl and planned to adopt her baby—and then the birth mother changed her mind. Angie and Conlan drifted apart and soon found they just didn’t love each other anymore. Metaphorically speaking, “her need for a child had been a high tide, an overwhelming force that drowned them. A year ago, she could have kicked to the surface but not now.” Sadder but wiser, Angie goes to work in the struggling family restaurant, bickering with Mama over updating the menu and replacing the ancient waitress. Soon, Angie befriends another young girl, Lauren Ribido, who’s eager to learn and desperately needs a job. Lauren’s family lives on the wrong side of the tracks, and her mother is a promiscuous alcoholic, but Angie knows nothing of this sad story and welcomes Lauren into the DeSaria family circle. The girl listens in, wide-eyed, as the sisters argue and make wisecracks and—gee-whiz—are actually nice to each other. Nothing at all like her relationship with her sluttish mother, who throws Lauren out when boyfriend David, en route to Stanford, gets her pregnant. Will Lauren, who’s just been accepted to USC, let Angie adopt her baby? Well, a bit of a twist at the end keeps things from becoming too predictable.
Heartfelt, yes, but pretty routine.Pub Date: July 1, 2004
ISBN: 0-345-46750-7
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Ballantine
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 15, 2004
Genetically engineered dinosaurs run amok in Crichton's new, vastly entertaining science thriller. From the introduction alone—a classically Crichton-clear discussion of the implications of biotechnological research—it's evident that the Harvard M.D. has bounced back from the science-fantasy silliness of Sphere (1987) for another taut reworking of the Frankenstein theme, as in The Andromeda Strain and The Terminal Man. Here, Dr. Frankenstein is aging billionaire John Hammond, whose monster is a manmade ecosystem based on a Costa Rican island. Designed as the world's ultimate theme park, the ecosystem boasts climate and flora of the Jurassic Age and—most spectacularly—15 varieties of dinosaurs, created by elaborate genetic engineering that Crichton explains in fascinating detail, rich with dino-lore and complete with graphics. Into the park, for a safety check before its opening, comes the novel's band of characters—who, though well drawn, double as symbolic types in this unsubtle morality play. Among them are hero Alan Grant, noble paleontologist; Hammond, venal and obsessed; amoral dino-designer Henry Wu; Hammond's two innocent grandchildren; and mathematician Ian Malcolm, who in long diatribes serves as Crichton's mouthpiece to lament the folly of science. Upon arrival, the visitors tour the park; meanwhile, an industrial spy steals some dino embryos by shutting down the island's power—and its security grid, allowing the beasts to run loose. The bulk of the remaining narrative consists of dinos—ferocious T. Rex's, voracious velociraptors, venom-spitting dilophosaurs—stalking, ripping, and eating the cast in fast, furious, and suspenseful set-pieces as the ecosystem spins apart. And can Grant prevent the dinos from escaping to the mainland to create unchecked havoc? Though intrusive, the moralizing rarely slows this tornado-paced tale, a slick package of info-thrills that's Crichton's most clever since Congo (1980)—and easily the most exciting dinosaur novel ever written. A sure-fire best-seller.
Pub Date: Nov. 7, 1990
ISBN: 0394588169
Page Count: 424
Publisher: Knopf
Review Posted Online: Sept. 21, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 1990
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