A showbiz tale that successfully mixes spirituality and compassion with rollicking storytelling.
The cowboys and Native Americans of the Wild West Shows ride again in this debut historical novel.
Brian takes readers back to 1904 and ’05 Oklahoma, and the beginnings of the Wild West Shows, those staged re-creations of the Old West that delighted audiences with the antics and skills of cowboys and Native Americans. Although Brian fills his cast with numerous historical personages (Will Rogers, Geronimo, Tom Mix, rancher/show promoter Zach Mulhall, and champion cowgirl Lucille Mulhall, to name a few), he makes clear at the start that the book “should be read solely as a work of fiction.” The narrative action centers around the shows themselves—the preparation, the early events, the rivalries between the Texas and Oklahoma cowboys, barroom brawls, and the big show in Madison Square Garden in New York City—but the drama’s heart lies in its focus on the plight of tribal members of the Ponca Nation who have been dislocated by a forced move from Nebraska to Oklahoma. Fictional Charlie White Horse, Zach’s right-hand man, personifies the cultural disruption of the Ponca, standing as he does with one foot in the white man’s world and the other still planted in tribal tradition. He knows the Ponca eventually will be cheated out of their remaining land, especially now that oil has been discovered near their sacred sites, but he remains determined to take care of his extended family and preserve the tribe’s spiritual connection with nature. A plethora of subplots, a large cast of good and bad guys, and an ample supply of humor should keep readers engaged. This impressive and entertaining romp features the wonderful Red Shirt, a medicine man, with his special cure for arthritis; young, love-struck farmer and ranch hand Cooder Gooch, and his best friend, Robert Black Elk, who can calm the most anxious horse; and Bible-thumping, ax-wielding, temperance leader Carrie Nation. The occasional copy editing stumbles (of the crowd at a show Brian writes, “An estimated 65,000 thousand people were watching”) and some anachronistic dialogue (“Oh my God, this is soooo fun”) are annoying but not fatal in this well-paced, poignant yarn.
A showbiz tale that successfully mixes spirituality and compassion with rollicking storytelling.Pub Date: March 24, 2016
ISBN: N/A
Page Count: -
Publisher: Bridge Creek Publishing Company
Review Posted Online: Aug. 8, 2016
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
A tasty, if not always tasteful, tale of supernatural mayhem that fans of King and Crichton alike will enjoy.
Are we not men? We are—well, ask Bigfoot, as Brooks does in this delightful yarn, following on his bestseller World War Z(2006).
A zombie apocalypse is one thing. A volcanic eruption is quite another, for, as the journalist who does a framing voice-over narration for Brooks’ latest puts it, when Mount Rainier popped its cork, “it was the psychological aspect, the hyperbole-fueled hysteria that had ended up killing the most people.” Maybe, but the sasquatches whom the volcano displaced contributed to the statistics, too, if only out of self-defense. Brooks places the epicenter of the Bigfoot war in a high-tech hideaway populated by the kind of people you might find in a Jurassic Park franchise: the schmo who doesn’t know how to do much of anything but tries anyway, the well-intentioned bleeding heart, the know-it-all intellectual who turns out to know the wrong things, the immigrant with a tough backstory and an instinct for survival. Indeed, the novel does double duty as a survival manual, packed full of good advice—for instance, try not to get wounded, for “injury turns you from a giver to a taker. Taking up our resources, our time to care for you.” Brooks presents a case for making room for Bigfoot in the world while peppering his narrative with timely social criticism about bad behavior on the human side of the conflict: The explosion of Rainier might have been better forecast had the president not slashed the budget of the U.S. Geological Survey, leading to “immediate suspension of the National Volcano Early Warning System,” and there’s always someone around looking to monetize the natural disaster and the sasquatch-y onslaught that follows. Brooks is a pro at building suspense even if it plays out in some rather spectacularly yucky episodes, one involving a short spear that takes its name from “the sucking sound of pulling it out of the dead man’s heart and lungs.” Grossness aside, it puts you right there on the scene.
A tasty, if not always tasteful, tale of supernatural mayhem that fans of King and Crichton alike will enjoy.Pub Date: June 16, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-9848-2678-7
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Del Rey/Ballantine
Review Posted Online: Feb. 9, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2020
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK TO SCREEN
Amateurish, with a twist savvy readers will see coming from a mile away.
A woman accused of shooting her husband six times in the face refuses to speak.
"Alicia Berenson was thirty-three years old when she killed her husband. They had been married for seven years. They were both artists—Alicia was a painter, and Gabriel was a well-known fashion photographer." Michaelides' debut is narrated in the voice of psychotherapist Theo Faber, who applies for a job at the institution where Alicia is incarcerated because he's fascinated with her case and believes he will be able to get her to talk. The narration of the increasingly unrealistic events that follow is interwoven with excerpts from Alicia's diary. Ah, yes, the old interwoven diary trick. When you read Alicia's diary you'll conclude the woman could well have been a novelist instead of a painter because it contains page after page of detailed dialogue, scenes, and conversations quite unlike those in any journal you've ever seen. " 'What's the matter?' 'I can't talk about it on the phone, I need to see you.' 'It's just—I'm not sure I can make it up to Cambridge at the minute.' 'I'll come to you. This afternoon. Okay?' Something in Paul's voice made me agree without thinking about it. He sounded desperate. 'Okay. Are you sure you can't tell me about it now?' 'I'll see you later.' Paul hung up." Wouldn't all this appear in a diary as "Paul wouldn't tell me what was wrong"? An even more improbable entry is the one that pins the tail on the killer. While much of the book is clumsy, contrived, and silly, it is while reading passages of the diary that one may actually find oneself laughing out loud.
Amateurish, with a twist savvy readers will see coming from a mile away.Pub Date: Feb. 5, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-250-30169-7
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Celadon Books
Review Posted Online: Nov. 3, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 15, 2018
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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