A big-hearted but unfocused adventure tale.
A Christian parable with an action-adventure twist.
The latest from Hoyer (In the Absence of Orders, 2007, etc.) takes place in a secluded valley called Thanoton, where the weather is permanently cloudy and the residents are taught that “the only thing outside the valley is a wasteland with creatures ready to devour anyone that enters.” Some residents follow the teachings of an ancient group known as the Children of Light, worshipping in secret to avoid punishment by Thanoton’s despotic king. Aided by a complex web of covert organizations and savvy double (and triple) agents, three teenagers set out to restore the valley by studying and following a text called The Book of Prophesies, after they hear messages from a mysterious Whisperer. The plot’s Christian underpinnings are plain; for example, one leader reminds his fellows: “We are here for the people, to set them free—free to worship the Light of the Word. Our highest purpose is to glorify Him.” Readers of all religious persuasions, however, may enjoy the book’s classic action-adventure elements; espionage, secret messages and daring escapes abound. All that duplicity, however, eventually becomes hard to follow. New characters keep popping into the story, and their abundant abilities to deceive one another and operate in secret under an oppressive regime increasingly push the limits of plausibility. Even more confusingly, the original main characters are largely absent from the book’s second and third acts, making the narrative feel disjointed and sometimes directionless. Still, Hoyer draws some compelling shades of gray out of what could have been a black-and-white tale of good versus evil, giving even the heroic characters space for flaws and keeping readers guessing about their true motivations. Reflecting on his own shortcomings, for example, one character thinks of the Whisperer: “He chose to use people to accomplish His will….He uses even their failures to accomplish His purpose.” Although they are couched in Christian terms, this novel’s nuanced values will likely resonate with readers of any stripe.
A big-hearted but unfocused adventure tale.Pub Date: April 4, 2014
ISBN: 978-0692023747
Page Count: 472
Publisher: Christian Publishing House
Review Posted Online: Feb. 23, 2015
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
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
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
The phrase “tour de force” could have been invented for this audacious novel.
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
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
PROFILES
PERSPECTIVES
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