A winsome, nostalgic portrayal of adolescent life.
Denning’s autobiographical novel recounts an unforgettable summer on a Cape Cod island.
Geoff and Peter, both 14, plan a three-week vacation on Cuttyhunk Island in the summer of 1959. The boys are on their own. They pitch a tent on the beach and have enough money for food. While Peter explores the island, Geoff becomes more invested in befriending locals. The islanders are typically wary of outsiders but take a shine to Geoff, especially the owner of the general store, who gives the boys cans of Chef Boyardee. Local Diana has a bit of romance with Geoff. The boys appreciate the time away from their fathers; Peter feels his dad ignores him, quite unlike Geoff’s incessantly critical and unsupportive dad. But Geoff’s father shows up on Cuttyhunk, seemingly drunk and demanding his son come home to Connecticut. Geoff, however, has already begun to feel that Cuttyhunk could be his home. Once he finds a job on the island, he debates whether to stay in this peaceful place that he’s fallen in love with. Geoff encounters many curious individuals, but the volatile relationships prove the most engaging. He struggles to win over a vicious, foulmouthed kitchen cook and frequently argues with Peter. Most of his experiences are indelible, like scavenging the beach for useful junk (e.g. a discarded door becomes a table). Other scenes are mundane; in an extended bit, Geoff and Peter buy a lobster for dinner and learn how to eat it properly. Throughout, Denning excels at describing the island’s scenery: “Geoff followed Diana across the road through an opening between tall clumps of oat grass that exposed a panoramic view of the Cuttyhunk harbor and the yacht club pier. The makeshift pier was made from tree limbs stuck in the mud.”
A winsome, nostalgic portrayal of adolescent life. (dedication; acknowledgements; introduction; prelude; in memory)Pub Date: N/A
ISBN: N/A
Page Count: -
Publisher: Self
Review Posted Online: April 30, 2021
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
BOOK REVIEW
A tasty, if not always tasteful, tale of supernatural mayhem that fans of King and Crichton alike will enjoy.
Are we not men? We are—well, ask Bigfoot, as Brooks does in this delightful yarn, following on his bestseller World War Z(2006).
A zombie apocalypse is one thing. A volcanic eruption is quite another, for, as the journalist who does a framing voice-over narration for Brooks’ latest puts it, when Mount Rainier popped its cork, “it was the psychological aspect, the hyperbole-fueled hysteria that had ended up killing the most people.” Maybe, but the sasquatches whom the volcano displaced contributed to the statistics, too, if only out of self-defense. Brooks places the epicenter of the Bigfoot war in a high-tech hideaway populated by the kind of people you might find in a Jurassic Park franchise: the schmo who doesn’t know how to do much of anything but tries anyway, the well-intentioned bleeding heart, the know-it-all intellectual who turns out to know the wrong things, the immigrant with a tough backstory and an instinct for survival. Indeed, the novel does double duty as a survival manual, packed full of good advice—for instance, try not to get wounded, for “injury turns you from a giver to a taker. Taking up our resources, our time to care for you.” Brooks presents a case for making room for Bigfoot in the world while peppering his narrative with timely social criticism about bad behavior on the human side of the conflict: The explosion of Rainier might have been better forecast had the president not slashed the budget of the U.S. Geological Survey, leading to “immediate suspension of the National Volcano Early Warning System,” and there’s always someone around looking to monetize the natural disaster and the sasquatch-y onslaught that follows. Brooks is a pro at building suspense even if it plays out in some rather spectacularly yucky episodes, one involving a short spear that takes its name from “the sucking sound of pulling it out of the dead man’s heart and lungs.” Grossness aside, it puts you right there on the scene.
A tasty, if not always tasteful, tale of supernatural mayhem that fans of King and Crichton alike will enjoy.Pub Date: June 16, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-9848-2678-7
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Del Rey/Ballantine
Review Posted Online: Feb. 9, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2020
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK TO SCREEN
A powerfully strong romance for readers who like their love stories full of torment and passion.
Best friends confront feelings for each other when they take a honeymoon trip together.
Francesca Gardiner and George Saint James have always been best friends—just like Jo and Laurie from Little Women, which they both love. Frankie has a big, complicated family and George was the boy next door who’d moved in with his eccentric grandmother. Their friendship survived childhood, awkward teenage years, and living together as young adults without ever venturing into the romantic—well, except for one kiss, but they don’t talk about that. When Frankie gets engaged to an older professor named Nate, George isn’t happy and a huge fight ensues. Despite his misgivings, George shows up to be her best man, but Nate leaves Frankie right before the wedding with only a cryptic letter. Devastated, Frankie goes to a friend’s house to recuperate, but her honeymoon is already planned and paid for—so she decides to travel to Tofino, a picturesque town on the coast of Vancouver Island, with George taking Nate’s place. Frankie wants to fix her friendship with George, but now that they’re in a romantic suite in a beautiful location, things are more complicated than ever. She’d always thought a relationship would be a bad idea, but she’s slowly beginning to realize they’ll never be able to go back to being kids. Maybe the only way forward involves forging a new kind of relationship. Fortune, the author of romances like This Summer Will Be Different (2024), returns with another love story full of longing and intense angst. The many allusions to Little Women are charming, and Frankie is a delightfully headstrong, feisty character. She and George have explosive chemistry, and Fortune manages to make the “will-they-or-won’t-they” nature of their relationship feel like life-or-death stakes.
A powerfully strong romance for readers who like their love stories full of torment and passion.Pub Date: May 5, 2026
ISBN: 9780593953242
Page Count: 432
Publisher: Berkley
Review Posted Online: Feb. 2, 2026
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2026
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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