Stepakoff uses this sliver of history well, but the romance between Maria and James seems irrelevant (and frankly less...
Stepakoff’s latest throws together America’s burgeoning space program, Nazi scientists and a talented violinist in a Nicholas Sparks–style romance.
Huntsville, Ala., circa 1957, was an interesting place. In the heart of the segregated South, it was beginning to hear the rumbles of the civil rights movement. It was also home to a unique aerospace program, one manned almost exclusively by former German SS officers. At the close of World War II, there was a race to capture the famed Nazi rocket scientists—both the U.S. and the Soviets wanted them. Under their leader, Wernher Von Braun, the group went to the U.S. with all their secrets, and the U.S. government sanitized their past. Twelve years later, in Huntsville, the space race is on—the Soviets have launched Sputnik and now the Germans are to help launch the United States’ own rocket satellite into space. Maria Reinhardt is contributing in her own way: An accomplished violinist, she and some friends have founded a local symphony. With her 12-year-old son Peter away at school and her husband, Hans, working in the lab, she has ample opportunity to revisit her past, which included American pilot James Cooper. Their brief end-of-war affair was unforgettable, but when the Allied forces came, Maria left with Hans (her older second cousin) rather than wait for James and risk capture by the Soviets. At the symphony’s first recital, she spots James Cooper, in Huntsville as a test pilot. What prevents Maria from running away with James is her belief that Hans is a good man. But is he? Her friend Sabine makes a chilling discovery: Her own husband has hidden a chest of gold—in the form of wedding bands and gold fillings—in their bomb shelter. What about Hans? Did he know his munitions lab was attached to a notorious labor camp? If she finds out the wretched truth, will she run away with James?
Stepakoff uses this sliver of history well, but the romance between Maria and James seems irrelevant (and frankly less interesting than Maria’s moral dilemmas), which is a bad sign for a romantic novel.Pub Date: Nov. 19, 2013
ISBN: 978-1-250-00109-2
Page Count: 272
Publisher: Dunne/St. Martin's
Review Posted Online: Sept. 15, 2013
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 1, 2013
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Entertaining and thoroughly engrossing.
Another reboot of Jane Austen?!? Hadlow pulls it off in a smart, heartfelt novel devoted to bookish Mary, middle of the five sisters in Pride and Prejudice.
Part 1 recaps Pride and Prejudice through Mary’s eyes, climaxing with the humiliating moment when she sings poorly at a party and older sister Elizabeth goads their father to cut her off in front of everyone. The sisters’ friend Charlotte, who marries the unctuous Mr. Collins after Elizabeth rejects him, emerges as a pivotal character; her conversations with Mary are even tougher-minded here than those with Elizabeth depicted by Austen. In Part 2, two years later, Mary observes on a visit that Charlotte is deferential but remote with her husband; she forms an intellectual friendship with the neglected and surprisingly nice Mr. Collins that leads to Charlotte’s asking Mary to leave. In Part 3, Mary finds refuge in London with her kindly aunt and uncle, Mr. and Mrs. Gardiner. Mrs. Gardiner is the second motherly woman, after Longbourn housekeeper Mrs. Hill, to try to undo the psychic damage wrought by Mary’s actual mother, shallow, status-obsessed Mrs. Bennet, by building up her confidence and buying her some nice clothes (funded by guilt-ridden Lizzy). Sure enough, two suitors appear: Tom Hayward, a poetry-loving lawyer who relishes Mary’s intellect but urges her to also express her feelings; and William Ryder, charming but feckless inheritor of a large fortune, whom naturally Mrs. Bennet loudly favors. It takes some maneuvering to orchestrate the estrangement of Mary and Tom, so clearly right for each other, but debut novelist Hadlow manages it with aplomb in a bravura passage describing a walking tour of the Lake District rife with seething complications furthered by odious Caroline Bingley. Her comeuppance at Mary’s hands marks the welcome final step in our heroine’s transformation from a self-doubting wallflower to a vibrant, self-assured woman who deserves her happy ending. Hadlow traces that progression with sensitivity, emotional clarity, and a quiet edge of social criticism Austen would have relished.
Entertaining and thoroughly engrossing.Pub Date: March 31, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-250-12941-3
Page Count: 448
Publisher: Henry Holt
Review Posted Online: Dec. 22, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2020
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Anyone who believes in true love or is simply willing to accept it as the premise of a winding tale will find this debut an...
True love flares between two people, but they find that circumstances always impede it.
On a winter day in London, Laurie spots Jack from her bus home and he sparks a feeling in her so deep that she spends the next year searching for him. Her roommate and best friend, Sarah, is the perfect wing-woman but ultimately—and unknowingly—ends the search by finding Jack and falling for him herself. Laurie’s hasty decision not to tell Sarah is the second painful missed opportunity (after not getting off the bus), but Sarah’s happiness is so important to Laurie that she dedicates ample energy into retraining her heart not to love Jack. Laurie is misguided, but her effort and loyalty spring from a true heart, and she considers her project mostly successful. Perhaps she would have total success, but the fact of the matter is that Jack feels the same deep connection to Laurie. His reasons for not acting on them are less admirable: He likes Sarah and she’s the total package; why would he give that up just because every time he and Laurie have enough time together (and just enough alcohol) they nearly fall into each other’s arms? Laurie finally begins to move on, creating a mostly satisfying life for herself, whereas Jack’s inability to be genuine tortures him and turns him into an ever bigger jerk. Patriarchy—it hurts men, too! There’s no question where the book is going, but the pacing is just right, the tone warm, and the characters sympathetic, even when making dumb decisions.
Anyone who believes in true love or is simply willing to accept it as the premise of a winding tale will find this debut an emotional, satisfying read.Pub Date: Oct. 16, 2018
ISBN: 978-0-525-57468-2
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Crown
Review Posted Online: July 30, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 2018
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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