A hair-raising story well told with sympathy and respect, particularly in the treatment of the heroic Filipinos, modest men...
Two Romanian refugees stow away on a stateless container ship, in a tale based on horrifying true incidents of cruelty and salvation.
Hough (The Final Confession of Mabel Stark, 2003) puts the novel to noble use in this well-researched treatment of the real-life rescue of one Romanian out of the thousands who fled the ruins of Ceausescu’s hideous regime. Relying on sketchy information from compatriots who have made it from Eastern Europe to North America, college-educated Daniel Pacepa teams with ex-miner Gheorghe Mihoc on the dangerous journey through Yugoslavia to the free West until they reach the Spanish port of Algeciras, where they hope to sneak onto a freighter that will take them across the Atlantic. It is their understanding that once discovered on board, they will be taken care of and dropped safely off at the next port. The reality is that many crews see stowaways as too troublesome to deal with. Indeed, the captain of the ship they board has recently forced a pair of refugees to leave the ship for a leaky improvised raft, and the Spanish shore is littered daily with the bodies of other stowaways. The multinational crew members of the Maersk Dubai are divided in their sentiments. The Chinese officers are capable of murder, the Filipino crew can’t stomach the official cruelty. Before the trusting Romanians can expose themselves to the officers, the Filipinos secrete them below-deck and feed them on the sly. The safety of the stowaways depends on a desperate message describing their wretched state sent by one of the crew to a sympathetic priest in Houston, but, in mid-ocean, Houston is removed from the itinerary.
A hair-raising story well told with sympathy and respect, particularly in the treatment of the heroic Filipinos, modest men with very big hearts.Pub Date: Sept. 1, 2004
ISBN: 1-55970-745-3
Page Count: 240
Publisher: Arcade
Review Posted Online: June 24, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 2004
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
In the contest of Most Winning Combination, it would be hard to beat grumpy Ove and his hidden, generous heart.
Originally published in Sweden, this charming debut novel by Backman should find a ready audience with English-language readers.
The book opens helpfully with the following characterizations about its protagonist: “Ove is fifty-nine. He drives a Saab. He’s the kind of man who points at people he doesn’t like the look of, as if they were burglars and his forefinger a policeman’s torch.” What the book takes its time revealing is that this dyed-in-the-wool curmudgeon has a heart of solid gold. Readers will see the basic setup coming a mile away, but Backman does a crafty job revealing the full vein of precious metal beneath Ove’s ribs, glint by glint. Ove’s history trickles out in alternating chapters—a bleak set of circumstances that smacks an honorable, hardworking boy around time and again, proving that, even by early adulthood, he comes by his grumpy nature honestly. It’s a woman who turns his life around the first time: sweet and lively Sonja, who becomes his wife and balances his pessimism with optimism and warmth. By 59, he's in a place of despair yet again, and it’s a woman who turns him around a second time: spirited, knowing Parvaneh, who moves with her husband and children into the terraced house next door and forces Ove to engage with the world. The back story chapters have a simple, fablelike quality, while the current-day chapters are episodic and, at times, hysterically funny. In both instances, the narration can veer toward the preachy or overly pat, but wry descriptions, excellent pacing and the juxtaposition of Ove’s attitude with his deeds add plenty of punch to balance out any pathos.
In the contest of Most Winning Combination, it would be hard to beat grumpy Ove and his hidden, generous heart.Pub Date: July 15, 2014
ISBN: 978-1-4767-3801-7
Page Count: 352
Publisher: Atria
Review Posted Online: June 28, 2014
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2014
BOOK TO SCREEN
BOOK TO SCREEN
BOOK TO SCREEN
Suspenseful, full of incident, and not obviously necessary.
Atwood goes back to Gilead.
The Handmaid’s Tale (1985), consistently regarded as a masterpiece of 20th-century literature, has gained new attention in recent years with the success of the Hulu series as well as fresh appreciation from readers who feel like this story has new relevance in America’s current political climate. Atwood herself has spoken about how news headlines have made her dystopian fiction seem eerily plausible, and it’s not difficult to imagine her wanting to revisit Gilead as the TV show has sped past where her narrative ended. Like the novel that preceded it, this sequel is presented as found documents—first-person accounts of life inside a misogynistic theocracy from three informants. There is Agnes Jemima, a girl who rejects the marriage her family arranges for her but still has faith in God and Gilead. There’s Daisy, who learns on her 16th birthday that her whole life has been a lie. And there's Aunt Lydia, the woman responsible for turning women into Handmaids. This approach gives readers insight into different aspects of life inside and outside Gilead, but it also leads to a book that sometimes feels overstuffed. The Handmaid’s Tale combined exquisite lyricism with a powerful sense of urgency, as if a thoughtful, perceptive woman was racing against time to give witness to her experience. That narrator hinted at more than she said; Atwood seemed to trust readers to fill in the gaps. This dynamic created an atmosphere of intimacy. However curious we might be about Gilead and the resistance operating outside that country, what we learn here is that what Atwood left unsaid in the first novel generated more horror and outrage than explicit detail can. And the more we get to know Agnes, Daisy, and Aunt Lydia, the less convincing they become. It’s hard, of course, to compete with a beloved classic, so maybe the best way to read this new book is to forget about The Handmaid’s Tale and enjoy it as an artful feminist thriller.
Suspenseful, full of incident, and not obviously necessary.Pub Date: Sept. 10, 2019
ISBN: 978-0-385-54378-1
Page Count: 432
Publisher: Nan A. Talese
Review Posted Online: Sept. 3, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2019
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
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