A disturbing story that, in the end, somehow seems a bit shallow.
An idealistic young heroine makes a decision that will alter her life, and possibly the world, in Rogers’ (The Voyage Home, 2004, etc.) eighth novel.
It’s not easy being a teenager in Lamb’s futuristic world. Like many young people, 16-year-old Jessie is struggling to find her own identity. She’s dealing with all of the conflicts inherent in a teen’s life—love, friendship, relationships, parental control—but she’s also surrounded by an ominous force that threatens the very future of humankind: a genetically engineered virus, known as Maternal Death Syndrome, which destroys pregnant women and their unborn children. Jessie’s father, a scientist, is part of a team that is working to stop it. Jessie, who narrates the story, begins to question all the attitudes and values she and her friends have learned as children. In an effort to find herself, Jessie joins an activist group and becomes marginally involved in several causes. As she ponders her role in life, the world around Jessie is disintegrating into chaotic demonstrations over women’s equality, genetic engineering, moral injustice and just about every other important social issue known to man. Each is treated superficially by both Jessie and the author, and ultimately these threads detract from what could have been a provocative story. As if Jessie doesn’t have enough on her plate already, she also must deal with her beloved aunt’s illness, a rocky event in her parents’ marriage, a friend’s assault, the betrayal of an older adult, and a sexual encounter. Amid the turmoil, Jessie resolves to do something to make her life meaningful, a move that her father and those around her try to prevent. With an emotional disconnect that is inconsistent with true teen behavior, Jessie tries to convince her parents, her friends and herself that her chosen mission is the right path for her—and that one person can, indeed, make a difference.
A disturbing story that, in the end, somehow seems a bit shallow.Pub Date: May 15, 2012
ISBN: 978-0-06-213080-8
Page Count: 256
Publisher: Perennial/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: April 22, 2012
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 2012
Two lessons: Don’t discount a woman just because she’s made of clay, and consider your wishes carefully should you find that...
Can’t we all just get along? Perhaps yes, if we’re supernatural beings from one side or another of the Jewish-Arab divide.
In her debut novel, Wecker begins with a juicy premise: At the dawn of the 20th century, the shtetls of Europe and half of “Greater Syria” are emptying out, their residents bound for New York or Chicago or Detroit. One aspirant, “a Prussian Jew from Konin, a bustling town to the south of Danzig,” is an unpleasant sort, a bit of a bully, arrogant, unattractive, but with enough loose gelt in his pocket to commission a rabbi-without-a-portfolio to build him an idol with feet of clay—and everything else of clay, too. The rabbi, Shaalman, warns that the ensuing golem—in Wecker’s tale, The Golem—is meant to be a slave and “not for the pleasures of a bed,” but he creates her anyway. She lands in Manhattan with less destructive force than Godzilla hit Tokyo, but even so, she cuts a strange figure. So does Ahmad, another slave bottled up—literally—and shipped across the water to a New York slum called Little Syria, where a lucky Lebanese tinsmith named Boutros Arbeely rubs a magic flask in just the right way and—shazam!—the jinni (genie) appears. Ahmad is generally ticked off by events, while The Golem is burdened with the “instinct to be of use.” Naturally, their paths cross, the most unnatural of the unnaturalized citizens of Lower Manhattan—and great adventures ensue, for Shaalman is in the wings, as is a shadowy character who means no good when he catches wind of the supernatural powers to be harnessed. Wecker takes the premise and runs with it, and though her story runs on too long for what is in essence a fairy tale, she writes skillfully, nicely evoking the layers of alienness that fall upon strangers in a strange land.
Two lessons: Don’t discount a woman just because she’s made of clay, and consider your wishes carefully should you find that magic lamp.Pub Date: April 23, 2013
ISBN: 978-0-06-211083-1
Page Count: 496
Publisher: Harper/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: March 30, 2013
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 15, 2013
BOOK REVIEW
PERSPECTIVES
Sci-fi, Monty Python-style—as West England villager Arthur Dent becomes the only survivor of Earth, rescued by Ford Prefect of Betelgeuse, a roving researcher for The Hitchhiker's Guide: when Earth is destroyed (demolished by the Vogons to make way for a hyperspatial express route), the two of them escape into a Vogon spaceship.
The hideous Vogons torture our heroes by reading poetry to them, but then they're miraculously picked up by the Starship Heart of Gold—which is powered by "the Infinite Improbability Drive," commanded by Galactic President Zaphod Beeblebrox, and staffed by an epically depressed robot named Marvin with a smart-aleck computer that sings "You'll Never Walk Alone." They're all headed for the legendary planet Magrathea, where roaming Arthur discovers Slartibartfast, the guy who originally made Earth ("Norway. . . that was one of mine. Won an award, you know. Lovely crinkly edges") and is now working on Earth Mark Two. And finally there's a confrontation with the Magrathea rulers—Benjy mouse and Frankie mouse—who want to mince Arthur's Earthling brain.
Lots of pure silliness, too many English references for U.S. readers, but—like moviegoers who sat through Life of Brian for the sake of a few good chuckles—fans of absurd deadpan parody will happily flip through this likable send-up in order to extract a couple of dozen fine giggles.
Pub Date: Sept. 1, 1980
ISBN: 1400052939
Page Count: 271
Publisher: Harmony/Crown
Review Posted Online: Nov. 2, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 1980
BOOK TO SCREEN
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