A creative, if somewhat underdeveloped, adventure.
An intuitive young heroine visits the world of Cloudscape in this middle-grade prequel.
Matilda, a girl from Vietnam adopted by an American family, has a special gift. Whenever there is danger lurking, she is alerted in the form of a stomachache. These premonitions can be extremely valuable, as when she saves a friend from a venomous snake. But sometimes the aches seem to have no source, as when Matilda is practicing jumps with her beloved horse, Merry. When her family visits Oregon’s Rose Festival, Matilda ignores her misgiving about riding the Ferris wheel—a decision that turns into a calamity after her seat belt snaps at the top of the ride. The next thing Matilda knows, she has awakened in an unfamiliar world. A kindly woman named Mrs. O’Carolan explains that she was rescued from her fall by the residents of Cloudscape, a fantastical community floating more than 6,000 feet above the ground. During her first day, Matilda is introduced to a young girl named Kiara, who was rescued from the same carnival ride. The two begin the assimilation process and soon settle into a routine on Cloudscape, where rescued individuals from all over the globe study weather patterns, collect useful items from passing airplanes, and craft cloud formations for the people below. But unlike the residents who appear resigned to remaining in the clouds, Matilda and Kiara harbor a desire to return to their families and lives on Earth. In this prequel to Cloudscape: Charlie’s Story (2016), Courtney’s choice of language is simple yet effective in her illustration of the world, which is imaginative and full of whimsical details. Unfortunately, the lack of clarity concerning certain elements tests suspension of disbelief. For instance, it is never quite clear why Cloudscape’s incredible technologies stop short of being able to return people home. Additionally, the lack of urgency surrounding the central conflict causes the narrative to rely on episodic, quickly resolved dangers for excitement. On the other hand, the authenticity of Matilda’s feelings (dutifully recorded in her journal) is a winning quality.
A creative, if somewhat underdeveloped, adventure.Pub Date: Oct. 28, 2019
ISBN: 978-0-9967059-5-0
Page Count: 189
Publisher: JN Courtney Publications
Review Posted Online: Feb. 10, 2020
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
Britisher Swift's sixth novel (Ever After, 1992 etc.) and fourth to appear here is a slow-to-start but then captivating tale of English working-class families in the four decades following WW II. When Jack Dodds dies suddenly of cancer after years of running a butcher shop in London, he leaves a strange request—namely, that his ashes be scattered off Margate pier into the sea. And who could better be suited to fulfill this wish than his three oldest drinking buddies—insurance man Ray, vegetable seller Lenny, and undertaker Vic, all of whom, like Jack himself, fought also as soldiers or sailors in the long-ago world war. Swift's narrative start, with its potential for the melodramatic, is developed instead with an economy, heart, and eye that release (through the characters' own voices, one after another) the story's humanity and depth instead of its schmaltz. The jokes may be weak and self- conscious when the three old friends meet at their local pub in the company of the urn holding Jack's ashes; but once the group gets on the road, in an expensive car driven by Jack's adoptive son, Vince, the story starts gradually to move forward, cohere, and deepen. The reader learns in time why it is that no wife comes along, why three marriages out of three broke apart, and why Vince always hated his stepfather Jack and still does—or so he thinks. There will be stories of innocent youth, suffering wives, early loves, lost daughters, secret affairs, and old antagonisms—including a fistfight over the dead on an English hilltop, and a strewing of Jack's ashes into roiling seawaves that will draw up feelings perhaps unexpectedly strong. Without affectation, Swift listens closely to the lives that are his subject and creates a songbook of voices part lyric, part epic, part working-class social realism—with, in all, the ring to it of the honest, human, and true.
Pub Date: April 5, 1996
ISBN: 0-679-41224-7
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Knopf
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 15, 1996
The best-selling author of tearjerkers like Angel Falls (2000) serves up yet another mountain of mush, topped off with...
Talk-show queen takes tumble as millions jeer.
Nora Bridges is a wildly popular radio spokesperson for family-first virtues, but her loyal listeners don't know that she walked out on her husband and teenaged daughters years ago and didn't look back. Now that a former lover has sold racy pix of naked Nora and horny himself to a national tabloid, her estranged daughter Ruby, an unsuccessful stand-up comic in Los Angeles, has been approached to pen a tell-all. Greedy for the fat fee she's been promised, Ruby agrees and heads for the San Juan Islands, eager to get reacquainted with the mom she plans to betray. Once in the family homestead, nasty Ruby alternately sulks and glares at her mother, who is temporarily wheelchair-bound as a result of a post-scandal car crash. Uncaring, Ruby begins writing her side of the story when she's not strolling on the beach with former sweetheart Dean Sloan, the son of wealthy socialites who basically ignored him and his gay brother Eric. Eric, now dying of cancer and also in a wheelchair, has returned to the island. This dismal threesome catch up on old times, recalling their childhood idylls on the island. After Ruby's perfect big sister Caroline shows up, there's another round of heartfelt talk. Nora gradually reveals the truth about her unloving husband and her late father's alcoholism, which led her to seek the approval of others at the cost of her own peace of mind. And so on. Ruby is aghast to discover that she doesn't know everything after all, but Dean offers her subdued comfort. Happy endings await almost everyone—except for readers of this nobly preachy snifflefest.
The best-selling author of tearjerkers like Angel Falls (2000) serves up yet another mountain of mush, topped off with syrupy platitudes about life and love.Pub Date: March 1, 2001
ISBN: 0-609-60737-5
Page Count: 336
Publisher: Crown
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2001
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