Entertaining verse for the Harlequin romance crowd.
Romance, adventure and schmaltz combine in this “epic” tale of lovers caught between worlds.
In the sixth century B.C., the Greek poet Anacreon succinctly summed up the vagaries of affection. “The dice of love,” he wrote, “are madness and turmoil.” In her first book-length work, Vanderbilt transforms this pithy sentiment into a protracted verse saga set in 1910 San Francisco, Maine and aboard various cargo ships. Though comprised of a number of poems ranging in form from sonnets to free verse, the narrative centers on the tortured life of a man who begins to prefer the girl of his dreams to his real-life lover. Grayson, a dashing and wealthy shipping magnate tossed in the midst of a bloody battle with a corporate rival, finds himself increasingly drawn from the pressured world of business to the comfort of his dreams, where the alluring red-haired Lara awaits: “One night, out of sorts and damaged by strain, / He dreamed up a lover and suffered the game.” As Grayson retreats further from his real-time woman and urgent business responsibilities, his connection to reality grows noticeably tenuous: “A shattered glass, it tinkled in his brain, / His eyes flashed and he saw his room again; / Its muted tapestry and soft rouge ground / Where his wine had spilt and caused the broken sound.” Throughout much of the collection, pat rhyme and overblown imagery serve to heighten the melodrama of Grayson and Lara’s otherworldly love, much as drastic life events (shootings, explosions, drownings) propel the tale’s plot to its turbulent conclusion. Occasionally, however, Vanderbilt hits the thematic nail on the head in capturing the sometimes paradoxical nature of intimacy: “Never before had his heart been so laid open / Nor had his life felt so unfree.”
Entertaining verse for the Harlequin romance crowd.Pub Date: Feb. 14, 2007
ISBN: 0-9788056-2-3
Page Count: -
Publisher: N/A
Review Posted Online: May 23, 2010
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
Heartfelt, yes, but pretty routine.
Life lessons.
Angie Malone, the youngest of a big, warm Italian-American family, returns to her Pacific Northwest hometown to wrestle with various midlife disappointments: her divorce, Papa’s death, a downturn in business at the family restaurant, and, above all, her childlessness. After several miscarriages, she, a successful ad exec, and husband Conlan, a reporter, befriended a pregnant young girl and planned to adopt her baby—and then the birth mother changed her mind. Angie and Conlan drifted apart and soon found they just didn’t love each other anymore. Metaphorically speaking, “her need for a child had been a high tide, an overwhelming force that drowned them. A year ago, she could have kicked to the surface but not now.” Sadder but wiser, Angie goes to work in the struggling family restaurant, bickering with Mama over updating the menu and replacing the ancient waitress. Soon, Angie befriends another young girl, Lauren Ribido, who’s eager to learn and desperately needs a job. Lauren’s family lives on the wrong side of the tracks, and her mother is a promiscuous alcoholic, but Angie knows nothing of this sad story and welcomes Lauren into the DeSaria family circle. The girl listens in, wide-eyed, as the sisters argue and make wisecracks and—gee-whiz—are actually nice to each other. Nothing at all like her relationship with her sluttish mother, who throws Lauren out when boyfriend David, en route to Stanford, gets her pregnant. Will Lauren, who’s just been accepted to USC, let Angie adopt her baby? Well, a bit of a twist at the end keeps things from becoming too predictable.
Heartfelt, yes, but pretty routine.Pub Date: July 1, 2004
ISBN: 0-345-46750-7
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Ballantine
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 15, 2004
Less bleak than the subject matter might warrant—Hannah’s default outlook is sunny—but still, a wrenching depiction of war’s...
The traumatic homecoming of a wounded warrior.
The daughter of alcoholics who left her orphaned at 17, Jolene “Jo” Zarkades found her first stable family in the military: She’s served over two decades, first in the army, later with the National Guard. A helicopter pilot stationed near Seattle, Jo copes as competently at home, raising two daughters, Betsy and Lulu, while trying to dismiss her husband Michael’s increasing emotional distance. Jo’s mettle is sorely tested when Michael informs her flatly that he no longer loves her. Four-year-old Lulu clamors for attention while preteen Betsy, mean-girl-in-training, dismisses as dweeby her former best friend, Seth, son of Jo’s confidante and fellow pilot, Tami. Amid these challenges comes the ultimate one: Jo and Tami are deployed to Iraq. Michael, with the help of his mother, has to take over the household duties, and he rapidly learns that parenting is much harder than his wife made it look. As Michael prepares to defend a PTSD-afflicted veteran charged with Murder I for killing his wife during a dissociative blackout, he begins to understand what Jolene is facing and to revisit his true feelings for her. When her helicopter is shot down under insurgent fire, Jo rescues Tami from the wreck, but a young crewman is killed. Tami remains in a coma and Jo, whose leg has been amputated, returns home to a difficult rehabilitation on several fronts. Her nightmares in which she relives the crash and other horrors she witnessed, and her pain, have turned Jo into a person her daughters now fear (which in the case of bratty Betsy may not be such a bad thing). Jo can't forgive Michael for his rash words. Worse, she is beginning to remind Michael more and more of his homicide client. Characterization can be cursory: Michael’s earlier callousness, left largely unexplained, undercuts the pathos of his later change of heart.
Less bleak than the subject matter might warrant—Hannah’s default outlook is sunny—but still, a wrenching depiction of war’s aftermath.Pub Date: Jan. 31, 2012
ISBN: 978-0-312-57720-9
Page Count: 400
Publisher: St. Martin's
Review Posted Online: Dec. 18, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2012
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