Based on a true story, we’re told, but Martin’s overheated plot keeps us from believing a word of it.
Inordinately busy first novel by the Texan author of The Least You Need to Know (stories: 1996).
It begins wonderfully, establishing the contrasting but intertwined existences of two families in the West Texas town of Denton during the 1920s. Yardman Little Washington Jones lives with his feisty wife, Eugie, and daughter Camellia in the peaceful black ghetto of Quakertown. Little’s primary employer, wealthy white businessman Andrew Bell, resides “up the hill” on Oak Street; his wife drinks “tonic” for her nerves, and his son, Kizer, is crippled. Martin quickly establishes a network of complex relationships, exploring his characters’ public and secret lives in both present action and extended flashbacks. Camellia, a light-skinned schoolteacher, falls in love with feisty black war veteran Ike Mattoon but can’t forget Kizer, a childhood friend who has always loved her. There’s also a relationship with a white man buried in Eugie’s past life, and every imaginable chicken comes home to roost when goodhearted Mr. Bell stands up to the Ku Klux Klan and spearheads a plan to buy out Quakertown’s homeowners at fair prices and move them to even greener pastures, some distance from downtown Denton. Ike’s refusal to truckle to racial prejudice, Kizer’s determination to have Camellia even if she’s another man’s wife, Andrew Bell’s frustrated benevolence, and the Candide-like Little’s earth-wisdom (“Treat a flower or a tree right, and it makes your life pretty”) are all cruelly tested. A threatened abortion, an accidental fatal shooting, at least one too many ponderously symbolic conflagrations, and the climactic release of Ike’s aggrieved violent impulses—these are only a few links in the chain of catastrophes that undermines the loving patience with which Martin, a fine stylist but a disastrous plotter, has created fully rounded characters deserving of a better fate than this novel’s ill-judged collapse into trite melodrama.
Based on a true story, we’re told, but Martin’s overheated plot keeps us from believing a word of it.Pub Date: June 25, 2001
ISBN: 0-525-94583-0
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Dutton
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 2001
A thoughtful and pensive tale with intelligent characters and a satisfying romance.
A promise to his best friend leads an Army serviceman to a family in need and a chance at true love in this novel.
Beckett Gentry is surprised when his Army buddy Ryan MacKenzie gives him a letter from Ryan’s sister, Ella. Abandoned by his mother, Beckett grew up in a series of foster homes. He is wary of attachments until he reads Ella’s letter. A single mother, Ella lives with her twins, Maisie and Colt, at Solitude, the resort she operates in Telluride, Colorado. They begin a correspondence, although Beckett can only identify himself by his call sign, Chaos. After Ryan’s death during a mission, Beckett travels to Telluride as his friend had requested. He bonds with the twins while falling deeply in love with Ella. Reluctant to reveal details of Ryan’s death and risk causing her pain, Beckett declines to disclose to Ella that he is Chaos. Maisie needs treatment for neuroblastoma, and Beckett formally adopts the twins as a sign of his commitment to support Ella and her children. He and Ella pursue a romance, but when an insurance investigator questions the adoption, Beckett is faced with revealing the truth about the letters and Ryan’s death, risking losing the family he loves. Yarros’ (Wilder, 2016, etc.) novel is a deeply felt and emotionally nuanced contemporary romance bolstered by well-drawn characters and strong, confident storytelling. Beckett and Ella are sympathetic protagonists whose past experiences leave them cautious when it comes to love. Beckett never knew the security of a stable home life. Ella impulsively married her high school boyfriend, but the marriage ended when he discovered she was pregnant. The author is especially adept at developing the characters through subtle but significant details, like Beckett’s aversion to swearing. Beckett and Ella’s romance unfolds slowly in chapters that alternate between their first-person viewpoints. The letters they exchanged are pivotal to their connection, and almost every chapter opens with one. Yarros’ writing is crisp and sharp, with passages that are poetic without being florid. For example, in a letter to Beckett, Ella writes of motherhood: “But I’m not the center of their universe. I’m more like their gravity.” While the love story is the book’s focus, the subplot involving Maisie’s illness is equally well-developed, and the link between Beckett and the twins is heartfelt and sincere.
A thoughtful and pensive tale with intelligent characters and a satisfying romance.Pub Date: Feb. 26, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-64063-533-3
Page Count: 432
Publisher: Entangled: Amara
Review Posted Online: Jan. 2, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 15, 2019
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
With frank language and patient plotting, this gangly teen crush grows into a confident adult love affair.
Eleven years ago, he broke her heart. But he doesn’t know why she never forgave him.
Toggling between past and present, two love stories unfold simultaneously. In the first, Macy Sorensen meets and falls in love with the boy next door, Elliot Petropoulos, in the closet of her dad’s vacation home, where they hide out to discuss their favorite books. In the second, Macy is working as a doctor and engaged to a single father, and she hasn’t spoken to Elliot since their breakup. But a chance encounter forces her to confront the truth: what happened to make Macy stop speaking to Elliot? Ultimately, they’re separated not by time or physical remoteness but by emotional distance—Elliot and Macy always kept their relationship casual because they went to different schools. And as a teen, Macy has more to worry about than which girl Elliot is taking to the prom. After losing her mother at a young age, Macy is navigating her teenage years without a female role model, relying on the time-stamped notes her mother left in her father’s care for guidance. In the present day, Macy’s father is dead as well. She throws herself into her work and rarely comes up for air, not even to plan her upcoming wedding. Since Macy is still living with her fiance while grappling with her feelings for Elliot, the flashbacks offer steamy moments, tender revelations, and sweetly awkward confessions while Macy makes peace with her past and decides her future.
With frank language and patient plotting, this gangly teen crush grows into a confident adult love affair.Pub Date: April 10, 2018
ISBN: 978-1-5011-2801-1
Page Count: 416
Publisher: Gallery Books/Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: Jan. 22, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 2018
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