An intriguing, sometimes-painful reminder of 1950s culture that offers enough bright spots to make this novel an enjoyable...
A summer job as a recreational therapist in a New York City psychiatric hospital unlocks the door to self-discovery for this tale’s young heroine.
King (A Woman Walking: 2nd Edition, 2016, etc.) reaches back to her own youthful work experience to create the backdrop for her latest novel—a depressing state institution in which fragile, and sometimes violent, patients are housed rather than treated. It is 1956, and 19-year-old Rennie Weinstein needs a summer job that will pay enough to get her through her senior year of college. Concordia Hospital, home to 6,000 patients in Queens, seems to offer a better opportunity than the standard camp/swimming instructor/coffee shop summer jobs: $60 a week to show up, take the women out to play, don’t lose anyone, and go home. Experience in working with mentally ill patients not required. And no training offered. Despite the requisite Loyalty Oath that she must sign to be a state employee (although the Senate hearings ended in 1954, the debris of McCarthyism still lingers), something Rennie considers repugnant, she decides to accept the position. Nervous, confused, and burdened by her own substantial load of emotional baggage, Rennie finds herself breaking the cardinal rules of employment at Concordia, as emphasized by the director, Jack Carson: “Don’t get personal. Don’t get friendly. Don’t offer to help.” As the summer progresses, she forges friendships with a remarkable assortment of secondary characters— Bruce, the son of the head psychiatrist at Concordia; Yanni, an Israeli cafe owner; and three protective construction workers who come to her rescue more than once. More important, she begins to earn a modicum of trust among the patients. Through these vivid relationships, Rennie begins to see the world beyond her own self-involvement. King makes effective use of the first-person narrative. Because the patients are depicted through Rennie’s eyes, and she is unencumbered by the details of diagnosis and prognosis, they are portrayed with a visceral poignancy and compassion (“The women ran to the field like kids let out of school for summer vacation. They ran and shouted and argued and cheered, releasing pent up energy, laughing when someone hit a home run”). The negative aspect of being inside Rennie’s head is that readers have to endure a bit too many of her overwrought anxiety attacks.
An intriguing, sometimes-painful reminder of 1950s culture that offers enough bright spots to make this novel an enjoyable read.Pub Date: May 20, 2016
ISBN: 978-1-63210-015-3
Page Count: 250
Publisher: Plain View Press
Review Posted Online: April 19, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 1, 2016
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
BOOK REVIEW
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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