A captivating and powerfully related account of Jesus’ early years.
A debut historical novel imagines Jesus’ youthful desire for spiritual enlightenment.
As a young boy in Galilee, Yeshua is precociously interested in religious study and implacably desires to devote his life to it. And while he is obedient to the laws of his faith, he’s also disturbed by their apparent contradictions and exclusion of many from God’s protective love. His father, however, interprets his philosophical curiosity as impudence and his aspirations as fanciful fits of vanity; he is a carpenter, and Yeshua is destined to become one as well. Zoroastrian seers prophesize that Yeshua is the Messiah, a prediction that stirs the boy. But his father dismisses the claim and arranges for Yeshua to marry for the good of the whole family. Then Yeshua meets Dhiman, a Buddhist monk who tells him that in his religious tradition, anyone can become a monk regardless of the circumstances of birth, and the boy runs off with him to study. But though he learns much, he is also stymied by monastic rules and is eventually forced to leave. He finds a new guru, Kahanji, who teaches him about Krishna. Again, Yeshua deepens his spiritual practice but rejects the caste system that aristocratically elevates some over others in the eyes of God. Yeshua finally returns home to his family and begins the ministry for which he becomes famous and which is viewed by the Roman authorities as politically seditious in intent. Duarte ambitiously conjures the undocumented years of Jesus’ life, before he became a historically transformative figure. The author’s knowledge of the period is remarkably astute, and she artfully concocts a less self-possessed Jesus, still grasping for a sense of his life’s mission. She also delves into his youthful worldly longings and the romantic experiences he has before his ministry, realistically fleshing out the possible details of his mortal life. Duarte masterfully traces the evolution of Jesus’ thought and the grand synthesis of religious traditions it culminates in: “I aim to remind my brother and sisters to love God and one another. Because it’s what’s in your heart that makes you righteous or impure.”
A captivating and powerfully related account of Jesus’ early years.Pub Date: July 13, 2017
ISBN: 978-0-9971807-0-1
Page Count: 312
Publisher: CreateSpace
Review Posted Online: July 28, 2017
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2017
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
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
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