CARNIVORE DIET

Name: CARNIVORE DIET
Author: Julia Slavin
ISBN: 0-393-05998-7

by Julia Slavin ‧ RELEASE DATE: July 1, 2005

Slavin’s efforts to undercut the reader’s sense of equilibrium are arresting for a bit, then persistently off-putting. In...

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A mythological Bigfoot-ish creature terrorizes Washington, D.C., in an absurdist fable that veers from the intriguingly eccentric to the precious.

First-novelist Slavin (stories: The Woman Who Cut Off Her Leg at the Maidstone Club, 1999) is best delineating the angst of Dylan Dunleavy, 14, whose body changes get him fired after three glorious seasons as the voice of a rodent called Harlan on a wildly popular animated TV show (“the job every kid in America wanted”). But nothing can stop Dylan’s voice from growing too low for the boy-rat Harlan, and, once ousted by Gold Street, Dylan feels the full weight of his loneliness. He lives with his protective, chin-up mother, Wendy, in a depressing housing complex in Washington, while his father, Congressman Matt, does time at Ainsville prison for shadiness. Grisly murders have been taking place, and, in his delusional grief (perhaps), Dylan spots the Chewy-like monster, called a chagwa, which seems to have sprung from the deepest recesses of man’s subconscious. Soon, the chagwa is sighted everywhere, large, hairy and voracious for steak, though no one seems able to shoot it. In alternate viewpoints, the surreal plight of Wendy and Dylan becomes apparent: stabilized on Solisan, a drug everyone takes, Wendy bids goodbye to her occasional affair, Peter, who is moving with his family to the historical enactment camp Colonial World, where there’s war with the Croatans and an outbreak of influenza. Wendy flirts with dishy political impresario Ben Sotterburg and entertains her husband at home for occasional, edgy furloughs from jail, while Dylan grows more depressed and isolated, the chagwa more restless and hungry and Wendy more nutty and unstable—until the whole city seems to erupt in paranoia.

Slavin’s efforts to undercut the reader’s sense of equilibrium are arresting for a bit, then persistently off-putting. In all, sparks of high goof and a lot of nonsense filler.

Pub Date: July 1, 2005

ISBN: 0-393-05998-7

Page Count: 288

Publisher: Norton

Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010

Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 15, 2005

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.

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

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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.).