A stunning, heartfelt, and poignant debut.
Caring for a profoundly disabled child 24/7 is both exhausting and tension-producing for every member of a family. Worse, the lack of affordable and readily available social supports all too often puts the burden of care on the child’s siblings and parents.
For dad Perry Novotny, a successful Atlanta homebuilder, his wife, Caroline Clissold, a Shakespeare scholar and Emory professor, and their two older kids, Ivy and Hugo, the challenge of rearing their youngest, Ben, a nonverbal boy with an IQ of 32, has left almost everyone frayed and close to despair. But not Hugo. As the oldest son, he seems to enjoy engaging with his kid brother. In fact, Hugo stays by Ben’s side whenever possible, soothing him during and after his near-constant grand mal seizures, interpreting the varying meanings of his sole word, "Guh," and generally keeping him entertained. After Ben is booted from his umpteenth group home—Ben bites, scratches, and hits, unaware of his capacity to cause serious physical injury to others—teenage Hugo makes Ben his project. Others in the family know that this is not a good plan, but, somehow, they allow it to unfold. For their part, Ivy withdraws into schoolwork while Caroline withdraws into scholarly research and soothes her nerves with drugs and alcohol. Perry, meanwhile, tries to keep a smile on his face no matter what. The tensions are palpable, and an inevitable crisis looms over much of the novel. When it occurs, it packs a punch and provides an incandescent spotlight on how few resources exist for families like the Novotny-Clissolds. The novel is heartbreaking and enraging, even chilling, as it exposes, in straightforward and never-maudlin terms, the stresses and strains of providing constant care to someone who will never be independent. Different coping styles are also beautifully explicated, without judgment.
A stunning, heartfelt, and poignant debut.Pub Date: Oct. 1, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-944388-74-4
Page Count: 300
Publisher: Fomite
Review Posted Online: July 14, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2019
BOOK REVIEW
Britisher Swift's sixth novel (Ever After, 1992 etc.) and fourth to appear here is a slow-to-start but then captivating tale of English working-class families in the four decades following WW II. When Jack Dodds dies suddenly of cancer after years of running a butcher shop in London, he leaves a strange request—namely, that his ashes be scattered off Margate pier into the sea. And who could better be suited to fulfill this wish than his three oldest drinking buddies—insurance man Ray, vegetable seller Lenny, and undertaker Vic, all of whom, like Jack himself, fought also as soldiers or sailors in the long-ago world war. Swift's narrative start, with its potential for the melodramatic, is developed instead with an economy, heart, and eye that release (through the characters' own voices, one after another) the story's humanity and depth instead of its schmaltz. The jokes may be weak and self- conscious when the three old friends meet at their local pub in the company of the urn holding Jack's ashes; but once the group gets on the road, in an expensive car driven by Jack's adoptive son, Vince, the story starts gradually to move forward, cohere, and deepen. The reader learns in time why it is that no wife comes along, why three marriages out of three broke apart, and why Vince always hated his stepfather Jack and still does—or so he thinks. There will be stories of innocent youth, suffering wives, early loves, lost daughters, secret affairs, and old antagonisms—including a fistfight over the dead on an English hilltop, and a strewing of Jack's ashes into roiling seawaves that will draw up feelings perhaps unexpectedly strong. Without affectation, Swift listens closely to the lives that are his subject and creates a songbook of voices part lyric, part epic, part working-class social realism—with, in all, the ring to it of the honest, human, and true.
Pub Date: April 5, 1996
ISBN: 0-679-41224-7
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Knopf
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 15, 1996
Wacky plot keeps the pages turning and enduring schmaltzy romantic sequences.
Sisters work together to solve a child-abandonment case.
Ellie and Julia Cates have never been close. Julia is shy and brainy; Ellie gets by on charm and looks. Their differences must be tossed aside when a traumatized young girl wanders in from the forest into their hometown in Washington. The sisters’ professional skills are put to the test. Julia is a world-renowned child psychologist who has lost her edge. She is reeling from a case that went publicly sour. Though she was cleared of all wrongdoing, Julia’s name was tarnished, forcing her to shutter her Beverly Hills practice. Ellie Barton is the local police chief in Rain Valley, who’s never faced a tougher case. This is her chance to prove she is more than just a fading homecoming queen, but a scarcity of clues and a reluctant victim make locating the girl’s parents nearly impossible. Ellie places an SOS call to her sister; she needs an expert to rehabilitate this wild-child who has been living outside of civilization for years. Confronted with her professional demons, Julia once again has the opportunity to display her talents and salvage her reputation. Hannah (The Things We Do for Love, 2004, etc.) is at her best when writing from the girl’s perspective. The feral wolf-child keeps the reader interested long after the other, transparent characters have grown tiresome. Hannah’s torturously over-written romance passages are stale, but there are surprises in store as the sisters set about unearthing Alice’s past and creating a home for her.
Wacky plot keeps the pages turning and enduring schmaltzy romantic sequences.Pub Date: March 1, 2006
ISBN: 0-345-46752-3
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Ballantine
Review Posted Online: June 24, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2005
© 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.
