It’s a shame that Kwok lets the end fall apart—rushing through a clichéd, melodramatic revelation that resolves way too...
From Kwok (Girl in Translation, 2010), another story about a plucky young Chinese-American woman whose hard work transports her out of poverty and hidebound traditions to find love and success.
At 22, having been fired for ineptness from numerous jobs, ABC (American Born Chinese) Charlie Wong works as a dishwasher in the restaurant where her dad is a noodle maker without peer. Unlike 11-year-old Lisa, Charlie’s younger sister, who is an ace student adored by all, Charlie didn't do well in school academically or socially. And unlike her long-dead mother, who was a ballerina with the Beijing Dance Academy before coming to America, Charlie seems completely lacking in grace except when practicing tai chi. But Charlie dreams of escaping the narrow confines of New York’s Chinatown, where she must live according to her father’s Old World rules and customs, which include a reliance on traditional Chinese medicine as practiced by his brother Henry; Lisa works after school in Uncle Henry's office as Charlie did before she proved too clumsy. Then Charlie answers a want ad and (a little too) miraculously is hired as a receptionist at Avery Studios, a respected uptown ballroom-dance studio. Although her receptionist skills are lacking, Charlie is in heaven around the dancers. Soon, the studio’s owner, Adrienne, recognizes Charlie's dormant talent as a dancer and, after the briefest training, hires her to teach the beginners class. Charlie is quickly caught up in learning a syllabus of dances and is even encouraged to enter a major competition. She’s also falling for not one, but two handsome men. But all is not well back in Chinatown, where Mr. Wong, who has no idea about his daughter’s secret uptown life, tries to find her a husband. And Lisa comes down with a mysterious ailment while preparing to take the entrance exam for prestigious Hunter High School.
It’s a shame that Kwok lets the end fall apart—rushing through a clichéd, melodramatic revelation that resolves way too easily—since much of Charlie’s Cinderella story, not to mention Charlie herself, is charming.Pub Date: June 24, 2014
ISBN: 978-1-59463-200-6
Page Count: 368
Publisher: Riverhead
Review Posted Online: March 19, 2014
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2014
Still, a respectful and absorbing page-turner.
Hannah’s new novel is an homage to the extraordinary courage and endurance of Frenchwomen during World War II.
In 1995, an elderly unnamed widow is moving into an Oregon nursing home on the urging of her controlling son, Julien, a surgeon. This trajectory is interrupted when she receives an invitation to return to France to attend a ceremony honoring passeurs: people who aided the escape of others during the war. Cut to spring, 1940: Viann has said goodbye to husband Antoine, who's off to hold the Maginot line against invading Germans. She returns to tending her small farm, Le Jardin, in the Loire Valley, teaching at the local school and coping with daughter Sophie’s adolescent rebellion. Soon, that world is upended: The Germans march into Paris and refugees flee south, overrunning Viann’s land. Her long-estranged younger sister, Isabelle, who has been kicked out of multiple convent schools, is sent to Le Jardin by Julien, their father in Paris, a drunken, decidedly unpaternal Great War veteran. As the depredations increase in the occupied zone—food rationing, systematic looting, and the billeting of a German officer, Capt. Beck, at Le Jardin—Isabelle’s outspokenness is a liability. She joins the Resistance, volunteering for dangerous duty: shepherding downed Allied airmen across the Pyrenees to Spain. Code-named the Nightingale, Isabelle will rescue many before she's captured. Meanwhile, Viann’s journey from passive to active resistance is less dramatic but no less wrenching. Hannah vividly demonstrates how the Nazis, through starvation, intimidation and barbarity both casual and calculated, demoralized the French, engineering a community collapse that enabled the deportations and deaths of more than 70,000 Jews. Hannah’s proven storytelling skills are ideally suited to depicting such cataclysmic events, but her tendency to sentimentalize undermines the gravitas of this tale.
Still, a respectful and absorbing page-turner.Pub Date: Feb. 3, 2015
ISBN: 978-0-312-57722-3
Page Count: 448
Publisher: St. Martin's
Review Posted Online: Nov. 19, 2014
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2014
BOOK TO SCREEN
SEEN & HEARD
BOOK TO SCREEN
The emotions run high, the conversations run deep, and the relationships ebb and flow with grace.
When tragedy strikes, a mother and daughter forge a new life.
Morgan felt obligated to marry her high school sweetheart, Chris, when she got pregnant with their daughter, Clara. But she secretly got along much better with Chris’ thoughtful best friend, Jonah, who was dating her sister, Jenny. Now her life as a stay-at-home parent has left her feeling empty but not ungrateful for what she has. Jonah and Jenny eventually broke up, but years later they had a one-night stand and Jenny got pregnant with their son, Elijah. Now Jonah is back in town, engaged to Jenny, and working at the local high school as Clara’s teacher. Clara dreams of being an actress and has a crush on Miller, who plans to go to film school, but her father doesn't approve. It doesn’t help that Miller already has a jealous girlfriend who stalks him via text from college. But Clara and Morgan’s home life changes radically when Chris and Jenny are killed in an accident, revealing long-buried secrets and forcing Morgan to reevaluate the life she chose when early motherhood forced her hand. Feeling betrayed by the adults in her life, Clara marches forward, acting both responsible and rebellious as she navigates her teenage years without her father and her aunt, while Jonah and Morgan's relationship evolves in the wake of the accident. Front-loaded with drama, the story leaves plenty of room for the mother and daughter to unpack their feelings and decide what’s next.
The emotions run high, the conversations run deep, and the relationships ebb and flow with grace.Pub Date: Dec. 10, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-5420-1642-1
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Montlake Romance
Review Posted Online: Oct. 13, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 1, 2019
BOOK TO SCREEN
BOOK TO SCREEN
BOOK TO SCREEN
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