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FREEMAN'S

Name: FREEMAN'S
Author: John Freeman
ISBN: 978-0-8021-2820-1

POWER

edited by John Freeman ‧ RELEASE DATE: Oct. 16, 2018

A motley collection of superb writing.

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Essays, stories, and poems about power, from the personal to the political and back again.

This anthology covers a lot of ground—geographically, temporally, and emotionally. It begins in the 1970s, with editor Freeman reminiscing about his childhood, and ranges from Julia Alvarez’s defiant rewriting of Homer to Eka Kurniawan’s disheartening tale about an abused Indonesian monkey who, despite the cruelty of her master, still dreams of becoming a human being. Plus there’s a stop in France, where enfant terrible Édouard Louis blames “Macron, El Khomri, Hollande, Hirsch, Sarkozy, Bertrand, [and] Chirac” for his father’s wretched health (“The history of your life is the history of these people who have lined up to cut you down”), while in Canada, Margaret Atwood reports on a global outbreak of female lycanthropy: “Look at their red-rimmed paws! / Look at their gnashing eyeballs!…Hairy all over, this belle dame, / and it’s not a sweater.” So what if Freeman hasn’t pieced together a coherent anthology? With a word as famously amorphous as “power” for his theme, how could he? (In his introduction he writes that “Everything that was, I discovered, was enacted by power.” That doesn’t exactly narrow it down.) But Freeman assembles such a talented roster that it doesn’t ultimately matter; each contribution is good enough to keep the reader interested in what’s coming next. This is true right up to the last, and best, entry: a short story by the Japanese novelist Kanako Nishi. It is a master class on the subtle and shifting power dynamics between genders and generations.

A motley collection of superb writing.

Pub Date: Oct. 16, 2018

ISBN: 978-0-8021-2820-1

Page Count: 320

Publisher: Grove

Review Posted Online: July 30, 2018

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 2018

Categories:

GENERAL FICTION

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SACRAMENTO NOIR
edited by John Freeman

- BOOK REVIEW
FREEMAN'S
edited by John Freeman

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THERE'S A REVOLUTION OUTSIDE, MY LOVE
edited by Tracy K. Smith & John Freeman

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TO KILL A MOCKINGBIRD

by Harper Lee ‧ RELEASE DATE: July 11, 1960

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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

Categories:

GENERAL FICTION

- BOOK REVIEW
THE LAND OF SWEET FOREVER
by Harper Lee ; edited by Casey Cep

- BOOK REVIEW
GO SET A WATCHMAN
by Harper Lee

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DISTANT SHORES

by Kristin Hannah ‧ RELEASE DATE: July 1, 2002

Soft-focus story moves right along with few surprises. This time around, Hannah avoids the soap-opera complications of her...

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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.).