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
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
Soft-focus story moves right along with few surprises. This time around, Hannah avoids the soap-opera complications of her...
Another middle-aged mom in a muddle.
After years of false starts and big hopes, Elizabeth’s ruggedly handsome husband Jack, a former football star, just landed a spot as a sportscaster on national news. He still loves her, even though much younger women are giving him come-hither looks. Heck, he doesn’t want to betray the love of his life after she helped him kick drugs and stuck by him even when he was a struggling has-been. And won’t it seem hypocritical if he fools around with his sexy assistant while he does in-depth reporting on a rape case involving a famous basketball center? Well, he fools around anyway. Elizabeth, nicknamed Birdie, knows nothing of this, but she withdraws from Jack when her hard-drinking, salt-of-the-earth father has a stroke and dies. Now no one will call her “sugar beet” ever again. Time to return home to Tennessee and contend with Anita, the sort-of-evil stepmother so trashy she wears pink puffy slippers all day long. Naturally, it turns out that Anita actually has a heart of gold and knows a few things about Birdie’s dead mother that were hushed up for years. Mom was an artist, just like Birdie, and an old scandal comes to light as Anita unrolls a vibrant canvas that portrays her secret lover. Perhaps, Birdie muses, her mother died of heartbreak, never having followed her true love or developed her talent. Has she, too, compromised everything she holds dear? Hoping to find out, Birdie joins a support group that promises to reconnect confused women with their passion. She and Jack separate, prompting a how-dare-you fit from their grown daughters. Will Birdie fly her empty nest? Will she go back to college for a degree in art? Will her brooding watercolors ever sell?
Soft-focus story moves right along with few surprises. This time around, Hannah avoids the soap-opera complications of her previous tales (Summer Island, 2001, etc.).Pub Date: July 1, 2002
ISBN: 0-345-45071-X
Page Count: 352
Publisher: Ballantine
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 15, 2002
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