FOUR FLAGS

Name: FOUR FLAGS
Author: Ray von Rosenberg
ISBN: 978-1449025755

by Ray von Rosenberg ‧ RELEASE DATE: Oct. 14, 2009

While in need of polishing and at times lapsing into straight historical note-taking, the novel is a compelling, at times...

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Von Rosenberg’s debut novel explores war-torn life in Russia, Prussia, Texas and Mexico in the days of Napoleon.

While he’s yet a preteen, Baron Ernst von Rosenberg, considered a Gypsy changeling by his imposing father, takes advantage of a summer break from military school and leaves his Prussian homestead in order to join Russia’s fight against Napoleon. On his way to Moscow, he meets a true Gypsy (who prefers the term Rom) named Yak, who will remain at Ernst’s side as a near-brother through all adventures. Ernst is drafted into the Russian military and Yak volunteers. Playing drum and bugle for the troops, the boys have a front-row seat to the vivid horrors of war. While Ernst briefly describes his reactions, it’s hard to get a feel for any true emotional toll it takes on him. Ernst and Yak both return to the von Rosenberg estate, Eckitten, from where they are soon summoned to fight with the Prussian military once again against Napoleon. Field Marshal Blucher, having received word of the boys’ valor in Russia, enlists the two as right-hand men and confidants. Following the conclusion of the disheartening gore known as Waterloo, the boys enjoy a respite at Eckitten that nears normal adolescence. Soon enough, the pair travel to America, where Ernst determines to find a dreamland less subjected to politics, war and bloodshed. While taking part in a mission meant to foment revolution in Texas (then under intransient ownership), the boys are captured and hauled to Mexico. Through a combination of crafty escapes, chance meeting and luck (benevolent and otherwise), Ernst finds himself in a precarious position. In the face of circumstances that would separate many men from their noble bearings, this “Little Baron” remains brave and finds comfort in memories of his many expeditions. Von Rosenberg’s first novel hinges on rather fantastical encounters, but it does so while acknowledging the importance of a good story—for surviving long nights during battle and for conveying history.

While in need of polishing and at times lapsing into straight historical note-taking, the novel is a compelling, at times humorous, means of experiencing important checkpoints in history.

Pub Date: Oct. 14, 2009

ISBN: 978-1449025755

Page Count: 624

Publisher: AuthorHouse

Review Posted Online: Oct. 12, 2010

Review Program: Kirkus Indie

Categories:

GENERAL FICTION

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SUMMER ISLAND

by Kristin Hannah ‧ RELEASE DATE: March 1, 2001

The best-selling author of tearjerkers like Angel Falls (2000) serves up yet another mountain of mush, topped off with...

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Talk-show queen takes tumble as millions jeer.

Nora Bridges is a wildly popular radio spokesperson for family-first virtues, but her loyal listeners don't know that she walked out on her husband and teenaged daughters years ago and didn't look back. Now that a former lover has sold racy pix of naked Nora and horny himself to a national tabloid, her estranged daughter Ruby, an unsuccessful stand-up comic in Los Angeles, has been approached to pen a tell-all. Greedy for the fat fee she's been promised, Ruby agrees and heads for the San Juan Islands, eager to get reacquainted with the mom she plans to betray. Once in the family homestead, nasty Ruby alternately sulks and glares at her mother, who is temporarily wheelchair-bound as a result of a post-scandal car crash. Uncaring, Ruby begins writing her side of the story when she's not strolling on the beach with former sweetheart Dean Sloan, the son of wealthy socialites who basically ignored him and his gay brother Eric. Eric, now dying of cancer and also in a wheelchair, has returned to the island. This dismal threesome catch up on old times, recalling their childhood idylls on the island. After Ruby's perfect big sister Caroline shows up, there's another round of heartfelt talk. Nora gradually reveals the truth about her unloving husband and her late father's alcoholism, which led her to seek the approval of others at the cost of her own peace of mind. And so on. Ruby is aghast to discover that she doesn't know everything after all, but Dean offers her subdued comfort. Happy endings await almost everyone—except for readers of this nobly preachy snifflefest.

The best-selling author of tearjerkers like Angel Falls (2000) serves up yet another mountain of mush, topped off with syrupy platitudes about life and love.

Pub Date: March 1, 2001

ISBN: 0-609-60737-5

Page Count: 336

Publisher: Crown

Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2001

Categories:

GENERAL FICTION

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LAST ORDERS

by Graham Swift ‧ RELEASE DATE: April 5, 1996

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Britisher Swift's sixth novel (Ever After, 1992 etc.) and fourth to appear here is a slow-to-start but then captivating tale of English working-class families in the four decades following WW II. When Jack Dodds dies suddenly of cancer after years of running a butcher shop in London, he leaves a strange request—namely, that his ashes be scattered off Margate pier into the sea. And who could better be suited to fulfill this wish than his three oldest drinking buddies—insurance man Ray, vegetable seller Lenny, and undertaker Vic, all of whom, like Jack himself, fought also as soldiers or sailors in the long-ago world war. Swift's narrative start, with its potential for the melodramatic, is developed instead with an economy, heart, and eye that release (through the characters' own voices, one after another) the story's humanity and depth instead of its schmaltz. The jokes may be weak and self- conscious when the three old friends meet at their local pub in the company of the urn holding Jack's ashes; but once the group gets on the road, in an expensive car driven by Jack's adoptive son, Vince, the story starts gradually to move forward, cohere, and deepen. The reader learns in time why it is that no wife comes along, why three marriages out of three broke apart, and why Vince always hated his stepfather Jack and still does—or so he thinks. There will be stories of innocent youth, suffering wives, early loves, lost daughters, secret affairs, and old antagonisms—including a fistfight over the dead on an English hilltop, and a strewing of Jack's ashes into roiling seawaves that will draw up feelings perhaps unexpectedly strong. Without affectation, Swift listens closely to the lives that are his subject and creates a songbook of voices part lyric, part epic, part working-class social realism—with, in all, the ring to it of the honest, human, and true.