A taut, disturbing family tale.
A dark novella focuses on the primal fears that befall parents—and anyone else who has endured the uncertainty of sleepless nights.
Parents often talk of the long evenings that come with caring for a newborn, but Richard and Lissa Platte face another level of struggle. Their 14-month-old child, Asher, has night terrors, and they’ve barely slept in the last six months. For Richard, every evening turns into “an ocean without shores.” He sadly wonders about the “terrible dreams” that plague his son. As the Plattes’ grip on reality slips away—Asher fussing and biting at day care, Lissa faltering on the careful preparation and style that propelled her to manage her own salon, and Richard losing time and awareness, forgetting the simplest of tasks or obligations—they begin to question whether something more sinister is going on. The flickering lights and sounds of their baby monitor seem to taunt them, and they each know that a breaking point—and a reckoning—will come. Their home, their lives, their jobs, their family have all become haunted, and when they find out what’s to blame, there’s no telling if they’ll ever recover. Ingwalson’s (Owl & Raccoon: Locked, 2016, etc.) narrative is effective and suspenseful, and while the conclusion at first appears to be a standard, urban legend-style twist, the ending is more complex and satisfying than that. At times, the prose needs some editing, as convoluted sentences get in the way of the mood: “She picks her phone up from a bedside table she found antiquing and sanded down and replaced the handles with little jewels and she did all these things herself.” But there are certainly instances when the minimalist writing style really impacts the reader, cutting to the core of the story: “There comes a moment when adults see past the flesh, past the noise and know themselves, and Richard thinks, Oh please, please don’t let this be that moment. This can’t be me.” While some readers may feel that the short length leads to a lack of details about the characters and their surroundings, others should enjoy the tight pacing and claustrophobic dynamic.
A taut, disturbing family tale.Pub Date: Feb. 28, 2017
ISBN: 978-1-5423-1125-0
Page Count: 124
Publisher: CreateSpace
Review Posted Online: April 20, 2017
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
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
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
The best-selling author of tearjerkers like Angel Falls (2000) serves up yet another mountain of mush, topped off with...
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
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