In a sequel to her earlier Winter’s Hare (1996), Goodman has written a sensitive, informative, and profoundly moving portrayal of a 14-year-old widow on pilgrimage during the 12th century. Lady Edith’s husband and baby girl have recently died, but she cannot shed tears over their deaths. Feeling threatened by an obnoxious older, powerful man, Sir Runcival, who will force her to marry him, Edith goes on pilgrimage to Jerusalem. Ostensibly putting herself out of his reach, she’s also unwittingly running from her sorrow. A strange wild girl, Rhiannon, begs for Edith’s protection as they travel through the English forest, and Edith takes her in. Rhiannon sees that Edith has buried her grief over her lost baby and prods her to face up to the loss. At last, as she visits Christ’s tomb, Edith allows herself to mourn for her lost child as Mary had mourned for hers, thus releasing herself from the silent torment that has stifled her life. Edith’s physical journey to Jerusalem parallels her emotional one. Goodman’s deft handling of Edith’s emotional turmoil lifts the book to a level beyond most popular young-adult novels. It would make a good companion to Francis Temple’s The Ramsay Scallop (1994) and would serve as a fitting introduction to The Canterbury Tales. Readers will not have had to read the earlier novel to enjoy this sequel. (Fiction. 12-14)
Pub Date: April 1, 2000
ISBN: 0-395-97729-0
Page Count: 240
Publisher: Houghton Mifflin
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 15, 2000
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Masquerading as a man, a young woman sets out to find her friend’s killer in New York and London at the turn of the century; disguise proves to be simultaneously liberating and imprisoning in Lewin’s big-canvas historical novel. No one is who she or he seems to be, not the gender-bending heroine Jackie who spends most of her life as Jack so she can play baseball; not her best friend, Nance, a black performer who “passes” as white, and who dies of a stab wound in the opening pages. Cleverly structured and meticulously detailed so that every piece of information neatly clicks into the jigsaw-puzzle ending, the novel runs on two tracks. One chronicles Jackie’s past history starting with her grandmother (whose incredible life both mirrors and influences her granddaughter’s); the other details her current adventures as the avenger of her best friend, along with a surprise unveiling of her father’s murderer. After a vivid trip through 19th-century America, the novel concludes in and around the music halls of London, where Jackie’s past and present converge. The derring-do climax fails to ignite, for this is a book in which the journey surpasses the destination, but overall Lewin produces a grand adventure that readers won’t soon forget. (Fiction. 12-14)
Pub Date: Oct. 1, 1999
ISBN: 0-8050-6225-4
Page Count: 520
Publisher: Henry Holt
Review Posted Online: May 30, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 1, 1999
A girl’s interest in family history overlaps a coming-of-age story about her vestigial understanding of her mother after death, and her own awareness of self and place in the world. Junior high-school student Carrie Schmidt identifies strongly with the missing girls of 1967’s headlines about runaways. Carrie’s mother is dead and she has just moved in with her grandmother, Mutti, who embarrasses her with her foreign accent and ways. Carrie’s ideal is her friend Mona’s mother, a “professional” who dresses properly, smells good, and knows how to set out a table; readers will grasp the mother’s superficiality, even though Carrie, at first, does not. Mutti has terror in her past, and tells Carrie stories of the Jews in WWII Vienna, and of subsequent events in nine concentration camps; these are mined under the premise that Carrie needs stories for “dream” material and her interest in so-called lucid dreaming, a diverting backdrop that deepens the story without overwhelming it. Mutti’s gripping, terrible tales and the return of an old friend who raised Carrie’s mother when she was sent to Scotland at age nine awaken in Carrie a connection to her current family, to her ancestry, and, ultimately, to a stronger sense of self. This uncommon novel from Metzger (Ellen’s Case, 1995, etc.) steps out of the genre of historical fiction to tell a story as significant to contemporary readers as to the inhabitants of the era it evokes. (Fiction. 10-14)
Pub Date: Feb. 1, 1999
ISBN: 0-670-87777-8
Page Count: 194
Publisher: Viking
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 1999
© Copyright 2024 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Follow
Popular in this Genre
We can’t wait for you to join Kirkus!
It’s free and takes less than 10 seconds!
Already have an account? Log in.
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
Welcome Back!
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
bookshelf
