A gritty and gripping sins-of-the-fathers tale from Freedman (Against the Wind, 1991, etc.), who this time puts a couple of memorably gutsy ladies center stage. Having resigned from the Oakland PD after being involved in a hostage crisis that left three people dead, Kate Blanchard divorces her brutally abusive husband (a fellow cop) and moves to Santa Barbara in search of a fresh start. With wise counsel from a retired investigator whose practice she takes over, the 40ish Kate sets up shop as a p.i. Retained by wealthy young Laura Sparks to probe the apparent suicide of Frank Bascombe, who died in the local jail while awaiting arraignment on drug charges, the fledgling sleuth soon learns she may be out of her depth. In addition to being Laura's lover, Bascombe was foreman at the vast ranch owned by the Sparks family, and the old-money clan wants to put a quick lid on his death for fear it could sully their good name. Particularly keen on keeping Kate at bay is Miranda Sparks, Laura's mother. A calculating sexual predator who takes her pleasures where she finds them (thanks to the impotence of a beloved but feckless husband), Miranda has been entrusted by matriarch Dorothy with the stewardship of the family's presumably substantial holdings. But undaunted by pointed warnings and a severe beating, Kate keeps digging. She finally discovers that Miranda is, literally, in bed with the representative of an international oil company that wants to slant-drill into the scenic channel—anathema in environmentally correct Santa Barbara. Kate also identifies other players with sinister agendas of their own. The case she would not drop eventually resolves itself in a shocking, violent, and cathartic climax. Plucky Kate and lusty Miranda are irresistible creations in their absorbing if occasionally melodramatic duel, set in an agreeably complex coastal eden: an immensely entertaining read. (Literary Guild featured alternate)
Pub Date: Jan. 1, 1996
ISBN: 0-670-85347-X
Page Count: 410
Publisher: Viking
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 1995
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
Coelho's placebo has racked up impressive sales in Brazil and Europe. Americans should flock to it like gulls.
Coelho is a Brazilian writer with four books to his credit. Following Diary of a Magus (1992—not reviewed) came this book, published in Brazil in 1988: it's an interdenominational, transcendental, inspirational fable—in other words, a bag of wind.
The story is about a youth empowered to follow his dream. Santiago is an Andalusian shepherd boy who learns through a dream of a treasure in the Egyptian pyramids. An old man, the king of Salem, the first of various spiritual guides, tells the boy that he has discovered his destiny: "to realize one's destiny is a person's only real obligation." So Santiago sells his sheep, sails to Tangier, is tricked out of his money, regains it through hard work, crosses the desert with a caravan, stops at an oasis long enough to fall in love, escapes from warring tribesmen by performing a miracle, reaches the pyramids, and eventually gets both the gold and the girl. Along the way he meets an Englishman who describes the Soul of the World; the desert woman Fatima, who teaches him the Language of the World; and an alchemist who says, "Listen to your heart" A message clings like ivy to every encounter; everyone, but everyone, has to put in their two cents' worth, from the crystal merchant to the camel driver ("concentrate always on the present, you'll be a happy man"). The absence of characterization and overall blandness suggest authorship by a committee of self-improvement pundits—a far cry from Saint- Exupery's The Little Prince: that flagship of the genre was a genuine charmer because it clearly derived from a quirky, individual sensibility.
Coelho's placebo has racked up impressive sales in Brazil and Europe. Americans should flock to it like gulls.Pub Date: July 1, 1993
ISBN: 0-06-250217-4
Page Count: 192
Publisher: N/A
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 1993
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
BOOK TO SCREEN
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