A remarkable tale of political maturity, and its steep price.
In Flanders’ (An Interlude in Berlin, 2018, etc.) historical novel, an idealistic diplomat in the Kennedy administration becomes increasingly disillusioned by the government’s grim conduct of the Vietnam War.
Dillon Randolph was groomed to become “a member of the club, one of the young men on the rise, an Establishment favorite”; his family name is well known in American politics, and his father, John Custis Randolph, is currently a Democratic congressman. But Dillon is also a poet who’s published two collections of his work and has the soul of a romantic. In 1961, he takes a job at the State Department and joins a group of friends—they call themselves the “Group of Five”—all “moved by the young President’s stirring rhetoric and call for a new generation of leadership.” Dillon is specifically recruited to work for the Bureau of Intelligence and Research under the tutelage of its new “charismatic leader,” Roger Hilsman. It’s a position that gives him a privileged perch from which to see the unfolding of the war in Southeast Asia. When a fellow member of the Group of Five—Palmer Knox, a CIA agent—kills himself out of despair of his own involvement in the execution of the war, Dillon is faced with a grave moral crisis that challenges more than his politics. Flanders intelligently chronicles Dillon’s growing disenchantment, not only with the bloody, “grim pragmatism” that he encountered regarding the management of the war, but also the “fractures in the Great Society” to which he was so devoted after Kennedy’s assassination. Over the course of the novel, the author deftly portrays the tumultuous and complex political climate of the day, which simultaneously contained shimmering optimism about the future, dread of the dangers posed by the Cold War, and nihilistic espionage. The author closely hews to the historical record, but artfully weaves a poignant human element into it; both Dillon and Palmer are emotionally convincing as characters. Overall, this is a nuanced novel that offers a historically edifying account of a troubled time.
A remarkable tale of political maturity, and its steep price.Pub Date: July 30, 2019
ISBN: 978-0-9908675-5-5
Page Count: 384
Publisher: Munroe Hill Press
Review Posted Online: Oct. 9, 2019
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
A bold but flawed debut novel.
There’s a mystery, a coming-of-age, abundant melodrama and even more abundant medical lore in this idiosyncratic first novel from a doctor best known for the memoir My Own Country (1994).
The nun is struggling to give birth in the hospital. The surgeon (is he also the father?) dithers. The late-arriving OB-GYN takes charge, losing the mother but saving her babies, identical twins. We are in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, in 1954. The Indian nun, Sister Mary Joseph Praise, was a trained nurse who had met the British surgeon Thomas Stone on a sea voyage ministering to passengers dying of typhus. She then served as his assistant for seven years. The emotionally repressed Stone never declared his love for her; had they really done the deed? After the delivery, Stone rejects the babies and leaves Ethiopia. This is good news for Hema (Dr. Hemalatha, the Indian gynecologist), who becomes their surrogate mother and names them Shiva and Marion. When Shiva stops breathing, Dr. Ghosh (another Indian) diagnoses his apnea; again, a medical emergency throws two characters together. Ghosh and Hema marry and make a happy family of four. Marion eventually emerges as narrator. “Where but in medicine,” he asks, “might our conjoined, matricidal, patrifugal, twisted fate be explained?” The question is key, revealing Verghese’s intent: a family saga in the context of medicine. The ambition is laudable, but too often accounts of operations—a bowel obstruction here, a vasectomy there—overwhelm the narrative. Characterization suffers. The boys’ Ethiopian identity goes unexplored. Shiva is an enigma, though it’s no surprise he’ll have a medical career, like his brother, though far less orthodox. They become estranged over a girl, and eventually Marion leaves for America and an internship in the Bronx (the final, most suspenseful section). Once again a medical emergency defines the characters, though they are not large enough to fill the positively operatic roles Verghese has ordained for them.
A bold but flawed debut novel.Pub Date: Feb. 6, 2009
ISBN: 978-0-375-41449-7
Page Count: 560
Publisher: Knopf
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 15, 2008
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
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