Like Francesca’s favorite dulce de leche, an indulgence for readers willing to binge on empty calories.
Travel writer enjoys cuisine, tango and reawakened sensuality in an airbrushed Buenos Aires.
Manhattan foodie and socialite Francesca, a native Neapolitan, is not aging gracefully. Her adult children have left the nest, and her Italian recipes have displaced sexual desire in her marriage; for some time now the only nookie between Francesca and banker husband George has been gnocchi. She’s resigned herself to celibacy (she doesn’t take seriously George’s urging to have an affair) when salvation arrives in the form of a magazine assignment. She’s to do a spread on the tango culture in Buenos Aires with special emphasis on a recent phenomenon: wealthy Brits and Americans who buy Tuck and Tango vacation packages combining plastic surgery and post-operative dance rehab. In Argentina, Francesca enrolls in tango classes, and the dance, a form of stylized intercourse, inflames her long-dormant libido. A target for her lust quickly surfaces in the shape of silver-haired Roberto, 40, a plastic surgeon and entrepreneur who has profited from the T&T trend. The novel tempers the lovers’ steamy grapplings with cool-down sections featuring Francesca’s other Argentinean friends: Ellie, an American singleton on her biennial tango (sans tuck) break; Sarah, a keen observer of Buenos Aires society scandals; Luis, an Adonis who’s risen from the barrio to international tango fame; and Analia, a danseuse who falls hopelessly in love with gay Luis during one of his capricious lapses into heterosexuality. From boudoir to ballroom, memoirist Chen (Rosemary and Bitter Oranges, 2003) displays a flair for sensory detail. However, her fictional characters transcend neither their formulaic roles (frigid epicurean spouse, sexy surgeon, etc.) nor the novel’s wish-fulfilling premise of an older woman emerging from invisibility to object of desire via a simple change of hemisphere. Promising complications—Francesca’s rival for both husband and lover is a billionairess in her 60s—are downplayed as minor blowback.
Like Francesca’s favorite dulce de leche, an indulgence for readers willing to binge on empty calories.Pub Date: Nov. 1, 2009
ISBN: 978-1-4165-7061-5
Page Count: 256
Publisher: Scribner
Review Posted Online: June 24, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2009
BOOK REVIEW
Anyone who believes in true love or is simply willing to accept it as the premise of a winding tale will find this debut an...
True love flares between two people, but they find that circumstances always impede it.
On a winter day in London, Laurie spots Jack from her bus home and he sparks a feeling in her so deep that she spends the next year searching for him. Her roommate and best friend, Sarah, is the perfect wing-woman but ultimately—and unknowingly—ends the search by finding Jack and falling for him herself. Laurie’s hasty decision not to tell Sarah is the second painful missed opportunity (after not getting off the bus), but Sarah’s happiness is so important to Laurie that she dedicates ample energy into retraining her heart not to love Jack. Laurie is misguided, but her effort and loyalty spring from a true heart, and she considers her project mostly successful. Perhaps she would have total success, but the fact of the matter is that Jack feels the same deep connection to Laurie. His reasons for not acting on them are less admirable: He likes Sarah and she’s the total package; why would he give that up just because every time he and Laurie have enough time together (and just enough alcohol) they nearly fall into each other’s arms? Laurie finally begins to move on, creating a mostly satisfying life for herself, whereas Jack’s inability to be genuine tortures him and turns him into an ever bigger jerk. Patriarchy—it hurts men, too! There’s no question where the book is going, but the pacing is just right, the tone warm, and the characters sympathetic, even when making dumb decisions.
Anyone who believes in true love or is simply willing to accept it as the premise of a winding tale will find this debut an emotional, satisfying read.Pub Date: Oct. 16, 2018
ISBN: 978-0-525-57468-2
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Crown
Review Posted Online: July 30, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 2018
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK TO SCREEN
Packed with riveting drama and painful truths, this book powerfully illustrates the devastation of abuse—and the strength of...
Hoover’s (November 9, 2015, etc.) latest tackles the difficult subject of domestic violence with romantic tenderness and emotional heft.
At first glance, the couple is edgy but cute: Lily Bloom runs a flower shop for people who hate flowers; Ryle Kincaid is a surgeon who says he never wants to get married or have kids. They meet on a rooftop in Boston on the night Ryle loses a patient and Lily attends her abusive father’s funeral. The provocative opening takes a dark turn when Lily receives a warning about Ryle’s intentions from his sister, who becomes Lily’s employee and close friend. Lily swears she’ll never end up in another abusive home, but when Ryle starts to show all the same warning signs that her mother ignored, Lily learns just how hard it is to say goodbye. When Ryle is not in the throes of a jealous rage, his redeeming qualities return, and Lily can justify his behavior: “I think we needed what happened on the stairwell to happen so that I would know his past and we’d be able to work on it together,” she tells herself. Lily marries Ryle hoping the good will outweigh the bad, and the mother-daughter dynamics evolve beautifully as Lily reflects on her childhood with fresh eyes. Diary entries fancifully addressed to TV host Ellen DeGeneres serve as flashbacks to Lily’s teenage years, when she met her first love, Atlas Corrigan, a homeless boy she found squatting in a neighbor’s house. When Atlas turns up in Boston, now a successful chef, he begs Lily to leave Ryle. Despite the better option right in front of her, an unexpected complication forces Lily to cut ties with Atlas, confront Ryle, and try to end the cycle of abuse before it’s too late. The relationships are portrayed with compassion and honesty, and the author’s note at the end that explains Hoover’s personal connection to the subject matter is a must-read.
Packed with riveting drama and painful truths, this book powerfully illustrates the devastation of abuse—and the strength of the survivors.Pub Date: Aug. 2, 2016
ISBN: 978-1-5011-1036-8
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Atria
Review Posted Online: May 30, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 2016
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
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