because Duncker promises so much more.
From a promising British writer (Monsieur Shoushana’s Lemon Trees, 1998), a fictional interpretation of the life of Dr.
James Miranda Barry, a medical doctor—who was actually a woman’serving with the British Army in the early 1800s. Duncker has an eye for period detail, and memorably re-creates the settings of real-life James’s strange and lonely existence. Born in 1799, James was the only child of a beautiful Irish widow, Mary Ann Bulkeley, who often posed for her famous painter brother James Barry. She was also the mistress of Venezuelan General Francisco Miranda, living in exile in England. James, who from a young age was dressed by her mother in boy's clothes, was less certain of her paternity: Her father could have been her uncle, the general, or David Erskine, a noble lover of Mary Ann’s. Spending summers on Erskine's estates, James meets and falls forever in love with scullery maid Alice Jones, an ambitious young woman whom she taught to read. At ten, James’s three putative fathers, at her mother's request’she felt her daughter could have a fuller life as a man—tell James that she’ll study medicine but as a man. This she does. Later, she joins the British Army and serves in South Africa, the Mediterranean, where she faces a cholera epidemic, and Jamaica, where she witnesses a slave revolt. Though respected for her enlightened ideas and effective remedies, she is not, of course, what "he" appears to be—which leads to a young woman falling in love with James, as well as to a plethora of rumors about his gender. Retired, James lives with Alice Jones, now a famous actress, who tries to console her for her sense of never having had a real identity, by observing that we're all actors making up the lines and the plot as we go on. More an abstract exploration of gender and disguise than a perceptive take on a historical figure. Which is disappointing,
because Duncker promises so much more.Pub Date: Feb. 14, 2000
ISBN: 0-06-019601-7
Page Count: 384
Publisher: Ecco/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2000
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Briskly written soap with down-to-earth types, mostly without the lachrymose contrivances of Hannah’s previous titles...
Sisters in and out of love.
Meghann Dontess is a high-powered matrimonial lawyer in Seattle who prefers sex with strangers to emotional intimacy: a strategy bound to backfire sooner or later, warns her tough-talking shrink. It’s advice Meghann decides to ignore, along with the memories of her difficult childhood, neglectful mother, and younger sister. Though she managed to reunite Claire with Sam Cavenaugh (her father but not Meghann’s) when her mother abandoned both girls long ago, Meghann still feels guilty that her sister’s life doesn’t measure up, at least on her terms. Never married, Claire ekes out a living running a country campground with her dad and is raising her six-year-old daughter on her own. When she falls in love for the first time with an up-and-coming country musician, Meghann is appalled: Bobby Austin is a three-time loser at marriage—how on earth can Claire be so blind? Bobby’s blunt explanation doesn’t exactly satisfy the concerned big sister, who busies herself planning Claire’s dream wedding anyway. And, to relieve the stress, she beds various guys she picks up in bars, including Dr. Joe Wyatt, a neurosurgeon turned homeless drifter after the demise of his beloved wife Diane (whom he euthanized). When Claire’s awful headache turns out to be a kind of brain tumor known among neurologists as a “terminator,” Joe rallies. Turns out that Claire had befriended his wife on her deathbed, and now in turn he must try to save her. Is it too late? Will Meghann find true love at last?
Briskly written soap with down-to-earth types, mostly without the lachrymose contrivances of Hannah’s previous titles (Distant Shores, 2002, etc.). Kudos for skipping the snifflefest this time around.Pub Date: May 1, 2003
ISBN: 0-345-45073-6
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Ballantine
Review Posted Online: June 24, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2003
Coelho's placebo has racked up impressive sales in Brazil and Europe. Americans should flock to it like gulls.
Coelho is a Brazilian writer with four books to his credit. Following Diary of a Magus (1992—not reviewed) came this book, published in Brazil in 1988: it's an interdenominational, transcendental, inspirational fable—in other words, a bag of wind.
The story is about a youth empowered to follow his dream. Santiago is an Andalusian shepherd boy who learns through a dream of a treasure in the Egyptian pyramids. An old man, the king of Salem, the first of various spiritual guides, tells the boy that he has discovered his destiny: "to realize one's destiny is a person's only real obligation." So Santiago sells his sheep, sails to Tangier, is tricked out of his money, regains it through hard work, crosses the desert with a caravan, stops at an oasis long enough to fall in love, escapes from warring tribesmen by performing a miracle, reaches the pyramids, and eventually gets both the gold and the girl. Along the way he meets an Englishman who describes the Soul of the World; the desert woman Fatima, who teaches him the Language of the World; and an alchemist who says, "Listen to your heart" A message clings like ivy to every encounter; everyone, but everyone, has to put in their two cents' worth, from the crystal merchant to the camel driver ("concentrate always on the present, you'll be a happy man"). The absence of characterization and overall blandness suggest authorship by a committee of self-improvement pundits—a far cry from Saint- Exupery's The Little Prince: that flagship of the genre was a genuine charmer because it clearly derived from a quirky, individual sensibility.
Coelho's placebo has racked up impressive sales in Brazil and Europe. Americans should flock to it like gulls.Pub Date: July 1, 1993
ISBN: 0-06-250217-4
Page Count: 192
Publisher: N/A
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 1993
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
BOOK TO SCREEN
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