An ambitious, energetic, overlong but passionate novel about fate, hope, and faith, by the author of the acclaimed La Maravilla (1993). VÇa's fiction often seems equally reminiscent of John Steinbeck and Gabriel Garc°a M†rquez. He has a frank, deep empathy for the underdog and outcast, and a clear, fierce anger about their mistreatment and exploitation. And he loves to weave vivid folkloric elements and beings into his plots. The action this time out repeatedly returns to the Silver Cloud CafÇ, a cantina in San Francisco's seedy Mission District, a way station for a curious group of wanderers. There is a midget philosopher, in search of the woman he loved and lost. A Mexican priest, in flight from a variety of spirits, both demonic and ethereal. And a rather curious assassin, on the trail of his longtime quarry. Not surprisingly, perhaps, their stories begin to intersect. Two ghastly murders in San Francisco, several decades apart, turn out to be related. The repercussions following the bloody repression of a revolt in Mexico in the 1920s reach into the present. Violence in VÇa's fiction has a way of lingering, the losses and guilt it generates being passed down from generation to generation. Only faith, he suggests, has the power to dissipate the deforming effects of violence. Few contemporary novelists dwell so much or so variously on the question of faith: The characters here dream about matters of faith, tell stories about improbable acts inspired by faith, and spend much of their time meditating on the possibilities of redemption. For VÇa, faith is very much on the side of the oppressed, and it plays a central role in the resolution of the various quests at the heart of the tale. A highly original work, then, equally concerned with religion and with the oppressed. Too crowded with incident for its own good but, still, a moving work.
Pub Date: Oct. 14, 1996
ISBN: 0-525-94077-4
Page Count: 352
Publisher: Dutton
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 1996
Briskly written soap with down-to-earth types, mostly without the lachrymose contrivances of Hannah’s previous titles...
Sisters in and out of love.
Meghann Dontess is a high-powered matrimonial lawyer in Seattle who prefers sex with strangers to emotional intimacy: a strategy bound to backfire sooner or later, warns her tough-talking shrink. It’s advice Meghann decides to ignore, along with the memories of her difficult childhood, neglectful mother, and younger sister. Though she managed to reunite Claire with Sam Cavenaugh (her father but not Meghann’s) when her mother abandoned both girls long ago, Meghann still feels guilty that her sister’s life doesn’t measure up, at least on her terms. Never married, Claire ekes out a living running a country campground with her dad and is raising her six-year-old daughter on her own. When she falls in love for the first time with an up-and-coming country musician, Meghann is appalled: Bobby Austin is a three-time loser at marriage—how on earth can Claire be so blind? Bobby’s blunt explanation doesn’t exactly satisfy the concerned big sister, who busies herself planning Claire’s dream wedding anyway. And, to relieve the stress, she beds various guys she picks up in bars, including Dr. Joe Wyatt, a neurosurgeon turned homeless drifter after the demise of his beloved wife Diane (whom he euthanized). When Claire’s awful headache turns out to be a kind of brain tumor known among neurologists as a “terminator,” Joe rallies. Turns out that Claire had befriended his wife on her deathbed, and now in turn he must try to save her. Is it too late? Will Meghann find true love at last?
Briskly written soap with down-to-earth types, mostly without the lachrymose contrivances of Hannah’s previous titles (Distant Shores, 2002, etc.). Kudos for skipping the snifflefest this time around.Pub Date: May 1, 2003
ISBN: 0-345-45073-6
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Ballantine
Review Posted Online: June 24, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2003
Coelho's placebo has racked up impressive sales in Brazil and Europe. Americans should flock to it like gulls.
Coelho is a Brazilian writer with four books to his credit. Following Diary of a Magus (1992—not reviewed) came this book, published in Brazil in 1988: it's an interdenominational, transcendental, inspirational fable—in other words, a bag of wind.
The story is about a youth empowered to follow his dream. Santiago is an Andalusian shepherd boy who learns through a dream of a treasure in the Egyptian pyramids. An old man, the king of Salem, the first of various spiritual guides, tells the boy that he has discovered his destiny: "to realize one's destiny is a person's only real obligation." So Santiago sells his sheep, sails to Tangier, is tricked out of his money, regains it through hard work, crosses the desert with a caravan, stops at an oasis long enough to fall in love, escapes from warring tribesmen by performing a miracle, reaches the pyramids, and eventually gets both the gold and the girl. Along the way he meets an Englishman who describes the Soul of the World; the desert woman Fatima, who teaches him the Language of the World; and an alchemist who says, "Listen to your heart" A message clings like ivy to every encounter; everyone, but everyone, has to put in their two cents' worth, from the crystal merchant to the camel driver ("concentrate always on the present, you'll be a happy man"). The absence of characterization and overall blandness suggest authorship by a committee of self-improvement pundits—a far cry from Saint- Exupery's The Little Prince: that flagship of the genre was a genuine charmer because it clearly derived from a quirky, individual sensibility.
Coelho's placebo has racked up impressive sales in Brazil and Europe. Americans should flock to it like gulls.Pub Date: July 1, 1993
ISBN: 0-06-250217-4
Page Count: 192
Publisher: N/A
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 1993
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
BOOK TO SCREEN
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