DEAR STRANGER, DEAREST FRIEND

Name: DEAR STRANGER, DEAREST FRIEND
Author: Laney Katz Becker
ISBN: 0-380-97853-9

by Laney Katz Becker ‧ RELEASE DATE: Oct. 1, 2000

A cutely packaged idea, and informative—it’s almost as much handbook as novel—but the two principals are tied to a script...

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Newcomer Becker may have hoped to bring out the hankies, but this info-novel about breast cancer and close friendship—from the “scare and cheer” template that produces many a women’s magazine article—is too formulaic to trigger the tears.

When Lara, almost 40, finds a lump in her breast, she checks out the Internet before making an appointment with her doctor. Her most helpful and sympathetic reply is from Susan, a Catholic who lives in Canton, Ohio, who advises her (successfully) to see her doctor immediately. Though Lara is Jewish and lives in a New York suburb, the two, as the months pass, become close friends. Susan urges Lara to consult a second doctor when her first mammogram is negative; Lara does, and the lump is indeed malignant. The medical details, choice of treatment, and prognosis are all clearly spelled out, and there’s even an afterword by an oncologist as well as a list of Breast Cancer Resources. On the doctor’s advice, Lara has a double mastectomy followed by chemotherapy and then, when she’s healed, breast reconstruction. She shares the experience of all this with Susan, and the two also exchange information about their husbands, children, careers, and daily lives. Susan cheers, consoles, and applauds as Lara begins to recover and resume a normal life. But then Susan’s own life starts to fall apart: now it’s Lara’s turn to help the woman she calls her dearest friend.

A cutely packaged idea, and informative—it’s almost as much handbook as novel—but the two principals are tied to a script that, for all its good intentions and somber subject, never really lets things come alive.

Pub Date: Oct. 1, 2000

ISBN: 0-380-97853-9

Page Count: 304

Publisher: Morrow/HarperCollins

Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 2000

Categories:

GENERAL FICTION

THE CURIOUS INCIDENT OF THE DOG IN THE NIGHT-TIME

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THE CURIOUS INCIDENT OF THE DOG IN THE NIGHT-TIME

by Mark Haddon ‧ RELEASE DATE: June 17, 2003

A kind of Holden Caulfield who speaks bravely and winningly from inside the sorrows of autism: wonderful, simple, easy,...

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Britisher Haddon debuts in the adult novel with the bittersweet tale of a 15-year-old autistic who’s also a math genius.

Christopher Boone has had some bad knocks: his mother has died (well, she went to the hospital and never came back), and soon after he found a neighbor’s dog on the front lawn, slain by a garden fork stuck through it. A teacher said that he should write something that he “would like to read himself”—and so he embarks on this book, a murder mystery that will reveal who killed Mrs. Shears’s dog. First off, though, is a night in jail for hitting the policeman who questions him about the dog (the cop made the mistake of grabbing the boy by the arm when he can’t stand to be touched—any more than he can stand the colors yellow or brown, or not knowing what’s going to happen next). Christopher’s father bails him out but forbids his doing any more “detecting” about the dog-murder. When Christopher disobeys (and writes about it in his book), a fight ensues and his father confiscates the book. In time, detective-Christopher finds it, along with certain other clues that reveal a very great deal indeed about his mother’s “death,” his father’s own part in it—and the murder of the dog. Calming himself by doing roots, cubes, prime numbers, and math problems in his head, Christopher runs away, braves a train-ride to London, and finds—his mother. How can this be? Read and see. Neither parent, if truth be told, is the least bit prepossessing or more than a cutout. Christopher, though, with pet rat Toby in his pocket and advanced “maths” in his head, is another matter indeed, and readers will cheer when, way precociously, he takes his A-level maths and does brilliantly.

A kind of Holden Caulfield who speaks bravely and winningly from inside the sorrows of autism: wonderful, simple, easy, moving, and likely to be a smash.

Pub Date: June 17, 2003

ISBN: 0-385-50945-6

Page Count: 224

Publisher: Doubleday

Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010

Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 15, 2003

Categories:

GENERAL FICTION

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SUMMER ISLAND

by Kristin Hannah ‧ RELEASE DATE: March 1, 2001

The best-selling author of tearjerkers like Angel Falls (2000) serves up yet another mountain of mush, topped off with...

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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.