A curtain call for Veryan's Sanguinet series (Sanguinet's Crown, 1985, etc.), which, like her Golden Chronicles and Jeweled Man sagas, are Georgian/Regency-period adventures with various dastardly groups threatening to subvert the English government. Here, a battle-scarred, oddly magnetic veteran of the Sanguinet conflicts arrives in the country to outwit enemies and win a lady. Marietta Washington and elder sister Fanny are pretty, sharp-witted, but impoverished, thanks to the gambling forays of their weak but goodhearted widower father, Sir Lionel. Also at home, in addition to younger brother Arthur, is Aunt Dova, an eerie but lovable bird who converses with lifelike dolls and, in disguise, tells fortunes, having been blessed with ``A Mystical Window Through Time.'' The Warrington house is part of the estate of Lanterns, owned by the ever-absent Lord Temple, and is rumored to be haunted and to contain a fabled, priceless jewel, ``The Sigh of Saladin.'' Suddenly arriving to camp out in Lanterns is the polite but evasive Diecon, a retired Major who becomes Arthur's idol. Marietta, puzzled, is drawn to Diecon—but is he really just a free-spirited ex-soldier? What explains his brilliance at the violin? Meanwhile, Marietta is courted by the handsome, supposedly wealthy Blake, whose relationship to Diecon, when revealed, makes for an unpleasant surprise. Before Diecon's real identity is revealed and Blake vanquished, Diecon and Marietta deal with the tragedy of Marietta's brother Eric, involved in treason; Diecon's friend Joselyn courts Fanny; and there is a return of the terrifying Sanguinet mob (Claude S., the leader, is now deceased) involving a kidnapping and a grand showdown in Lanterns. The villains are vanquished, the Sigh of Saladin makes an appearance, and true lovers are united. Reliable Veryan, mixing romance, humor, light mystery, and a satisfyingly noisy finish with just enough touches of period diction and mores to add the right Regency flavor.
Pub Date: Oct. 1, 1996
ISBN: 0-312-14640-X
Page Count: 352
Publisher: St. Martin's
Review Posted Online: June 24, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 1996
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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