Digressions abound and ultimately overwhelm James’ ambitious but unfocused story.
Set mostly in the not-too-distant future, James’ (People and Peppers: A Romance, 2015, etc.) novel follows a sprawling cast of characters as they cope with (and sometimes profit from) environmental degradation, the privatization of the U.S. government, and a deadly illness.
Chief among the protagonists here is Whitney “Whitey” Fording, of Backwoods, Missouri, who quits the military because of the presence of too many “Coloreds” and, sometime later, moves to New York City, where he’s promptly arrested for his part in a scam. Sentenced to “rehab” and admitted into a mysterious “early-release program,” Whitey falls in love with one of his instructors, Annabel Brea-Sauzi, despite the fact (or maybe because) she is “black as a moonless Missouri midnight.” Little does he know Annabel is interested in him, at least in part, for his genetic material, for reasons that become apparent over the course of the novel. Meanwhile, a group of billionaires, rich off technologies meant to address climate change, initiate a “bloodless coup,” taking over the U.S. government as a “civilian Authority” called “NuUS[dot]com.” Other characters include Whitey’s siblings, a trio of “sixteen-year-old nerds,” and even a cyborg named Aesop. James’ writing is lively and often funny, but there’s too much going on here to invest in the characters or their circumstances. The second (and stronger) half of the novel follows Whitey as he, his sister, her lawyer boss, Annabel, and the couple’s young daughter flee to Backwoods after a strange illness begins killing off large swaths of humanity. By then, though, readers already lost in the flood of characters and subplots may have run out of patience.
Digressions abound and ultimately overwhelm James’ ambitious but unfocused story.Pub Date: July 15, 2016
ISBN: 978-1-941861-16-5
Page Count: 324
Publisher: Harvard Square Editions
Review Posted Online: July 30, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 15, 2016
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
A strict report, worthy of sympathy.
A violent surfacing of adolescence (which has little in common with Tarkington's earlier, broadly comic, Seventeen) has a compulsive impact.
"Nobody big except me" is the dream world of Holden Caulfield and his first person story is down to the basic, drab English of the pre-collegiate. For Holden is now being bounced from fancy prep, and, after a vicious evening with hall- and roommates, heads for New York to try to keep his latest failure from his parents. He tries to have a wild evening (all he does is pay the check), is terrorized by the hotel elevator man and his on-call whore, has a date with a girl he likes—and hates, sees his 10 year old sister, Phoebe. He also visits a sympathetic English teacher after trying on a drunken session, and when he keeps his date with Phoebe, who turns up with her suitcase to join him on his flight, he heads home to a hospital siege. This is tender and true, and impossible, in its picture of the old hells of young boys, the lonesomeness and tentative attempts to be mature and secure, the awful block between youth and being grown-up, the fright and sickness that humans and their behavior cause the challenging, the dramatization of the big bang. It is a sorry little worm's view of the off-beat of adult pressure, of contemporary strictures and conformity, of sentiment….
A strict report, worthy of sympathy.Pub Date: June 15, 1951
ISBN: 0316769177
Page Count: -
Publisher: Little, Brown
Review Posted Online: Nov. 2, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 1951
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