What happens when an improbable love affair brings a freedom-of- information lobby under the microscope itself: another melancholy farce by the gifted British playwright (Noises Off, Benefactors) and novelist (The Trick of It, 1990; A Landing on the Sun, 1992). The London office of OPEN, once you step over the two bag-ladies to get inside, is rife with its own petty secrets: why the files on Jacqui's desk have been scattered all over the floor; what kind of photos are in those magazines Kevin's hiding in Kent's satchel; what everybody thinks of Shireen's IQ; and who knows just what about whose private life. But the OPEN staff succeeds in keeping their secrets from each other, more or less, until Roy's budding romance with Hilary Wood, a civil servant of the sort OPEN normally feasts on, brings her to the attention of Terry Little, the grand old man of OPEN. Finding Hilary ``like a helping of rather brainy mashed potatoes,'' Terry naturally brings her back to the office for a quick tumble, only to find within a few days that: (1) she's sent him an unsought grail—a copy of the hush-hush records on the death of a Pakistani troublemaker in police custody, (2) she's resigned her post at Whitehall over the leak, and (3) she'll be coming to work for OPEN, where, in the course of one mad morning when she realizes that shamelessly charming Terry's been seeing both her and Jacqui on a rigorously non-overlapping schedule, (4) she'll be flinging wide the shutters of OPEN to the world, or at least to its manic exposers themselves. As intricately worked out as a Joe Orton play, though the amusingly scheming cast remains obstinately lovable. Frayn seems bent on a single-handed crusade to restore plotting to a central place in the British novel.
Pub Date: Feb. 1, 1993
ISBN: 0-670-84554-X
Page Count: 352
Publisher: Viking
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 15, 1992
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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