Not much doubt how things will turn out. Still, the writing is sprightly and surprisingly engaging.
Another British entry into the flowering ranks of postmarriage chick-lit (see the similarly titled Starter Wife, p. 495) recounts the “adventures” of a woman coping with divorce.
Tess, an elementary school teacher, is devastated when her lawyer husband, Barney, announces on Boxing Day that he’s leaving her for his secretary, Dawn. Nicknamed Tip Top Tess for her tidying ways, Tess lets herself and her flat fall into such messy disrepair that her friend Mel suggests she join a divorce-survivor’s group run by William, whose semi-accurate perceptions are interspersed with Tess’s narration. Slowly, Tess gets to know her fellow survivors: big-hearted Carol Ann, whose cheating husband has died since he left her; beautiful media celebrity Jo, who cheated on her husband; natty Natalie, whose husband beats her; shaggy, sexy Aaron, with whom Tess has a very unsatisfactory one-night stand. After Barney tells Tess that Dawn is pregnant, Tess begins to face the fact that her marriage is irretrievably over, that it was probably only a “starter marriage.” First-novelist Harrison takes a leisurely approach as Tess flops around in her misery, drinking too much, learning her parents’ unhappy secrets and generally feeling sorry for herself. Then, on a school outdoor adventure program, she meets Robin, the program leader, who helps her overcome her fear of water. Just as romance is about to bloom, one of the children goes missing along with Robin’s daughter. The kids are found, but Tess’s romance stalls. Meanwhile, Natalie moves in with Tess to hide from her husband, Jo is caught in a tabloid scandal and William realizes he has fallen in love with Carol Ann. For kickers, Barney announces he wants Tess back despite his impending fatherhood—and Robin text-messages that he wants to pick up where he and Tess left off during the school trip.
Not much doubt how things will turn out. Still, the writing is sprightly and surprisingly engaging.Pub Date: July 5, 2005
ISBN: 0-451-21604-0
Page Count: 352
Publisher: NAL/Berkley
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 15, 2005
The best-selling author of tearjerkers like Angel Falls (2000) serves up yet another mountain of mush, topped off with...
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
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
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