by Keith Melton ‧ RELEASE DATE: Oct. 1, 2013
Straightforward historical fiction that needs a little more.
Melton’s debut historical novel centers on the Roman Catholic religious insurrection in 16th-century England.
Using original historical sources, Melton’s novel takes place mostly following King Henry VIII’s break from the Catholic Church after the monarchy introduced the Dissolution of the Monasteries, one of its most divisive religious and political reforms, which began in 1536. In the small town of Louth in Lincolnshire lived a shoemaker named Nicholas Melton (a real historical figure but of no definite relation to the author). Though a simple cobbler by trade, he had great faith in Catholicism, and he soon found himself leading an uprising against the crown’s reforms. Dubbed Captain Cobbler by the townsfolk, and flirting with death by hanging stemming from charges of treason, Nicholas led the insurgents all the way to Lincoln, dressed in his multicolored Coat of Motley. With a cast of more than a hundred characters—many genuine historical figures—author Melton channels the spirit of his namesake (if not his ancestor) while presenting a vivid portrait of early 16th-century England during a most tumultuous time. With a thread of insurrection sewn throughout, the novel unfolds a colorful tapestry of the townsfolk of Louth and surrounding Lincolnshire as they debate and execute their plan to take on the royals. Via flashback, the narrative bounces from Nicholas’ jail cell in the Tower of London on the morning of his scheduled execution, to the fateful days of uprising in October 1536—then to his boyhood and teen years, and the early life of King Henry VIII and Catherine before the turmoil. The changing points of view can be confusing, though, as many chapters lack date and place references, and some of the material seems superfluous to the story. Generally, the archaic dialogue works well, though it may be too antiquated for some readers, and the shortage of plots twists and lack of a stronger story arc might keep the pages from turning more quickly. Regardless, Nicholas was certainly a noble man still worth following.
Straightforward historical fiction that needs a little more.Pub Date: Oct. 1, 2013
ISBN: N/A
Page Count: 374
Publisher: Dog Ear Publisher
Review Posted Online: Aug. 21, 2013
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
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by Max Brooks ‧ RELEASE DATE: June 16, 2020
A tasty, if not always tasteful, tale of supernatural mayhem that fans of King and Crichton alike will enjoy.
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New York Times Bestseller
Are we not men? We are—well, ask Bigfoot, as Brooks does in this delightful yarn, following on his bestseller World War Z(2006).
A zombie apocalypse is one thing. A volcanic eruption is quite another, for, as the journalist who does a framing voice-over narration for Brooks’ latest puts it, when Mount Rainier popped its cork, “it was the psychological aspect, the hyperbole-fueled hysteria that had ended up killing the most people.” Maybe, but the sasquatches whom the volcano displaced contributed to the statistics, too, if only out of self-defense. Brooks places the epicenter of the Bigfoot war in a high-tech hideaway populated by the kind of people you might find in a Jurassic Park franchise: the schmo who doesn’t know how to do much of anything but tries anyway, the well-intentioned bleeding heart, the know-it-all intellectual who turns out to know the wrong things, the immigrant with a tough backstory and an instinct for survival. Indeed, the novel does double duty as a survival manual, packed full of good advice—for instance, try not to get wounded, for “injury turns you from a giver to a taker. Taking up our resources, our time to care for you.” Brooks presents a case for making room for Bigfoot in the world while peppering his narrative with timely social criticism about bad behavior on the human side of the conflict: The explosion of Rainier might have been better forecast had the president not slashed the budget of the U.S. Geological Survey, leading to “immediate suspension of the National Volcano Early Warning System,” and there’s always someone around looking to monetize the natural disaster and the sasquatch-y onslaught that follows. Brooks is a pro at building suspense even if it plays out in some rather spectacularly yucky episodes, one involving a short spear that takes its name from “the sucking sound of pulling it out of the dead man’s heart and lungs.” Grossness aside, it puts you right there on the scene.
A tasty, if not always tasteful, tale of supernatural mayhem that fans of King and Crichton alike will enjoy.Pub Date: June 16, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-9848-2678-7
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Del Rey/Ballantine
Review Posted Online: Feb. 9, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2020
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BOOK TO SCREEN
by Hanya Yanagihara ‧ RELEASE DATE: March 10, 2015
The phrase “tour de force” could have been invented for this audacious novel.
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Best Books Of 2015
Kirkus Prize
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National Book Award Finalist
Four men who meet as college roommates move to New York and spend the next three decades gaining renown in their professions—as an architect, painter, actor and lawyer—and struggling with demons in their intertwined personal lives.
Yanagihara (The People in the Trees, 2013) takes the still-bold leap of writing about characters who don’t share her background; in addition to being male, JB is African-American, Malcolm has a black father and white mother, Willem is white, and “Jude’s race was undetermined”—deserted at birth, he was raised in a monastery and had an unspeakably traumatic childhood that’s revealed slowly over the course of the book. Two of them are gay, one straight and one bisexual. There isn’t a single significant female character, and for a long novel, there isn’t much plot. There aren’t even many markers of what’s happening in the outside world; Jude moves to a loft in SoHo as a young man, but we don’t see the neighborhood change from gritty artists’ enclave to glitzy tourist destination. What we get instead is an intensely interior look at the friends’ psyches and relationships, and it’s utterly enthralling. The four men think about work and creativity and success and failure; they cook for each other, compete with each other and jostle for each other’s affection. JB bases his entire artistic career on painting portraits of his friends, while Malcolm takes care of them by designing their apartments and houses. When Jude, as an adult, is adopted by his favorite Harvard law professor, his friends join him for Thanksgiving in Cambridge every year. And when Willem becomes a movie star, they all bask in his glow. Eventually, the tone darkens and the story narrows to focus on Jude as the pain of his past cuts deep into his carefully constructed life.
The phrase “tour de force” could have been invented for this audacious novel.Pub Date: March 10, 2015
ISBN: 978-0-385-53925-8
Page Count: 720
Publisher: Doubleday
Review Posted Online: Dec. 21, 2014
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2015
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