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Movie Game

Name: Movie Game
Author: Michael Ebner
ISBN: 978-0-9930613-0-1

by Michael Ebner ‧ RELEASE DATE: Sept. 15, 2015

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Ebner’s (All the Talk Is Dead, 2009) novel tells of a cinephile’s search for family, sex, and laughs, wrapped in a mystery.

On the surface, Joe seems like a typical high school student. He’s snarky, rebellious, and equally obsessed with girls and movies (although it’s a toss-up). But beneath his devil-may-care attitude lies a deep emotional reservoir of pain and abandonment issues. Three years ago, Joe’s father, a jack-of-all-trades scientist, abandoned the family following the revelation that Joe’s mother was having an affair. There’s more to Joe’s father’s disappearance than is readily apparent, however, because now the U.S. government is spying on Joe. To make matters worse, Joe’s girlfriend, Alice, died in a tragic accident three years ago. With mom and dad both out of the picture, Joe and his older sister, Loren, are more or less left to fend for themselves. While college student Loren tries to be a positive influence on her wayward brother’s life—balancing her own career aspirations with ad hoc parenting—Joe’s antiauthoritarian, individualistic attitude makes him hard to control. This is not to say that Joe is cruel or disrespectful to his sister; on the contrary, when he discovers that Loren’s boyfriend is not all he claims to be, he steps in to protect her from a broken heart and sets her on the right path. Joe’s story is entertaining, and Ebner keeps the pages turning with a mix of humor and mystery. In a sense, though, Joe’s aforementioned chivalry is indicative of an underlying weakness in the novel. Although the author paints an entertaining portrait of his protagonist, Joe seems just a bit too cool and correct. He’s quick with a quip at every moment and always occupies the moral high ground. Even in situations in which his actions seem deplorable, such as the opening scene—in which Joe follows a loquacious moviegoing couple back to their home to educate them on cinema etiquette—Ebner makes sure that Joe’s antagonists appear even worse by comparison. The narrative voice also remains firmly rooted in Joe’s corner, which makes for a less compelling read.

A fast-paced, humorous novel, but one that rarely offers any critique of its protagonist’s actions.

Pub Date: Sept. 15, 2015

ISBN: 978-0-9930613-0-1

Page Count: 302

Publisher: Pen and Picture

Review Posted Online: Aug. 1, 2015

Review Program: Kirkus Indie

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THE NIGHTINGALE

by Kristin Hannah ‧ RELEASE DATE: Feb. 3, 2015

Still, a respectful and absorbing page-turner.

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Hannah’s new novel is an homage to the extraordinary courage and endurance of Frenchwomen during World War II.

In 1995, an elderly unnamed widow is moving into an Oregon nursing home on the urging of her controlling son, Julien, a surgeon. This trajectory is interrupted when she receives an invitation to return to France to attend a ceremony honoring passeurs: people who aided the escape of others during the war. Cut to spring, 1940: Viann has said goodbye to husband Antoine, who's off to hold the Maginot line against invading Germans. She returns to tending her small farm, Le Jardin, in the Loire Valley, teaching at the local school and coping with daughter Sophie’s adolescent rebellion. Soon, that world is upended: The Germans march into Paris and refugees flee south, overrunning Viann’s land. Her long-estranged younger sister, Isabelle, who has been kicked out of multiple convent schools, is sent to Le Jardin by Julien, their father in Paris, a drunken, decidedly unpaternal Great War veteran. As the depredations increase in the occupied zone—food rationing, systematic looting, and the billeting of a German officer, Capt. Beck, at Le Jardin—Isabelle’s outspokenness is a liability. She joins the Resistance, volunteering for dangerous duty: shepherding downed Allied airmen across the Pyrenees to Spain. Code-named the Nightingale, Isabelle will rescue many before she's captured. Meanwhile, Viann’s journey from passive to active resistance is less dramatic but no less wrenching. Hannah vividly demonstrates how the Nazis, through starvation, intimidation and barbarity both casual and calculated, demoralized the French, engineering a community collapse that enabled the deportations and deaths of more than 70,000 Jews. Hannah’s proven storytelling skills are ideally suited to depicting such cataclysmic events, but her tendency to sentimentalize undermines the gravitas of this tale.

Still, a respectful and absorbing page-turner.

Pub Date: Feb. 3, 2015

ISBN: 978-0-312-57722-3

Page Count: 448

Publisher: St. Martin's

Review Posted Online: Nov. 19, 2014

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2014

Categories:

HISTORICAL FICTION | FAMILY LIFE & FRIENDSHIP

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by Kristin Hannah

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by Kristin Hannah

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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.