The literary equivalent of the titular trail: it takes time to reach the end, but the trek is worth it.
A man hiking on the Appalachian Trail recollects the loves and losses he’s experienced throughout his 128 years in Robinson’s (Life in Continuum, 2012, etc.) epic drama.
In 2087, Carlton Jeffries is documenting his long life. He’s on the Appalachian Trail with his dog, Sam, having thru-hiked it twice before. Born in Tennessee in 1958, Carlton grows into a teenager who finds young love to be sometimes fleeting. He endures a dispirited marriage and spiteful divorce but ultimately starts a family. His unusually lengthy lifespan, however, means that he has to watch people die, including his grandchildren, and reside in a country whose government has all but crumbled. Robinson’s novel, boasting nearly 750 pages, is ample in its historical details. Most events, such as Sen. Robert Kennedy’s assassination or the 1986 Challenger tragedy, are like background music, enriching the story without directly affecting its protagonist. But others have considerable impact, such as when loved ones don’t return from war. The easy-to-follow tale bounces from 2087 to a chronological account of Carlton’s life and his previous times hiking the trail—once in 1976 as a teenager and then, later, when he’s almost 50. Even the loyal Sam has his own timeline: in the 1970s, Carlton gets a puppy named Langley, who, as it turns out, is Sam’s ancestor. Later chapters in the future setting are downright dystopian but undeniably fascinating: noteworthy occurrences include Congress granting power to individual states, resulting in Carlton needing a passport to travel outside of Tennessee, and a ghastly new source of fuel. The Appalachian Trail, meanwhile, is the narrative’s constant; Carlton meets and falls in love with Judith during his first hike, and he eventually shares his veneration of the trail with his daughter, Rachel. The story’s so expansive that readers will grow attached to Carlton, even if he’s occasionally at fault for his severed relationships. It can be a depressing affair since he outlives so many people, but Robinson’s ability to generate an emotional response is without question.
The literary equivalent of the titular trail: it takes time to reach the end, but the trek is worth it.Pub Date: July 14, 2015
ISBN: 978-1-5143-6449-9
Page Count: 748
Publisher: CreateSpace
Review Posted Online: Aug. 31, 2015
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 1, 2015
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
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
Genetically engineered dinosaurs run amok in Crichton's new, vastly entertaining science thriller. From the introduction alone—a classically Crichton-clear discussion of the implications of biotechnological research—it's evident that the Harvard M.D. has bounced back from the science-fantasy silliness of Sphere (1987) for another taut reworking of the Frankenstein theme, as in The Andromeda Strain and The Terminal Man. Here, Dr. Frankenstein is aging billionaire John Hammond, whose monster is a manmade ecosystem based on a Costa Rican island. Designed as the world's ultimate theme park, the ecosystem boasts climate and flora of the Jurassic Age and—most spectacularly—15 varieties of dinosaurs, created by elaborate genetic engineering that Crichton explains in fascinating detail, rich with dino-lore and complete with graphics. Into the park, for a safety check before its opening, comes the novel's band of characters—who, though well drawn, double as symbolic types in this unsubtle morality play. Among them are hero Alan Grant, noble paleontologist; Hammond, venal and obsessed; amoral dino-designer Henry Wu; Hammond's two innocent grandchildren; and mathematician Ian Malcolm, who in long diatribes serves as Crichton's mouthpiece to lament the folly of science. Upon arrival, the visitors tour the park; meanwhile, an industrial spy steals some dino embryos by shutting down the island's power—and its security grid, allowing the beasts to run loose. The bulk of the remaining narrative consists of dinos—ferocious T. Rex's, voracious velociraptors, venom-spitting dilophosaurs—stalking, ripping, and eating the cast in fast, furious, and suspenseful set-pieces as the ecosystem spins apart. And can Grant prevent the dinos from escaping to the mainland to create unchecked havoc? Though intrusive, the moralizing rarely slows this tornado-paced tale, a slick package of info-thrills that's Crichton's most clever since Congo (1980)—and easily the most exciting dinosaur novel ever written. A sure-fire best-seller.
Pub Date: Nov. 7, 1990
ISBN: 0394588169
Page Count: 424
Publisher: Knopf
Review Posted Online: Sept. 21, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 1990
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