THE LEMON JELL-O SYNDROME

Name: THE LEMON JELL-O SYNDROME
Author: Man Martin
ISBN: 978-1-60953-141-6

by Man Martin ‧ RELEASE DATE: May 16, 2017

A slight, charming, gravely loopy bit of whimsy equally likely to appeal to amateur etymologists, untenured academics,...

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Martin (Paradise Dogs, 2011) presents a medical mystery in which the detective is also the victim of a rare and deeply threatening malady: loss of self.

Even before his self-alienation, grammarian Bone King is living a life of quiet desperation. His status as a lecturer at Atlanta’s Fulsome College is marginal at best. His first book, Misplaced Modifiers, seems to have sunk without a trace, and he’s so far behind on Words that his editor has stopped reading his incomplete drafts and his dissertation committee has basically given up on him. Lately he’s been worried that Mary Snyder, the former student he married, is carrying on an affair with yardman Cash Hudson. But none of these stresses seem adequate to predict Bone’s sudden, inexplicable inability to go through open doors. He brushes off an initial attack that sends him to the emergency room but after an embarrassingly inconvenient recurrence, agrees to consult the eminent neurologist/psychiatrist Dr. Limongello, whom everyone describes as an eccentric who can work miracles. The eccentric part is certainly on the money, as Bone realizes when Limongello tells him, sagely but obscurely, “Your condition’s root cause is a disjunction between how your hormones tell you to feel and a decent human response,” and advises him to try dancing through doorways he can’t walk through. Though Bone is no dancer, he does succeed in square-dancing his way through a number of stasis-inducing doorways and take on board some surprisingly effective longer-range advice from Limongello before an unfortunate series of events brings on a crisis that’s both unique and deeply expressive of the kinds of self-alienation many readers will recognize.

A slight, charming, gravely loopy bit of whimsy equally likely to appeal to amateur etymologists, untenured academics, spouses who fear cuckolding, and anyone who’s ever woken up with the feeling that they aren’t quite themselves.

Pub Date: May 16, 2017

ISBN: 978-1-60953-141-6

Page Count: 304

Publisher: Unbridled Books

Review Posted Online: Feb. 20, 2017

Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2017

Categories:

GENERAL FICTION

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SUMMER ISLAND

by Kristin Hannah ‧ RELEASE DATE: March 1, 2001

The best-selling author of tearjerkers like Angel Falls (2000) serves up yet another mountain of mush, topped off with...

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Talk-show queen takes tumble as millions jeer.

Nora Bridges is a wildly popular radio spokesperson for family-first virtues, but her loyal listeners don't know that she walked out on her husband and teenaged daughters years ago and didn't look back. Now that a former lover has sold racy pix of naked Nora and horny himself to a national tabloid, her estranged daughter Ruby, an unsuccessful stand-up comic in Los Angeles, has been approached to pen a tell-all. Greedy for the fat fee she's been promised, Ruby agrees and heads for the San Juan Islands, eager to get reacquainted with the mom she plans to betray. Once in the family homestead, nasty Ruby alternately sulks and glares at her mother, who is temporarily wheelchair-bound as a result of a post-scandal car crash. Uncaring, Ruby begins writing her side of the story when she's not strolling on the beach with former sweetheart Dean Sloan, the son of wealthy socialites who basically ignored him and his gay brother Eric. Eric, now dying of cancer and also in a wheelchair, has returned to the island. This dismal threesome catch up on old times, recalling their childhood idylls on the island. After Ruby's perfect big sister Caroline shows up, there's another round of heartfelt talk. Nora gradually reveals the truth about her unloving husband and her late father's alcoholism, which led her to seek the approval of others at the cost of her own peace of mind. And so on. Ruby is aghast to discover that she doesn't know everything after all, but Dean offers her subdued comfort. Happy endings await almost everyone—except for readers of this nobly preachy snifflefest.

The best-selling author of tearjerkers like Angel Falls (2000) serves up yet another mountain of mush, topped off with syrupy platitudes about life and love.

Pub Date: March 1, 2001

ISBN: 0-609-60737-5

Page Count: 336

Publisher: Crown

Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2001

Categories:

GENERAL FICTION

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TO KILL A MOCKINGBIRD

by Harper Lee ‧ RELEASE DATE: July 11, 1960

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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.