Lemann's second novel rambles on in its deceptively ladylike way, much like her first, Lives of the Saints (1985), which shares the same sense of lovable absurdity, and which also flirts with the dark side. This fragmentary tale of displaced southerners embraces the ``insane maniacs'' who stagger across its pages and into the life of its narrator, Storey Collier, a thirtysomethingish belle from ``Looziana'' who works for a major New York City newspaper. This admitted ``glamour gal'' spends her weekends at Orient Point, an enclave of eight houses on the North Shore of Long Island, where she keeps an eye on her cousin's children while he—a ``glamour boy'' turned ``burnt-out failure''—dries out in a New Orleans sanitarium. Everywhere she goes, Storey seeks out the sleazy, broken-down aspect of things—the sort of grubby elegance that reminds her of home. The rickety enclave on Long Island, with its whirl of boating, dinner parties, bridge, and ``getting plastered all afternoon,'' is summer home to a number of romantic characters- -from the volatile southern girl and ``live wire'' Margaret, who lands in jail every other night, to little Al Collier, the charming three-year-old son of Storey's cousin, a pint-size philosopher who adores both Storey and her former ``heartthrob,'' Hobby Fox. A ``moody bachelor'' and former pro baseball player, Hobby is a colleague of Storey's at the paper, and also a strong, silent type given to misanthropy, with a ``dark Southern wit.'' The ever- neurasthenic Storey, who agonizes over her career and her failure at romance, suffers with grace and a wit all her own; she beguiles with her sense of ``big-league poignancy'' and her tendency to overdramatize everything. Lemann's atmospheric fiction, with its loopy lyrical style, is an elegant testament to courtliness and gentility.
Pub Date: May 12, 1992
ISBN: 0-679-40304-3
Page Count: 256
Publisher: Knopf
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 1992
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
A strict report, worthy of sympathy.
A violent surfacing of adolescence (which has little in common with Tarkington's earlier, broadly comic, Seventeen) has a compulsive impact.
"Nobody big except me" is the dream world of Holden Caulfield and his first person story is down to the basic, drab English of the pre-collegiate. For Holden is now being bounced from fancy prep, and, after a vicious evening with hall- and roommates, heads for New York to try to keep his latest failure from his parents. He tries to have a wild evening (all he does is pay the check), is terrorized by the hotel elevator man and his on-call whore, has a date with a girl he likes—and hates, sees his 10 year old sister, Phoebe. He also visits a sympathetic English teacher after trying on a drunken session, and when he keeps his date with Phoebe, who turns up with her suitcase to join him on his flight, he heads home to a hospital siege. This is tender and true, and impossible, in its picture of the old hells of young boys, the lonesomeness and tentative attempts to be mature and secure, the awful block between youth and being grown-up, the fright and sickness that humans and their behavior cause the challenging, the dramatization of the big bang. It is a sorry little worm's view of the off-beat of adult pressure, of contemporary strictures and conformity, of sentiment….
A strict report, worthy of sympathy.Pub Date: June 15, 1951
ISBN: 0316769177
Page Count: -
Publisher: Little, Brown
Review Posted Online: Nov. 2, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 1951
BOOK REVIEW
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
APPRECIATIONS
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
© Copyright 2024 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Follow
Popular in this Genre
We can’t wait for you to join Kirkus!
It’s free and takes less than 10 seconds!
Already have an account? Log in.
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
Welcome Back!
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
bookshelf
