Fenter provides worthy social commentary tucked inside this tender tale, but a languid delivery keeps the message from fully...
Teenager Cliff Kelly learns to balance his family’s values with a newfound independence in Fenter’s sequel to 2010’s The Ruin.
The novel begins in 1955, as Cliff returns home after spending a year living alone in a cliff dwelling near the rural Colorado community in which he grew up. After this period of self-reflection, Cliff resumes life armed with stronger character and confidence. These values are immediately tested when he deepens his relationship with Angelina, whose Catholic upbringing and Latino heritage clash with the Anglo-Christian Kelly family. Cliff befriends his former nemesis Hector and their relationship brings closure to events preceding his sojourn in the wilderness. Cliff’s family is a minority in the predominantly Latino area, and his outsider status lessens as Hector and Angelina educate Cliff on their culture’s customs and language. Cliff returns their favors by helping Hector with his schoolwork and showing Angelina the survival skills he cultivated during his solitude. Cliff introduces Angelina to beekeeping and the two work on capturing a swarm. During the process, Larry, a mentally unsound young man, threatens Cliff and Angelina, and the danger they encounter ultimately intensifies their bond. Cliff is a great role model for the book’s young adult audience, though parts involving Larry may not be appropriate for all readers. Teenagers will relate to Cliff’s struggles as he moves into adulthood and admire the mature choices he makes when confronts challenges. The book can also benefit parents raising kids coming of age in adverse societies. Yet the book’s pith—the importance of forgiveness, of forging common ground no matter how extreme the difference—become buried in longueurs describing the Colorado land, farming methods and bee-keeping procedures. The veracity of these expositions is undisputed, but they draw readers away from the nexus of messages Fenter imparts. The plot’s climactic moments slow from prolix dialogue; the cast of diverse characters all speak in the same formal, long-winded style. This implausible phrasing enervates the compelling, emotional moments between Cliff and Angelina—nevertheless, their relationship is inspiring.
Fenter provides worthy social commentary tucked inside this tender tale, but a languid delivery keeps the message from fully resonating.Pub Date: April 13, 2011
ISBN: 978-1461093473
Page Count: 298
Publisher: CreateSpace
Review Posted Online: June 3, 2011
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
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
Briskly written soap with down-to-earth types, mostly without the lachrymose contrivances of Hannah’s previous titles...
Sisters in and out of love.
Meghann Dontess is a high-powered matrimonial lawyer in Seattle who prefers sex with strangers to emotional intimacy: a strategy bound to backfire sooner or later, warns her tough-talking shrink. It’s advice Meghann decides to ignore, along with the memories of her difficult childhood, neglectful mother, and younger sister. Though she managed to reunite Claire with Sam Cavenaugh (her father but not Meghann’s) when her mother abandoned both girls long ago, Meghann still feels guilty that her sister’s life doesn’t measure up, at least on her terms. Never married, Claire ekes out a living running a country campground with her dad and is raising her six-year-old daughter on her own. When she falls in love for the first time with an up-and-coming country musician, Meghann is appalled: Bobby Austin is a three-time loser at marriage—how on earth can Claire be so blind? Bobby’s blunt explanation doesn’t exactly satisfy the concerned big sister, who busies herself planning Claire’s dream wedding anyway. And, to relieve the stress, she beds various guys she picks up in bars, including Dr. Joe Wyatt, a neurosurgeon turned homeless drifter after the demise of his beloved wife Diane (whom he euthanized). When Claire’s awful headache turns out to be a kind of brain tumor known among neurologists as a “terminator,” Joe rallies. Turns out that Claire had befriended his wife on her deathbed, and now in turn he must try to save her. Is it too late? Will Meghann find true love at last?
Briskly written soap with down-to-earth types, mostly without the lachrymose contrivances of Hannah’s previous titles (Distant Shores, 2002, etc.). Kudos for skipping the snifflefest this time around.Pub Date: May 1, 2003
ISBN: 0-345-45073-6
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Ballantine
Review Posted Online: June 24, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2003
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