Gruenfeld (All Fall Down, 1994; Irreparable Harm, 1993) returns in top form, this time delivering a first-rate courtroom thriller with a twisty two-track plot that will keep most readers guessing right up through the denouements. Deputy D.A. Sal Milano, who heads L.A. County's Santa Monica office has what he believes is a slam-dunk case. A bush-league hood named Vinnie Rosamund has abducted and raped the lovely Pierman twins. When brought to book, however, the surprisingly well- connected Vinnie beats the rap on an outrageous technicality, and southern California's feral press corps effectively puts paid to Sal's hopes of running for higher office. The story goes national when one of the wronged sisters, either Diane (an aggressive defense attorney) or Lisa (a softer-edged caterer), shoots Vinnie to death in a chichi restaurant before a dozen or more witnesses. Sal (an admirer and perhaps more of Diane's) faces the unwelcome prospect of prosecuting two beautiful women whom the public believes committed a crime no worse than justifiable homicide. Duty-bound as a credibly obedient servant of the law, Sal sets the wheels of justice in motion; since neither sister will talk and no one knows who pulled the trigger, he does his best to stack the deck with conspiracy and obstruction as well as murder charges. At trial, Sal maneuvers with cunning and finesse enough to convince defense counsel (Diane's law partner) that it's time to plea bargain. The resultant deal, which helps expose corrupt judges who have rigged the outcome of several high-profile proceedings, satisfactorily seals the fate of the accused and revivifies Sal's political ambitions. A worldly-wise legal shocker. (First printing of 75,000)
Pub Date: June 24, 1996
ISBN: 0-525-94130-4
Page Count: 464
Publisher: Dutton
Review Posted Online: May 20, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 15, 1996
Categories: GENERAL FICTION
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The years pass by at a fast and steamy clip in Blume’s latest adult novel (Wifey, not reviewed; Smart Women, 1984) as two friends find loyalties and affections tested as they grow into young women. In sixth grade, when Victoria Weaver is asked by new girl Caitlin Somers to spend the summer with her on Martha’s Vineyard, her life changes forever. Victoria, or more commonly Vix, lives in a small house; her brother has muscular dystrophy; her mother is unhappy, and money is scarce. Caitlin, on the other hand, lives part of the year with her wealthy mother Phoebe, who’s just moved to Albuquerque, and summers with her father Lamb, equally affluent, on the Vineyard. The story of how this casual invitation turns the two girls into what they call "Summer sisters" is prefaced with a prologue in which Vix is asked by Caitlin to be her matron of honor. The years in between are related in brief segments by numerous characters, but mostly by Vix. Caitlin, determined never to be ordinary, is always testing the limits, and in adolescence falls hard for Von, an older construction worker, while Vix falls for his friend Bru. Blume knows the way kids and teens speak, but her two female leads are less credible as they reach adulthood. After high school, Caitlin travels the world and can’t understand why Vix, by now at Harvard on a scholarship and determined to have a better life than her mother has had, won’t drop out and join her. Though the wedding briefly revives Vix’s old feelings for Bru, whom Caitlin is marrying, Vix is soon in love with Gus, another old summer friend, and a more compatible match. But Caitlin, whose own demons have been hinted at, will not be so lucky. The dark and light sides of friendship breathlessly explored in a novel best saved for summer beachside reading.
Pub Date: May 8, 1998
ISBN: 0-385-32405-7
Page Count: 336
Publisher: Delacorte
Review Posted Online: May 20, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 1998
Categories: GENERAL FICTION
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The phrase “tour de force” could have been invented for this audacious novel.
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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. 22, 2014
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2015
Categories: GENERAL FICTION
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