Under the funky trappings, Wener’s third (after The Perfect Play, 2004) is a satisfying coming-of-age novel with a...
Family drama with surreal touches finds British former pop star Wener (of the ’90s band Sleeper) back in good form.
When her overachieving lawyer brother Daniel goes missing, family failure Claire is the only one with a clue. The theory that he’s intentionally disappeared with help from a mysterious Japanese organization may be far-fetched, but she follows the story from London back to Miami, where the family had spent a few tragic years. While her alcoholic mother, beautiful sister and Daniel’s perfect wife remain caught up in their own preconceptions, the broke, divorced Claire follows a series of odd clues. A waitress in a basement sushi joint provides one lead, a scary Russian sailor another, and soon Claire is on the road, accompanied by her ex-husband, Michael. Trustworthy only in that she knows he will disappoint her, Michael also serves as a means of returning to the city of her youth, moving them in with the dysfunctional Huey and Tess, and their boa constrictor, Harvey Weinstein. While things were weird before—that Japanese organization may only be a television program—they get truly bizarre in America, thanks in part to Valium-laced margaritas. But as Claire learns that her instincts are actually good, it’s her expectations that need adjusting. Some of the characters here are merely caricatures. The rude waitress, for example, sounds like a badly translated haiku: “How empty it would make a man feel,” she says. “How rotten and bruised like soft autumnal fruit dropped prematurely from the tree.” And some situations, such as the encounter with the pet boa’s namesake, are straight slapstick. But even the odder characters ring true emotionally, no matter what their obsessions—and that saves them.
Under the funky trappings, Wener’s third (after The Perfect Play, 2004) is a satisfying coming-of-age novel with a sympathetic heroine.Pub Date: Nov. 1, 2006
ISBN: 0-06-084173-7
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Harper/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 2006
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
Briskly written soap with down-to-earth types, mostly without the lachrymose contrivances of Hannah’s previous titles...
Sisters in and out of love.
Meghann Dontess is a high-powered matrimonial lawyer in Seattle who prefers sex with strangers to emotional intimacy: a strategy bound to backfire sooner or later, warns her tough-talking shrink. It’s advice Meghann decides to ignore, along with the memories of her difficult childhood, neglectful mother, and younger sister. Though she managed to reunite Claire with Sam Cavenaugh (her father but not Meghann’s) when her mother abandoned both girls long ago, Meghann still feels guilty that her sister’s life doesn’t measure up, at least on her terms. Never married, Claire ekes out a living running a country campground with her dad and is raising her six-year-old daughter on her own. When she falls in love for the first time with an up-and-coming country musician, Meghann is appalled: Bobby Austin is a three-time loser at marriage—how on earth can Claire be so blind? Bobby’s blunt explanation doesn’t exactly satisfy the concerned big sister, who busies herself planning Claire’s dream wedding anyway. And, to relieve the stress, she beds various guys she picks up in bars, including Dr. Joe Wyatt, a neurosurgeon turned homeless drifter after the demise of his beloved wife Diane (whom he euthanized). When Claire’s awful headache turns out to be a kind of brain tumor known among neurologists as a “terminator,” Joe rallies. Turns out that Claire had befriended his wife on her deathbed, and now in turn he must try to save her. Is it too late? Will Meghann find true love at last?
Briskly written soap with down-to-earth types, mostly without the lachrymose contrivances of Hannah’s previous titles (Distant Shores, 2002, etc.). Kudos for skipping the snifflefest this time around.Pub Date: May 1, 2003
ISBN: 0-345-45073-6
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Ballantine
Review Posted Online: June 24, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2003
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