Morris’s latest is as anemic as her previous (Acts of God, 2000).
Obsessed by the accident that killed her father, a woman confides her misgivings to a famous novelist in this, Morris’s eighth work of fiction.
Andrea Geller is a painter and junior faculty member at Hartwood, a liberal arts college in upstate New York. Drifting uncertainly between two lovers (Charlie, single but unexciting, and Gil, married but passionate), Andrea doesn’t consider either relationship as important as discovering the truth about her father’s death. Simon Geller was a distinguished pediatric cardiologist on his second marriage. One foggy night he left the house on an errand, lost control of his car, and suffered a heart attack, but took two years to die. Andrea wants to know why her stepmother Elena, who supervised his medication, had let him drive off alone. And where was he going? Elena had inherited everything, and, though Andrea and brother Robby contested the will, the judge had ruled against them. For Andrea her father’s death is still an open wound. Enter Loretta Partlow, Pulitzer Prize–winning novelist and Andrea’s neighbor. The two become friendly. Andrea is hoping the novelist will use her version of events (deliberate overmedication to cause a death) in a story that will scare the daylights out of her stepmother, a big Partlow fan. Whoa! Didn’t Andrea know never to trust a writer, especially a “gorgon” like Loretta with her “ferret eyes”? Couldn’t she have listened to her own “small voice” telling her to desist? Regardless, Andrea confides in her neighbor, though initially concealing her own difficulties with her father. But Loretta will root those out and use them to devastating effect in the novel (which gets a rave from Kirkus). But before we reach that all too predictable climax, there’s much genteel chitchat between the spider and the fly, all quite boring. Evidently, Partlow is one of those writers who saves her dazzle for the printed word.
Morris’s latest is as anemic as her previous (Acts of God, 2000).Pub Date: Oct. 1, 2004
ISBN: 0-312-32792-7
Page Count: 224
Publisher: St. Martin's
Review Posted Online: June 24, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2004
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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