A vivid but messy adventure surrounding a young impressionist.
A debut historical novel summons the art world of 19th-century Paris.
Who could have guessed that René Bernard, the son of an oysterman, would become one of the most legendary painters of the impressionist era? A childhood illness provides the opportunity to escape the family business and instead attend art school in Lyon. From there, René goes to Paris, like all the painters of his generation, to make a name for himself amid the squalor and brilliance of the city’s bohemian arts community. It is in Paris that he first lays eyes on the Flower Girl, a woman of beauty and intrigue who immediately steals his heart: “This young girl had hair of long beautiful brown curls that fell from her head and surrounded her shoulders. Her skin was as clear and unblemished as a newborn baby.” René sets out to court the Flower Girl—whose true identity is unknown—and make her his muse, though in this he is challenged by the Critic, a bane to artists everywhere who is also shrouded in mystery. Soldiers, ladies, and a trained lion round out the cast of characters of René’s colorful milieu. In a time when art can make a man famous or destroy his life, this budding painter must determine what cost he is willing to pay for immortality. MacDougall writes in a stylistic prose that brings René’s Paris to life with gritty detail: “She had a bit of a purse but dressed in rags. Tongues had come to Paris to blend in and make a life for herself, whatever that might mean. She took a room in the least expensive district, living with an alcoholic woman, and her lover, another alcoholic woman.” René’s paintings (actually created by the author, an artist) possess a certain folksy charm, but they don’t look like anything that would have been executed by a renowned impressionist. In addition, MacDougall unfortunately invests in the intricacies of his plot rather than the development of his characters: Numerous pseudonyms and hidden backstories obscure these figures, and the eventual reveals are not particularly satisfying. Ambitious and occasionally inventive, this sprawling novel never quite achieves the level of intrigue it seeks.
A vivid but messy adventure surrounding a young impressionist.Pub Date: Nov. 27, 2017
ISBN: 978-1-5470-7139-5
Page Count: 358
Publisher: CreateSpace
Review Posted Online: March 12, 2018
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
A strict report, worthy of sympathy.
A violent surfacing of adolescence (which has little in common with Tarkington's earlier, broadly comic, Seventeen) has a compulsive impact.
"Nobody big except me" is the dream world of Holden Caulfield and his first person story is down to the basic, drab English of the pre-collegiate. For Holden is now being bounced from fancy prep, and, after a vicious evening with hall- and roommates, heads for New York to try to keep his latest failure from his parents. He tries to have a wild evening (all he does is pay the check), is terrorized by the hotel elevator man and his on-call whore, has a date with a girl he likes—and hates, sees his 10 year old sister, Phoebe. He also visits a sympathetic English teacher after trying on a drunken session, and when he keeps his date with Phoebe, who turns up with her suitcase to join him on his flight, he heads home to a hospital siege. This is tender and true, and impossible, in its picture of the old hells of young boys, the lonesomeness and tentative attempts to be mature and secure, the awful block between youth and being grown-up, the fright and sickness that humans and their behavior cause the challenging, the dramatization of the big bang. It is a sorry little worm's view of the off-beat of adult pressure, of contemporary strictures and conformity, of sentiment….
A strict report, worthy of sympathy.Pub Date: June 15, 1951
ISBN: 0316769177
Page Count: -
Publisher: Little, Brown
Review Posted Online: Nov. 2, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 1951
BOOK REVIEW
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
APPRECIATIONS
Genetically engineered dinosaurs run amok in Crichton's new, vastly entertaining science thriller. From the introduction alone—a classically Crichton-clear discussion of the implications of biotechnological research—it's evident that the Harvard M.D. has bounced back from the science-fantasy silliness of Sphere (1987) for another taut reworking of the Frankenstein theme, as in The Andromeda Strain and The Terminal Man. Here, Dr. Frankenstein is aging billionaire John Hammond, whose monster is a manmade ecosystem based on a Costa Rican island. Designed as the world's ultimate theme park, the ecosystem boasts climate and flora of the Jurassic Age and—most spectacularly—15 varieties of dinosaurs, created by elaborate genetic engineering that Crichton explains in fascinating detail, rich with dino-lore and complete with graphics. Into the park, for a safety check before its opening, comes the novel's band of characters—who, though well drawn, double as symbolic types in this unsubtle morality play. Among them are hero Alan Grant, noble paleontologist; Hammond, venal and obsessed; amoral dino-designer Henry Wu; Hammond's two innocent grandchildren; and mathematician Ian Malcolm, who in long diatribes serves as Crichton's mouthpiece to lament the folly of science. Upon arrival, the visitors tour the park; meanwhile, an industrial spy steals some dino embryos by shutting down the island's power—and its security grid, allowing the beasts to run loose. The bulk of the remaining narrative consists of dinos—ferocious T. Rex's, voracious velociraptors, venom-spitting dilophosaurs—stalking, ripping, and eating the cast in fast, furious, and suspenseful set-pieces as the ecosystem spins apart. And can Grant prevent the dinos from escaping to the mainland to create unchecked havoc? Though intrusive, the moralizing rarely slows this tornado-paced tale, a slick package of info-thrills that's Crichton's most clever since Congo (1980)—and easily the most exciting dinosaur novel ever written. A sure-fire best-seller.
Pub Date: Nov. 7, 1990
ISBN: 0394588169
Page Count: 424
Publisher: Knopf
Review Posted Online: Sept. 21, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 1990
© Copyright 2025 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.
