Despite clumsy foreshadowing, a sensitive take of defining family ties forged in childhood by tragedy.
Scottish first-novelist Forsyth depicts four adults blighted by a childhood catastrophe who later, in middle age, find things falling apart once again.
On a July day 34 years ago, 13-year-old Lindsay set off down the beach and was never seen again. Moving among that defining moment, the subsequent years, and the present, Forsyth is most successful when detailing personal relationships, less so when attributing significance to the mysterious disappearance. Though hints are dropped along the way, the truth is revealed only at the end when it no longer seems to matter: by then, those involved have since developed more urgent problems. Lindsay’s cousin Annie, six at the time, was spending the summer with her brother Alistair at the High House on the Scottish coast. Lindsay’s two brothers, Tom and Jamie, were also there. Now in their 40s, they have been affected in different ways: the men, who resented Lindsay’s bossiness, feel guilty for not having stopped her wandering off; Annie, married to schoolteacher Graham and unable to get pregnant, obsessively mourns Lindsay and her own infertility. But when 15-year-old Rob, Alistair’s son, arrives suddenly from England, matters begin to change. While Annie delights in mothering Rob, Graham, tired of her emotional neediness, begins an affair with Jan, a fellow teacher. Jamie’s wife, career woman Ruth, gets pregnant and threatens to abort the baby. Tom, still living in High House, is trying to forget Meg, the married lover who has just ended their affair. Annie, still close to her cousins and not realizing her marriage is in danger, revisits High House with Rob in tow. Shortly afterward, Ruth undergoes an emergency hysterectomy, Annie confronts Graham, and Rob disappears. As the cousins gather to search for Rob, they are finally able to discuss what actually happened to Lindsay and their own roles in her disappearance.
Despite clumsy foreshadowing, a sensitive take of defining family ties forged in childhood by tragedy.Pub Date: Aug. 1, 2001
ISBN: 0-312-27873-X
Page Count: 288
Publisher: Dunne/St. Martin's
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 2001
The phrase “tour de force” could have been invented for this audacious novel.
Four men who meet as college roommates move to New York and spend the next three decades gaining renown in their professions—as an architect, painter, actor and lawyer—and struggling with demons in their intertwined personal lives.
Yanagihara (The People in the Trees, 2013) takes the still-bold leap of writing about characters who don’t share her background; in addition to being male, JB is African-American, Malcolm has a black father and white mother, Willem is white, and “Jude’s race was undetermined”—deserted at birth, he was raised in a monastery and had an unspeakably traumatic childhood that’s revealed slowly over the course of the book. Two of them are gay, one straight and one bisexual. There isn’t a single significant female character, and for a long novel, there isn’t much plot. There aren’t even many markers of what’s happening in the outside world; Jude moves to a loft in SoHo as a young man, but we don’t see the neighborhood change from gritty artists’ enclave to glitzy tourist destination. What we get instead is an intensely interior look at the friends’ psyches and relationships, and it’s utterly enthralling. The four men think about work and creativity and success and failure; they cook for each other, compete with each other and jostle for each other’s affection. JB bases his entire artistic career on painting portraits of his friends, while Malcolm takes care of them by designing their apartments and houses. When Jude, as an adult, is adopted by his favorite Harvard law professor, his friends join him for Thanksgiving in Cambridge every year. And when Willem becomes a movie star, they all bask in his glow. Eventually, the tone darkens and the story narrows to focus on Jude as the pain of his past cuts deep into his carefully constructed life.
The phrase “tour de force” could have been invented for this audacious novel.Pub Date: March 10, 2015
ISBN: 978-0-385-53925-8
Page Count: 720
Publisher: Doubleday
Review Posted Online: Dec. 21, 2014
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2015
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
PROFILES
PERSPECTIVES
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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