Screenwriter and director Conn, who adapted the film Claire of the Moon into a novel, may be too firmly entrenched in Hollywoodor so it seems in her formulaic latest. Lindsay Brennan, a lesbian, is a variation on a clichÇ: the familiar Type A personality who puts work ahead of personal life and in the process risks alienating herself from love and happiness. As the most brilliant architect ever to hit Portland, Oregon, Lindsay has made work her life for so long that her heart is frozenuntil she's introduced (by a former for-sex-only flame) to Sondra Pinchot, a 40-ish interior designer/alcoholic who's just bought the beach house of her dreams and is looking for just-the- right architect to redesign it. After a few weeks of combining work with passionweeks during which Lindsay and Sondra snag the plum job of designing the Darlington Arts PavilionSondra cracks under the pressure of her first relationship with a woman. Enter her daughter Samantha, also an interior designer (and, conveniently, stuck in an unfulfilling heterosexual relationship in Seattle), who rides in on a white horse to send her mother to rehab and take over her portion of the Pavilion joband ultimately prove herself to be Lindsay's soulmate. The supporting cast of Lindsay's assistants provides some laughsSnag is a GÇrard Depardieu-loving, hedonistic queen; and overweight, always-a-bridesmaid Megan finally meets her love matchbut finally takes up too much space in the book, possibly compensating, inadvertently, for the fact that Lindsay, Sondra, and Samantha are one-dimensional and inherently dull. The prologuea dramatic car crashconnects precariously to the conclusion, in which Conn tries, too late, to establish the notion that things aren't always what they seem. So many plot twists, so little timethe passion never truly emerges from the shadow in this convoluted, scene-obsessed production. (Author tour)
Pub Date: Oct. 19, 1995
ISBN: 0-684-80326-7
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 1995
BOOK REVIEW
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
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
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