A charming, inquisitive sports tale.
A debut YA novel tells the story of a high school junior trying to get a grip on his basketball game—and his life.
Stevie Kalkannes’ friends call him the “Gym Class Hero” because, despite his skills on the basketball court—“Known as the best three ball shooter in the school, I could rain threes, teardrops from the sky”—he has refused to play for the Jackson High School team. But during his junior year, a new coach comes to town, and Stevie decides he might want to start living up to the legacy of his star older brother, Benny. Stevie makes the cut even though he spends all his free time pining after the new girl at school, Mindy Derosiers. Despite Stevie’s inexperience with romance, he and Mindy manage to hit it off—though she proves to be a more complicated girlfriend than he expected. The stress over Mindy and various unresolved emotions surrounding his family and basketball may be at the root of his new problem: missing key free throws at the ends of games. But help comes from unlikely sources. At first, Stevie thinks the two girls in his Food and Fitness class, Alison Johnson and Jillian, are just health nuts. As it turns out, their ideas about mindfulness might be just what Stevie needs to take back control of his game. Like many teenage narrators, Stevie is jocular and sarcastic. Yet Kalmbach’s prose isn’t one-note, and Stevie’s shtick often takes a back seat to more lyrical passages: “A first period rumor, its wildfire spread by the runners delivering passes from the main office, fanning the flames—a new girl in school and you ought to see her—whole classrooms inquisitive—their fascination displacing the Pythagorean Theorem, Iambic Pentameter.” Because this is a sports book, a passing interest in basketball is probably required to get the most out of Stevie’s arc. The author knows the game and is skilled at capturing its drama on paper, teasing out plays into meaningful encounters. This is not a work of high drama, but it contains that potent combination of forces—friends, family, love, childhood passions, and new ideas—that summon to mind the transitional years of adolescence.
A charming, inquisitive sports tale.Pub Date: Sept. 4, 2017
ISBN: 978-0-9993597-0-9
Page Count: 316
Publisher: SoTol Publishing
Review Posted Online: Aug. 21, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2018
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
A bold but flawed debut novel.
There’s a mystery, a coming-of-age, abundant melodrama and even more abundant medical lore in this idiosyncratic first novel from a doctor best known for the memoir My Own Country (1994).
The nun is struggling to give birth in the hospital. The surgeon (is he also the father?) dithers. The late-arriving OB-GYN takes charge, losing the mother but saving her babies, identical twins. We are in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, in 1954. The Indian nun, Sister Mary Joseph Praise, was a trained nurse who had met the British surgeon Thomas Stone on a sea voyage ministering to passengers dying of typhus. She then served as his assistant for seven years. The emotionally repressed Stone never declared his love for her; had they really done the deed? After the delivery, Stone rejects the babies and leaves Ethiopia. This is good news for Hema (Dr. Hemalatha, the Indian gynecologist), who becomes their surrogate mother and names them Shiva and Marion. When Shiva stops breathing, Dr. Ghosh (another Indian) diagnoses his apnea; again, a medical emergency throws two characters together. Ghosh and Hema marry and make a happy family of four. Marion eventually emerges as narrator. “Where but in medicine,” he asks, “might our conjoined, matricidal, patrifugal, twisted fate be explained?” The question is key, revealing Verghese’s intent: a family saga in the context of medicine. The ambition is laudable, but too often accounts of operations—a bowel obstruction here, a vasectomy there—overwhelm the narrative. Characterization suffers. The boys’ Ethiopian identity goes unexplored. Shiva is an enigma, though it’s no surprise he’ll have a medical career, like his brother, though far less orthodox. They become estranged over a girl, and eventually Marion leaves for America and an internship in the Bronx (the final, most suspenseful section). Once again a medical emergency defines the characters, though they are not large enough to fill the positively operatic roles Verghese has ordained for them.
A bold but flawed debut novel.Pub Date: Feb. 6, 2009
ISBN: 978-0-375-41449-7
Page Count: 560
Publisher: Knopf
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 15, 2008
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
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