by Jennifer Dawn deConinck Smith ‧ RELEASE DATE: Nov. 25, 2019
A simple yet potent message from a child who’s a sometimes-bland messenger.
A hospital-bound child offers messages of hope in a Christian novel by debut author Smith.
Kipper is about 6 years old and has never known life outside of a hospital. When that young narrator first appears in this inspirational novel, he is in the intensive care unit, and his future on Earth is anything but certain. Yet Kipper is not one to fret. He has a penchant for drawing (his artwork appears throughout the book), a love of clouds, and, after a chance encounter with a young Chinese girl, a personal relationship with Jesus. Kipper’s body may not have much mobility, but his mind is free to roam. And roam it does over topics like the beauty of nature, the free will of humans, and the importance of trusting completely in God. Even as Kipper becomes weaker physically, his spiritual self grows. He learns not to worry, and he encourages readers to do the same with statements such as, “Everything, good and bad, happens for a reason, beyond our own understanding through life.” Kipper’s spiritual progress, though largely predictable, provides a force for reflection. If someone with so little, whose entire life has been so confined, can find so much reason to rejoice, why can’t everyone else? Certain parts of this tale lack much in the way of substance, however. A toy sailboat race has him describing every sailboat and its construction. Kipper also describes every child who participates in the race. This information is no more enticing or motivational than it sounds. Nor is the event made more exciting by the reader’s being told: “It was so exciting to watch, as this race unfolded!” In the end, though, Kipper’s lesson is as lasting as his circumstances are difficult, and some readers might learn much from a boy on the brink of death who finds no reason to give in to despair.
A simple yet potent message from a child who’s a sometimes-bland messenger.Pub Date: Nov. 25, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-72833-406-6
Page Count: 288
Publisher: AuthorHouse
Review Posted Online: March 19, 2020
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
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by Emily Matchar ‧ RELEASE DATE: March 12, 2024
An interesting story about antisemitism, family secrets, and Jewish life in rural America.
Four generations of a Jewish family find their fates tied to a mysterious and glamorous hotel.
The historic resort in Matchar’s latest is a real property in White Sulphur Springs, West Virginia. Its secret, chronicled here, has long been disclosed. But although this renders some of the book’s mystery anticlimactic, the real heart of the story is Matchar’s examination of the hardships faced by four generations of a Jewish family in rural America. Far from the crowded tenements of the big cities, the Zelners must contend with antisemitism, poverty, and painful secrets in a small, isolated, and often hostile community. Matchar reveals the journeys of each generation, the Zelners’ trials interwoven with the fate of the magnificent hotel, a magnet for the wealthy and famous. The gentle patriarch, Sol, starts his life in America as a door-to-door peddler, then opens a general store in the shadow of the hotel. His daughter-in-law, Sylvia, a dissatisfied immigrant from Poland accustomed to finer things, works at the hotel during World War II, when it becomes a luxurious camp for German and Italian diplomats (an affair with one of the latter tempts the married Sylvia, who has just had her first child). Later, her daughter, Doree, embarks on a romance with a mysterious man working at the hotel while Sylvia’s son, Alan, is convinced there’s a conspiracy behind some new construction there. In the 1990s, Doree’s son, Jordan, a Washington Post reporter, sets out to uncover the truth. Some storylines turn out to be more compelling than others, as is often the case with multigenerational novels, with some dubious developments in Doree’s narrative and Jordan’s segments feeling superfluous except as a means to an end. But Sol’s and Sylvia’s plotlines allow Matchar to offer a glimpse into American Jewish history.
An interesting story about antisemitism, family secrets, and Jewish life in rural America.Pub Date: March 12, 2024
ISBN: 9780593713969
Page Count: 352
Publisher: Putnam
Review Posted Online: Jan. 20, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 15, 2024
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by C.S. Lewis ‧ RELEASE DATE: Jan. 1, 1942
These letters from some important executive Down Below, to one of the junior devils here on earth, whose job is to corrupt mortals, are witty and written in a breezy style seldom found in religious literature. The author quotes Luther, who said: "The best way to drive out the devil, if he will not yield to texts of Scripture, is to jeer and flout him, for he cannot bear scorn." This the author does most successfully, for by presenting some of our modern and not-so-modern beliefs as emanating from the devil's headquarters, he succeeds in making his reader feel like an ass for ever having believed in such ideas. This kind of presentation gives the author a tremendous advantage over the reader, however, for the more timid reader may feel a sense of guilt after putting down this book. It is a clever book, and for the clever reader, rather than the too-earnest soul.
Pub Date: Jan. 1, 1942
ISBN: 0060652934
Page Count: 53
Publisher: Macmillan
Review Posted Online: Oct. 17, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 1943
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