BEAUTIFUL GRAVITY

Name: BEAUTIFUL GRAVITY
Author: Martin Hyatt
ISBN: 978-0-9975923-0-6

by Martin Hyatt ‧ RELEASE DATE: Oct. 4, 2016

Hyatt’s novel brings together the grittily realistic with the transcendent, and the result is a beguiling character study.

bookshelf

A solitary man has an emotional and sexual awakening when an unlikely couple arrives in his small Louisiana town.

Boz Matthews, the narrator, is a man in his mid-30s who remains troubled by childhood memories of his violent father and suicidal mother. As the story begins, he's working for his beloved grandfather at the local diner. Things change with the arrival of Catty Mills, a country singer best known for one late-1980s hit, and her companion, Kyle. Boz finds himself attracted to both of them in different ways, and a fourth point on this love quadrangle appears in the form of Meg, an old friend of Boz’s with a long history of depression. The novel opens with a haunting portrait of solitude and depression: the bond between Boz and his grandfather is neatly established with a few key gestures and is gradually expanded throughout the book. Hyatt is deft with parceling out information, whether it’s Boz’s attraction to La Dolce Vita–era Marcello Mastroianni or the fact that, at one point, he had enjoyed writing. And for all that the novel tells a deceptively simple story—that of Boz finding his place in the world—it never stints on the emotional complexity of the characters at its center. Each of them is, in his or her own way, damaged, and while the bond that develops among the quartet has the ability to heal, it also possesses the ability to hurt in equal measure. There are hard-earned moments of emotional triumph to be found here, but there are also gut-wrenchingly sad ones.

Hyatt’s novel brings together the grittily realistic with the transcendent, and the result is a beguiling character study.

Pub Date: Oct. 4, 2016

ISBN: 978-0-9975923-0-6

Page Count: 224

Publisher: ANTIBOOKCLUB

Review Posted Online: July 19, 2016

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2016

Categories:

GENERAL FICTION

bookshelf

TO KILL A MOCKINGBIRD

by Harper Lee ‧ RELEASE DATE: July 11, 1960

bookshelf

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

Categories:

GENERAL FICTION

- BOOK REVIEW
THE LAND OF SWEET FOREVER
by Harper Lee ; edited by Casey Cep

- BOOK REVIEW
GO SET A WATCHMAN
by Harper Lee

- SEEN & HEARD
The Snowy Day Is NYC Library’s Most Popular Book

- SEEN & HEARD
ALA Releases List of 2020’s Most Challenged Books

- SEEN & HEARD
NYT Readers Voting on Best Book of Past 125 Years

bookshelf

DISTANT SHORES

by Kristin Hannah ‧ RELEASE DATE: July 1, 2002

Soft-focus story moves right along with few surprises. This time around, Hannah avoids the soap-opera complications of her...

bookshelf

Another middle-aged mom in a muddle.

After years of false starts and big hopes, Elizabeth’s ruggedly handsome husband Jack, a former football star, just landed a spot as a sportscaster on national news. He still loves her, even though much younger women are giving him come-hither looks. Heck, he doesn’t want to betray the love of his life after she helped him kick drugs and stuck by him even when he was a struggling has-been. And won’t it seem hypocritical if he fools around with his sexy assistant while he does in-depth reporting on a rape case involving a famous basketball center? Well, he fools around anyway. Elizabeth, nicknamed Birdie, knows nothing of this, but she withdraws from Jack when her hard-drinking, salt-of-the-earth father has a stroke and dies. Now no one will call her “sugar beet” ever again. Time to return home to Tennessee and contend with Anita, the sort-of-evil stepmother so trashy she wears pink puffy slippers all day long. Naturally, it turns out that Anita actually has a heart of gold and knows a few things about Birdie’s dead mother that were hushed up for years. Mom was an artist, just like Birdie, and an old scandal comes to light as Anita unrolls a vibrant canvas that portrays her secret lover. Perhaps, Birdie muses, her mother died of heartbreak, never having followed her true love or developed her talent. Has she, too, compromised everything she holds dear? Hoping to find out, Birdie joins a support group that promises to reconnect confused women with their passion. She and Jack separate, prompting a how-dare-you fit from their grown daughters. Will Birdie fly her empty nest? Will she go back to college for a degree in art? Will her brooding watercolors ever sell?

Soft-focus story moves right along with few surprises. This time around, Hannah avoids the soap-opera complications of her previous tales (Summer Island, 2001, etc.).