by John Curry ‧ RELEASE DATE: June 17, 2018
A gritty, often gross tale of a desperate ne’er-do-well.
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In this debut novel, an alcoholic gambler gets the chance to make money on the other side of the table.
When the housing market collapses and destroys Tim’s dream of flipping an old Philadelphia dwelling—and the portion of his savings he spent to acquire it—he abandons the property to his creditors and moves to Atlantic City to try “to play poker for a living.” Turns out that this is easier said than done, as Tim learns once he starts running bad. “What does ‘running bad’ mean?” he asks readers. “It means losing $50,000 in just under three months at middle stakes poker. It means a $2700 chicken sandwich—that’s the chicken sandwich you eat right after you’ve just lost $2700 right before lunchtime.” He’s also gained 30 pounds and developed a crippling addiction to alcohol while routinely entertaining ideas of drinking himself to death as a means of escaping his troubles. He tries to stay out of Atlantic City by squatting in his own foreclosed row house in Philadelphia, but he’s driven away when a neighborhood flood sends “raw sewage gurgling up through the basement’s drainage system” and he’s beset by a biblical plague of flies. He returns to Atlantic City and has just hit rock bottom when he gets an offer from “the world’s most inconspicuous loan shark,” Brian: running an underground card game in midtown Manhattan. It’s illegal and it’s rigged against the players—just like the casinos, Wall Street, and the rest of America. Tim agrees and is quickly dropped into a world of rakes, vigs, rich college kids, vague threats, and Russian floor men, where everything is too expensive and fools are easily parted with their money. For once Tim is on the winning side of a hustle—at least until, as happens with every hustle, the floor collapses out from under him. Curry’s prose deftly captures Tim in all his down-and-out glory. Like most literary drunks, he’s equal parts philosopher (“The secret behind all class conflict and social instability in the Western hemisphere lies within the walls of this American public convenience store”) and wince-inducing cautionary tale (“After about six more hours of trying to blind myself, I plod my way to the bathroom, as it seems the safest, most logical place to have a seriously dark moment”). Tim is offended by the casual racism of others, though he is a frequent source of it, and he rarely meets a woman who doesn’t cause him to go on at some length about the ways in which she disgusts him. Tim’s misadventures evoke the long tradition of vagabond literature practiced by writers like George Orwell, Hunter S. Thompson, Denis Johnson, and others. While Tim’s story will be compelling enough for fans of that genre, Curry does not successfully excavate enough humanity from the protagonist’s fringe experiences to warrant all the misanthropy and exploitative leering. The connections between the 2008 financial crisis, gambling, and addiction are fertile, but the author doesn’t quite tie them together in a satisfying way.
A gritty, often gross tale of a desperate ne’er-do-well.Pub Date: June 17, 2018
ISBN: 978-1-73241-121-0
Page Count: 160
Publisher: The Okie Doke Book Publishing Corporation
Review Posted Online: Feb. 4, 2019
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
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by Nora Roberts ‧ RELEASE DATE: June 13, 1995
Thoroughbreds and Virginia blue-bloods cavort, commit murder, and fall in love in Roberts's (Hidden Riches, 1994, etc.) latest romantic thriller — this one set in the world of championship horse racing. Rich, sheltered Kelsey Byden is recovering from a recent divorce when she receives a letter from her mother, Naomi, a woman she has believed dead for over 20 years. When Kelsey confronts her genteel English professor father, though, he sheepishly confesses that, no, her mother isn't dead; throughout Kelsey's childhood, she was doing time for the murder of her lover. Kelsey meets with Naomi and not only finds her quite charming, but the owner of Three Willows, one of the most splendid horse farms in Virginia. Kelsey is further intrigued when she meets Gabe Slater, a blue-eyed gambling man who owns a neighboring horse farm; when one of Gabe's horses is mated with Naomi's, nostrils flare, flanks quiver, and the romance is on. Since both Naomi and Gabe have horses entered in the Kentucky Derby, Kelsey is soon swept into the whirlwind of the Triple Crown, in spite of her family's objections to her reconciliation with the notorious Naomi. The rivalry between the two horse farms remains friendly, but other competitors — one of them is Gabe's father, a vicious alcoholic who resents his son's success — prove less scrupulous. Bodies, horse and human, start piling up, just as Kelsey decides to investigate the murky details of her mother's crime. Is it possible she was framed? The ground is thick with no-goods, including haughty patricians, disgruntled grooms, and jockeys with tragic pasts, but despite all the distractions, the identity of the true culprit behind the mayhem — past and present — remains fairly obvious. The plot lopes rather than races to the finish. Gambling metaphors abound, and sexual doings have a distinctly equine tone. But Roberts's style has a fresh, contemporary snap that gets the story past its own worst excesses.
Pub Date: June 13, 1995
ISBN: 0-399-14059-X
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Putnam
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 15, 1995
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by Nora Roberts
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by Nora Roberts
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by Nora Roberts
by Kristin Hannah ‧ RELEASE DATE: Feb. 1, 2008
Dated sermonizing on career versus motherhood, and conflict driven by characters’ willed helplessness, sap this tale of...
Lifelong, conflicted friendship of two women is the premise of Hannah’s maudlin latest (Magic Hour, 2006, etc.), again set in Washington State.
Tallulah “Tully” Hart, father unknown, is the daughter of a hippie, Cloud, who makes only intermittent appearances in her life. Tully takes refuge with the family of her “best friend forever,” Kate Mularkey, who compares herself unfavorably with Tully, in regards to looks and charisma. In college, “TullyandKate” pledge the same sorority and major in communications. Tully has a life goal for them both: They will become network TV anchorwomen. Tully lands an internship at KCPO-TV in Seattle and finagles a producing job for Kate. Kate no longer wishes to follow Tully into broadcasting and is more drawn to fiction writing, but she hesitates to tell her overbearing friend. Meanwhile a love triangle blooms at KCPO: Hard-bitten, irresistibly handsome, former war correspondent Johnny is clearly smitten with Tully. Expecting rejection, Kate keeps her infatuation with Johnny secret. When Tully lands a reporting job with a Today-like show, her career shifts into hyperdrive. Johnny and Kate had started an affair once Tully moved to Manhattan, and when Kate gets pregnant with daughter Marah, they marry. Kate is content as a stay-at-home mom, but frets about being Johnny’s second choice and about her unrealized writing ambitions. Tully becomes Seattle’s answer to Oprah. She hires Johnny, which spells riches for him and Kate. But Kate’s buttons are fully depressed by pitched battles over slutwear and curfews with teenaged Marah, who idolizes her godmother Tully. In an improbable twist, Tully invites Kate and Marah to resolve their differences on her show, only to blindside Kate by accusing her, on live TV, of overprotecting Marah. The BFFs are sundered. Tully’s latest attempt to salvage Cloud fails: The incorrigible, now geriatric hippie absconds once more. Just as Kate develops a spine, she’s given some devastating news. Will the friends reconcile before it’s too late?
Dated sermonizing on career versus motherhood, and conflict driven by characters’ willed helplessness, sap this tale of poignancy.Pub Date: Feb. 1, 2008
ISBN: 978-0-312-36408-3
Page Count: 496
Publisher: St. Martin's
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 1, 2007
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