Lucid, readable prose but, as travelogue, neither transporting nor insightful. (map)
A pilgrimage along an ancient road, from St.-Jean-Pied-de-Port in France to Santiago de Compostela in Spain, the site of a shrine to the Apostle James.
Having trekked 283 kilometers of the route three years earlier, novelist Harrison (The Seal Wife, 2002, etc.) returns for a second trip with her 12-year-old daughter. On both journeys, she endures the burden of a heavy pack and temperamental weather, blisters, thirst, and fatigue, finding little relief in spartan meals and accommodations along the way. This account of discomfort, though, is rather matter-of-fact, and the author does little to offset any of it with those transcendent moments that make travel—and travel-writing—engaging and worthwhile. Harrison's capable writing is flattened by her emotional evenness; her meditative detachment, perhaps a spiritual achievement appropriate to the milieu, results in a muted account that lacks passion. Harrison's occasional reflections on mortality, fear, and family outshine her encounters with locals and descriptions of place, but she doesn't contemplate anything too deeply or for too long. When, after days of eating, sleeping, and walking alongside her daughter, it occurs to Harrison that she's almost intimidated by her child: “her beauty and her silences, her ability to wound me.” But she doesn't pursue the revelation or use it to lessen the distance between them or to better understand its nature. Also missing is any substantive discussion of Harrison's faith. Her Catholicism is hardly traditional: raised by Jewish grandparents and schooled by Christian Scientists, she converted to Catholicism at 12, married a Quaker, and never baptized her children. On this trek through holy ground, she neglects to discuss her enduring faith, its role in her life, or how (and if at all) she intends to pass it on to her children.
Lucid, readable prose but, as travelogue, neither transporting nor insightful. (map)Pub Date: Nov. 1, 2003
ISBN: 0-7922-3745-5
Page Count: 168
Publisher: National Geographic
Review Posted Online: June 24, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2003
Stricter than, say, Bergen Evans or W3 ("disinterested" means impartial — period), Strunk is in the last analysis...
Privately published by Strunk of Cornell in 1918 and revised by his student E. B. White in 1959, that "little book" is back again with more White updatings.
Stricter than, say, Bergen Evans or W3 ("disinterested" means impartial — period), Strunk is in the last analysis (whoops — "A bankrupt expression") a unique guide (which means "without like or equal").Pub Date: May 15, 1972
ISBN: 0205632645
Page Count: 105
Publisher: Macmillan
Review Posted Online: Oct. 28, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 1972
This is not the Nutcracker sweet, as passed on by Tchaikovsky and Marius Petipa. No, this is the original Hoffmann tale of 1816, in which the froth of Christmas revelry occasionally parts to let the dark underside of childhood fantasies and fears peek through. The boundaries between dream and reality fade, just as Godfather Drosselmeier, the Nutcracker's creator, is seen as alternately sinister and jolly. And Italian artist Roberto Innocenti gives an errily realistic air to Marie's dreams, in richly detailed illustrations touched by a mysterious light. A beautiful version of this classic tale, which will captivate adults and children alike. (Nutcracker; $35.00; Oct. 28, 1996; 136 pp.; 0-15-100227-4)
Pub Date: Oct. 28, 1996
ISBN: 0-15-100227-4
Page Count: 136
Publisher: Harcourt
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 1996
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