An overly ambitious novel that spans decades and covers a century’s worth of Fermina’s history. The flashbacks may be...
Four Latina sisters research their mysterious ancestry.
There always seem to be more questions than answers for Loretta, Bette, Rita and Sophia Gabaldón. Loretta begins the family’s tale in 1966. The adolescent girls are still reeling from the loss of their mother. Fermina, an ancient Native American with a strong spiritual side, has filled the shoes of the Gabaldón matriarch. Before Fermina’s death, she promises each girl a special gift. But the wizened old lady never clarifies the nature of her gift and the girls spend the next two decades trying to discover their inheritance. Each sister takes a turn narrating this tale of a scrappy California family (the father and the lone brother are ancillary characters—this book is all about women). Absent a mother, the teenage girls find lots of trouble—these women can’t quite seem to get their relationships right. Bette latches on to losers and criminals before deciding to go it alone as a single mom. Loretta throws herself into veterinary studies and leads a monkish existence. Sullen Rita embarks on a career that leads her to mix with society’s outcasts and leave her family far behind. And the baby, Sophia, perhaps makes the biggest mess of her life as she packs on the pounds and attaches to a good-for-nothing loaf. Perhaps if they come to terms with their past, they will break free from the shackles that bind them to unrewarding relationships. López (Soy la Avon Lady and Other Stories, 2002) jam-packs this work with drama, the highlight being an ill-fated Route 66 adventure in 1983.
An overly ambitious novel that spans decades and covers a century’s worth of Fermina’s history. The flashbacks may be skipped; the Gabaldón sisters alone offer ample fodder.Pub Date: Oct. 1, 2008
ISBN: 978-0-446-69921-1
Page Count: 328
Publisher: Grand Central Publishing
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 2008
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Wacky plot keeps the pages turning and enduring schmaltzy romantic sequences.
Sisters work together to solve a child-abandonment case.
Ellie and Julia Cates have never been close. Julia is shy and brainy; Ellie gets by on charm and looks. Their differences must be tossed aside when a traumatized young girl wanders in from the forest into their hometown in Washington. The sisters’ professional skills are put to the test. Julia is a world-renowned child psychologist who has lost her edge. She is reeling from a case that went publicly sour. Though she was cleared of all wrongdoing, Julia’s name was tarnished, forcing her to shutter her Beverly Hills practice. Ellie Barton is the local police chief in Rain Valley, who’s never faced a tougher case. This is her chance to prove she is more than just a fading homecoming queen, but a scarcity of clues and a reluctant victim make locating the girl’s parents nearly impossible. Ellie places an SOS call to her sister; she needs an expert to rehabilitate this wild-child who has been living outside of civilization for years. Confronted with her professional demons, Julia once again has the opportunity to display her talents and salvage her reputation. Hannah (The Things We Do for Love, 2004, etc.) is at her best when writing from the girl’s perspective. The feral wolf-child keeps the reader interested long after the other, transparent characters have grown tiresome. Hannah’s torturously over-written romance passages are stale, but there are surprises in store as the sisters set about unearthing Alice’s past and creating a home for her.
Wacky plot keeps the pages turning and enduring schmaltzy romantic sequences.Pub Date: March 1, 2006
ISBN: 0-345-46752-3
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Ballantine
Review Posted Online: June 24, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2005
A strict report, worthy of sympathy.
A violent surfacing of adolescence (which has little in common with Tarkington's earlier, broadly comic, Seventeen) has a compulsive impact.
"Nobody big except me" is the dream world of Holden Caulfield and his first person story is down to the basic, drab English of the pre-collegiate. For Holden is now being bounced from fancy prep, and, after a vicious evening with hall- and roommates, heads for New York to try to keep his latest failure from his parents. He tries to have a wild evening (all he does is pay the check), is terrorized by the hotel elevator man and his on-call whore, has a date with a girl he likes—and hates, sees his 10 year old sister, Phoebe. He also visits a sympathetic English teacher after trying on a drunken session, and when he keeps his date with Phoebe, who turns up with her suitcase to join him on his flight, he heads home to a hospital siege. This is tender and true, and impossible, in its picture of the old hells of young boys, the lonesomeness and tentative attempts to be mature and secure, the awful block between youth and being grown-up, the fright and sickness that humans and their behavior cause the challenging, the dramatization of the big bang. It is a sorry little worm's view of the off-beat of adult pressure, of contemporary strictures and conformity, of sentiment….
A strict report, worthy of sympathy.Pub Date: June 15, 1951
ISBN: 0316769177
Page Count: -
Publisher: Little, Brown
Review Posted Online: Nov. 2, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 1951
BOOK REVIEW
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
APPRECIATIONS
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