An extended, sometimes labored parable of good and evil on “the need for transparency in human interactions.”
Singh’s debut novel exposes the conflicting interests and corrupting desires of trade unions during the last three decades of 20th-century India.
Chosen to replace the latest in a line of negligent managers at the Amlawar branch of India’s nationalized bank, a noble, accomplished man named Purshottam encounters a disheartening situation in which workers are rewarded for laziness, sloppiness and absenteeism. He soon discovers that top union leaders control not just the bank, but the politics of his country, causing its citizens to live under fear and great hardships. Believing that the bank’s productivity reflects that of the nation, Purshottam socializes with his new employees, empowers them in their day-to-day duties and encourages them to take pride in their work. When the ruthless union activist, Pandey, and his proudly manipulative underling, Neki Lal, realize that the new manager’s integrity threatens their very existence, they attempt to intimidate him. Meanwhile, Chanchal, a young orphan desperate for spirituality, also struggles at the Amlawar branch. His rejection of American-influenced business techniques and his desire for truth and justice make him a target. Unfairly dismissed, he’s visited by an angel who confirms his innate goodness before cult members murder him. With the sheen of a martyr, his fate becomes an inspiration for all bank employees—regardless of caste or union involvement—to follow a “religion” of “transparency and truth.” Singh does an excellent job of introducing readers to the perils of unions and the nationalization of competitive industries. His cast of peons, clerks, officers and the laborers reveals India’s complex and unforgiving class system, but the characters come off as two-dimensional and experience little growth, despite a last-minute transformation by Neki Lal “to do the right” after Chanchal’s death. Stilted dialogue and high-minded editorializing mar the storytelling, as does the meandering pace and absence of intrigue.
An extended, sometimes labored parable of good and evil on “the need for transparency in human interactions.”Pub Date: Jan. 27, 2013
ISBN: 978-1481203876
Page Count: 282
Publisher: CreateSpace
Review Posted Online: April 1, 2013
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
Wacky plot keeps the pages turning and enduring schmaltzy romantic sequences.
Sisters work together to solve a child-abandonment case.
Ellie and Julia Cates have never been close. Julia is shy and brainy; Ellie gets by on charm and looks. Their differences must be tossed aside when a traumatized young girl wanders in from the forest into their hometown in Washington. The sisters’ professional skills are put to the test. Julia is a world-renowned child psychologist who has lost her edge. She is reeling from a case that went publicly sour. Though she was cleared of all wrongdoing, Julia’s name was tarnished, forcing her to shutter her Beverly Hills practice. Ellie Barton is the local police chief in Rain Valley, who’s never faced a tougher case. This is her chance to prove she is more than just a fading homecoming queen, but a scarcity of clues and a reluctant victim make locating the girl’s parents nearly impossible. Ellie places an SOS call to her sister; she needs an expert to rehabilitate this wild-child who has been living outside of civilization for years. Confronted with her professional demons, Julia once again has the opportunity to display her talents and salvage her reputation. Hannah (The Things We Do for Love, 2004, etc.) is at her best when writing from the girl’s perspective. The feral wolf-child keeps the reader interested long after the other, transparent characters have grown tiresome. Hannah’s torturously over-written romance passages are stale, but there are surprises in store as the sisters set about unearthing Alice’s past and creating a home for her.
Wacky plot keeps the pages turning and enduring schmaltzy romantic sequences.Pub Date: March 1, 2006
ISBN: 0-345-46752-3
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Ballantine
Review Posted Online: June 24, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2005
A strict report, worthy of sympathy.
A violent surfacing of adolescence (which has little in common with Tarkington's earlier, broadly comic, Seventeen) has a compulsive impact.
"Nobody big except me" is the dream world of Holden Caulfield and his first person story is down to the basic, drab English of the pre-collegiate. For Holden is now being bounced from fancy prep, and, after a vicious evening with hall- and roommates, heads for New York to try to keep his latest failure from his parents. He tries to have a wild evening (all he does is pay the check), is terrorized by the hotel elevator man and his on-call whore, has a date with a girl he likes—and hates, sees his 10 year old sister, Phoebe. He also visits a sympathetic English teacher after trying on a drunken session, and when he keeps his date with Phoebe, who turns up with her suitcase to join him on his flight, he heads home to a hospital siege. This is tender and true, and impossible, in its picture of the old hells of young boys, the lonesomeness and tentative attempts to be mature and secure, the awful block between youth and being grown-up, the fright and sickness that humans and their behavior cause the challenging, the dramatization of the big bang. It is a sorry little worm's view of the off-beat of adult pressure, of contemporary strictures and conformity, of sentiment….
A strict report, worthy of sympathy.Pub Date: June 15, 1951
ISBN: 0316769177
Page Count: -
Publisher: Little, Brown
Review Posted Online: Nov. 2, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 1951
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