A well-written but mostly predictable Christian novel.
Lederman’s (co-editor: Good Words for the Young, 2016) decades-spanning Christian historical novel tells the story of a group of misfits who find their faith in Las Vegas.
Uukkarnit Noongwook is a Native American Athabaskan from Nenana, Alaska. In 1925, he sets out with his mother to find his father, a dog-sledder-turned-celebrity who absconded to the Lower 48 with a New York reporter. Their search brings them to Nevada, where a silver boom has drawn men from all over. Uukkarnit adopts the name “Luke” and encounters a group of kind Christians who teach him the ways of their faith. Meanwhile, David Gold is a boxer from the Lower East Side of Manhattan who attended the Moody Bible Institute before becoming the sparring partner of heavyweight champion Jack Johnson. He’s seeking an answer to the questions, “Can I love God, not as I want Him to be, but as He is; and what is His will—what does He want of me?” By 1930, David is in Reno, Nevada, where he meets a woman whose small, Las Vegas–based congregation needs a preacher. In 2011, Tim Faber and Joan Reed are the middle-aged producers of the hit documentary series Mysteries of Modern Science. Tim never had any faith, but the once-devout Joan pines for her lost religiosity. They’re making a special about Belgian Catholic priest Georges Lemaître, who was the first to theorize that the universe had once been atom-sized and continues to expand—although, as this book portrays it, he was written out of history by jealous, secular scientists. Joan even suspects that an attempt was made on his life. Now, the producers travel to Las Vegas to meet with Lemaître’s 99-year-old astrophysicist colleague, Luke Noongwook, to get the full story. These separate stories of varied characters come together to form a tapestry of faith, yearning, and wonder at the majesty of the universe. Lederman’s prose is polished and often lyrical, particularly when he voices the characters of Luke and his mother: “Our gods are as harsh as the world around us, they offer no relief,” Luke’s mother says to David and her son. “Tatqim, moon god, lusts after his sister, Seqinek, the sun, and gives her endless chase; their story is an ugliness that mars the beauty of the night. And your god, where is he? Can he, too, be found among the stars?” Even in these moments, however, Lederman tips his hand to reveal the book’s strict Christian worldview, in which atheists are depicted as arrogant fools and other religions are portrayed as being rooted in fear. The book has the expected cameos of historical fiction—including the aforementioned Johnson and pilot Amelia Earhart—which fans of the genre will enjoy, even if they do strain credulity. The overall milieu is attractive throughout, and the novel is often entertaining. However, because it is, first and foremost, a story of rediscovering faith, the ultimate resolution of the main characters’ stories is never really in doubt.
A well-written but mostly predictable Christian novel.Pub Date: March 12, 2019
ISBN: 978-0-9986030-1-8
Page Count: 398
Publisher: Azure Star, LLC
Review Posted Online: Jan. 22, 2019
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
BOOK REVIEW
A first novel, this is also a first person account of Scout's (Jean Louise) recall of the years that led to the ending of a mystery, the breaking of her brother Jem's elbow, the death of her father's enemy — and the close of childhood years. A widower, Atticus raises his children with legal dispassion and paternal intelligence, and is ably abetted by Calpurnia, the colored cook, while the Alabama town of Maycomb, in the 1930's, remains aloof to their divergence from its tribal patterns. Scout and Jem, with their summer-time companion, Dill, find their paths free from interference — but not from dangers; their curiosity about the imprisoned Boo, whose miserable past is incorporated in their play, results in a tentative friendliness; their fears of Atticus' lack of distinction is dissipated when he shoots a mad dog; his defense of a Negro accused of raping a white girl, Mayella Ewell, is followed with avid interest and turns the rabble whites against him. Scout is the means of averting an attack on Atticus but when he loses the case it is Boo who saves Jem and Scout by killing Mayella's father when he attempts to murder them. The shadows of a beginning for black-white understanding, the persistent fight that Scout carries on against school, Jem's emergence into adulthood, Calpurnia's quiet power, and all the incidents touching on the children's "growing outward" have an attractive starchiness that keeps this southern picture pert and provocative. There is much advance interest in this book; it has been selected by the Literary Guild and Reader's Digest; it should win many friends.
Pub Date: July 11, 1960
ISBN: 0060935464
Page Count: 323
Publisher: Lippincott
Review Posted Online: Oct. 7, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 1960
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
Soft-focus story moves right along with few surprises. This time around, Hannah avoids the soap-opera complications of her...
Another middle-aged mom in a muddle.
After years of false starts and big hopes, Elizabeth’s ruggedly handsome husband Jack, a former football star, just landed a spot as a sportscaster on national news. He still loves her, even though much younger women are giving him come-hither looks. Heck, he doesn’t want to betray the love of his life after she helped him kick drugs and stuck by him even when he was a struggling has-been. And won’t it seem hypocritical if he fools around with his sexy assistant while he does in-depth reporting on a rape case involving a famous basketball center? Well, he fools around anyway. Elizabeth, nicknamed Birdie, knows nothing of this, but she withdraws from Jack when her hard-drinking, salt-of-the-earth father has a stroke and dies. Now no one will call her “sugar beet” ever again. Time to return home to Tennessee and contend with Anita, the sort-of-evil stepmother so trashy she wears pink puffy slippers all day long. Naturally, it turns out that Anita actually has a heart of gold and knows a few things about Birdie’s dead mother that were hushed up for years. Mom was an artist, just like Birdie, and an old scandal comes to light as Anita unrolls a vibrant canvas that portrays her secret lover. Perhaps, Birdie muses, her mother died of heartbreak, never having followed her true love or developed her talent. Has she, too, compromised everything she holds dear? Hoping to find out, Birdie joins a support group that promises to reconnect confused women with their passion. She and Jack separate, prompting a how-dare-you fit from their grown daughters. Will Birdie fly her empty nest? Will she go back to college for a degree in art? Will her brooding watercolors ever sell?
Soft-focus story moves right along with few surprises. This time around, Hannah avoids the soap-opera complications of her previous tales (Summer Island, 2001, etc.).Pub Date: July 1, 2002
ISBN: 0-345-45071-X
Page Count: 352
Publisher: Ballantine
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 15, 2002
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