by Patrick McCabe ‧ RELEASE DATE: March 1, 2001
One wonders, though, why McCabe seems compelled to keep retelling the same essential story, with minimal (albeit artful and...
The violent history that continues to plague the Irish writer's fragmented homeland, dramatized in such critically praised fiction as The Butcher Boy (1993) and Breakfast on Pluto (1998), once again suffuses his blackly comic—and frustratingly arch—latest.
Structured as a basically chronological series of related tales, McCabe's seventh novel chronicles the increasing dementia of Pat McNab, a middle-aged bachelor son of "Gullytown" in rural Northern Ireland—and a serial alcoholic whose problems only begin when he murders his nagging mother and buries her in the backyard. In a bifurcated narrative that observes Pat’s actions both through a boozy haze and from the viewpoint of an analytical (and annoyingly pedantic) omniscient observer, McCabe compiles a lurid and often risible catalogue of rapidly accumulating horrors. Egged on by the ghost of his (still domineering) "Mammy," Pat impulsively dispatches neurotic widow Mrs. Tubridy (who makes him her domestic slave and lover), an "interfering peddler of dirt" (i.e., a "turf salesman") unwise enough to threaten blackmail, a property-hungry neighbor, an amorous aunt retired from a career in pornographic films, and numerous others—including Pat's confederates in a botched drug operation, three wild girls who take a fancy to him (in a droll parody of the classical legend of the Golden Apples), and even the policeman who finally arrives to apprehend him. Or are these crimes only figments of Pat's drunken imagination?—a possibility clearly suggested by considerable internal evidence, including interpolated flashbacks to Pat's childhood, spent cowering under the thumb of his brutal father, a former IRA soldier himself irrationally inclined to "imagining things." Meanwhile, McCabe keeps it all moving along swiftly, employing snatches of sentimental poetry and pop songs as chapter headings and ironic refrains.
One wonders, though, why McCabe seems compelled to keep retelling the same essential story, with minimal (albeit artful and ghoulishly amusing) variations. One gets the point, appreciates the skill with which it's made, and wishes this impressively gifted author would move on.Pub Date: March 1, 2001
ISBN: 0-06-019678-5
Page Count: 320
Publisher: HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2001
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BOOK REVIEW
by J.D. Salinger ‧ RELEASE DATE: June 15, 1951
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
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SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
APPRECIATIONS
by Kristin Hannah ‧ RELEASE DATE: March 1, 2006
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
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