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ARE YOU LAUGHING AT ME?

Name: ARE YOU LAUGHING AT ME?
Author: John Wayne Sears
ISBN: 978-1463598839

by John Wayne Sears ‧ RELEASE DATE: Jan. 24, 2012

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A disaster-prone adventurer gets into various predicaments at home in British Columbia and the far-flung locales of Hawaii, Costa Rica and Mexico in Sears’ debut memoir.

Sears doesn’t personally seem to have much of an interest in travel but his friends and wife Pat do. Thus, Sears gets dragged or coaxed along on all kinds of adventures, which, more often than not, involve a series of minor, everyday inconveniences. This, perhaps, is not the best fodder for a 300-page collection of personal essays. The author’s prose is fairly straightforward, very clever and always personable, and despite a tendency to get carried away with hokey jokes, the book exhibits a decent sense of structure and pace. In Sears, readers find a very likable narrator who comes across as an eccentric uncle with a penchant for mischief. The stories are conversational and conspiratorially related, as Sears chugs along gamely in the face of mounting obstacles while smarting off to Pat, ogling leggy island women and accidentally ingesting copious amounts of seawater. Unfortunately, there is only so much humor that can be wrung out of swallowing seawater, backaches and chafing. Sears does have plenty of material to work with from a lifetime of travel but often it’s not as captivating as readers may wish. For example, if Sears had actually encountered an enraged giant gorilla in the wilds of Costa Rica, as opposed to one of the ubiquitous howler monkeys found there, that might account for the terror the author recounts experiencing. Instead, his panic-stricken reaction is good for a laugh but doesn’t rise above the level of an interesting anecdote. With few notable exceptions, such as Sears’ touching remembrance of a deceased friend, that’s too often the case with the essays found herein. In this chronicle of humorous adventuring, Sears could use more adventure.

Pub Date: Jan. 24, 2012

ISBN: 978-1463598839

Page Count: 314

Publisher: CreateSpace

Review Posted Online: March 21, 2012

Review Program: Kirkus Indie

Categories:

GENERAL FICTION

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SUMMER ISLAND

by Kristin Hannah ‧ RELEASE DATE: March 1, 2001

The best-selling author of tearjerkers like Angel Falls (2000) serves up yet another mountain of mush, topped off with...

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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

Categories:

GENERAL FICTION

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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.