The long-anticipated seventh book may reveal what's still missing from this series, because it certainly isn’t detail.
The sixth installment of Riley’s mammoth series about the adopted daughters of an enigmatic shipping magnate.
This volume, weighing in at 500-plus pages, concerns Electra, the youngest of the six D’Aplièse sisters—each named for a star in the Pleiades constellation—who were rescued by seafaring entrepreneur “Pa Salt.” As always, the prefatory cast of characters notes that a seventh sister, Merope, is “missing.” Like her sisters before her, Electra was bequeathed clues by Pa (who died under mysterious circumstances) as to her birth origins. But Electra, a Manhattan supermodel who’s addicted to vodka and cocaine, is blasé about her personal quest. When Stella Jackson, a prominent black attorney, claims to be Electra’s biological grandmother, Riley begins the extended backstory common to all the books, this one about Electra’s ancestor. Stella’s reluctance to spill the beans all at once and Electra’s own prodigious procrastination slow the narrative just enough to maintain suspense. The tale centers on Cecily Huntley-Morgan, a white New York socialite who, on the eve of World War II, finds herself living in Kenya in a marriage of convenience to Bill Forsythe, who spends most of his time away on cattle drives with Maasai tribesmen. This situation stems from Cecily’s broken engagement in New York, which she followed with an unwanted pregnancy courtesy of a rebound rake. Rarely for this series, both storylines hold their own. Electra checks into rehab, vowing to forswear hedonism and use her fame and wealth to help addicted and underprivileged youth. The Kenyan setting, in seeming homage to Out of Africa, is colorfully atmospheric even as Cecily remains stolidly unhedonistic amid the Happy Valley set of hard-partying and dissolute British expats who surround her. The second half of the novel plumbs, with many detours and digressions and much descriptive minutiae, the mystery of how Cecily and Stella are connected and how Electra came to be abandoned.
The long-anticipated seventh book may reveal what's still missing from this series, because it certainly isn’t detail.Pub Date: May 19, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-9821-1064-2
Page Count: 528
Publisher: Atria
Review Posted Online: March 1, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2020
This is historical adventure on a grand scale, right up there with the works of Conn Iggulden and Minette Walters.
Plenty of gore from days of yore fills the 12th entry in Cornwell’s The Last Kingdom series (War of the Wolf, 2018, etc.).
The pagan warlord Uhtred of Bebbanburg narrates his 10th-century adventures, during which he hacks people apart so that kingdoms might be stitched together. He is known to some as the Godless or the Wicked, a reputation he enjoys. Edward, King of Wessex, Mercia, and East Anglia is gravely ill, and Uhtred pledges an oath to likely heir Æthelstan to kill two rivals, Æthelhelm and “his rotten nephew,” Ælfweard, when the king dies. Uhtred’s wife, Eadith, wants him to break that oath, but he cannot live with the dishonor of being an oathbreaker. The tale seems to begin in the middle, as though the reader had just turned the last page in the 11th book—and yet it stands alone quite well. Uhtred travels the coast and the river Temes in the good ship Spearhafoc, powered by 40 rowers struggling against tides and currents. He and his men fight furious battles, and he lustily impales foes with his favorite sword, Serpent-Breath. “I don’t kill the helpless,” though, which is one of his few limits. So, early in the story, when a man calling himself “God’s chosen one” declares “We were sent to kill you,” readers may chuckle and say yeah, right. But Uhtred faces true challenges such as Waormund, “lord Æthelhelm’s beast.” Immense bloodletting aside, Cornwell paints vivid images of the filth in the Temes and in cities like Lundene. This is mainly manly fare, of course. Few women are active characters. The queen needs rescuing, and “when queens call for help, warriors go to war.” The action is believable if often gruesome and loathsome, and it never lets up for long.
This is historical adventure on a grand scale, right up there with the works of Conn Iggulden and Minette Walters.Pub Date: Nov. 26, 2019
ISBN: 978-0-06-256321-7
Page Count: 336
Publisher: HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: Sept. 1, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2019
A heartfelt tale of love too stubborn to surrender to human frailties.
When Chi Chi Donatelli gave famous crooner Saverio Armandonada a manicure on a 1930s New Jersey beach, little did she know that the swanky singer would change her life.
After his childhood sweetheart married another man, Saverio left the security of his job on the factory line in Detroit, earning his father’s disapproval but opening wide the door to success as a big-band singer. Along his way to stardom, Saverio changed his name to Tony Arma and discovered a talent for romancing—but never marrying—the ladies. But once he meets Chi Chi, his bachelor days are numbered. From a large, boisterous Italian family, Chi Chi is eager to have a life like Tony’s, with the freedom to sing and travel the country. She wants no part of marriage with its shackles. Soon Chi Chi and Tony are touring together, eventually developing a profitable shtick, with Chi Chi writing bestselling songs and Tony serenading them to dreamy audiences. It’s only a matter of time before Tony proposes. After all, unlike his other girls, Chi Chi offers Tony not only beauty and charm, but also the stability of a home. The lovers’ work in the entertainment industry gives way to a marriage blessed with babies yet held apart by war. Once reunited, Chi Chi’s independence and Tony’s philandering further fracture their marriage. But as Tony’s path wends from woman to woman, Chi Chi forges a new life on her own terms. A mistress of the sweeping family saga, bestselling author Trigiani (Kiss Carlo, 2017, etc.) sets Chi Chi and Tony’s lifelong love affair against the grand stage of World War II through the postwar boom years and the women’s liberation movement, tracing a society catching up with Chi Chi’s determination to control her own financial and personal freedom.
A heartfelt tale of love too stubborn to surrender to human frailties.Pub Date: Nov. 20, 2018
ISBN: 978-0-06-231925-8
Page Count: 464
Publisher: Harper/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: Aug. 20, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2018
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