Austen’s wit seems less sparkling and more forced in so trite a setting.
The pseudonymous author of two Jane Austen sequels (The Third Sister, 1996, etc.) here takes up Austen’s unfinished
manuscript satirizing land speculators and fashionable seaside towns, completing it with period style and dash, though plot developments are less satisfying Austen began The Brothers (better known as Sanditon, the name her survivors gave it) shortly before she died in 1817. The 12 chapters she wrote promise a spirited satire of the burgeoning popularity of seaside resorts, whose air and water were thought to have healing powers, and Barrett picks up where Austen left off. Several themes have contemporary resonance, particularly the characters” preoccupation with alternative medicine and the desire of property developers Mr. Parker and Lady Debenham to profit from this fashion. These two, who have invested money in building houses to rent, hope that Sanditon will be the next Brighton. The folly of their enterprise is seen mostly through the eyes of Charlotte Heywood, a young woman staying with the Parkers in their new seaside villa, Trafalgar House. Charlotte is amused by romantic, verse-quoting Sir Edward, Lady Debenham’s nephew and heir, but Edward himself is more taken with Clara, the Lady’s penniless prot‚g‚e. As the season opens, a gratifying number of wealthy visitors arrive, as do Mr. Parker’s hypochondriacal sisters and youngest brother, who soon find their health, happiness, and vocation in Sanditon. Also in attendance is Sidney, another Parker brother, who shares Charlotte’s sardonic understanding of others” follies. Mutual attraction ensues as the plot labors to thicken. The resort still has too many vacant accommodations, so Sir Edward goes to London, hoping to make money by persuading a horse-racing and gambling establishment to move to Sanditon. It does, but the ensuing scandal soon empties the town. Only love triumphs. All those nice Regency details are here, but the people are sketchy creatures compelled to rush through a creaky plot. Even
Austen’s wit seems less sparkling and more forced in so trite a setting.Pub Date: April 1, 2000
ISBN: 0-87131-908-X
Page Count: 240
Publisher: N/A
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2000
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
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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