With a skilled craftsman's goodnatured showing off, he manages to relate an entire neighborhood and family history through...
In addition to his poetry, Pinsky is best noted for his criticism and for his wellreceived 1994 translation of Dante's Inferno. This is Pinsky's first collection of verse since he assembled the work of the prior three decades in a 1996 volume. Most of the poems here have appeared previously in standard literary publications such as the Atlantic Monthly, the New Yorker, and Threepenny Review. Pinsky has gathered together here work on a wide variety of seemingly unrelated and unlikely poetic topics—from Victrolas, computers, and televisions to a phonebook cover from the 1940s depicting a stylized, lightningwielding Hermes, then to a vintage Oldsmobile and an alternately green and pink piano. This collection marks, in Pinsky's own estimation, ``a place near the end of the middle stretch of road'' where he glances, like a doorpost Janus, simultaneously backwards and forwards. He has a slight tendency to rhapsodize his subjects, and occasionally he becomes wistfully nostalgic, but he keeps himself honest, admitting that he often ``cannot tell good fortune from bad.'' At the same time, he pays homage to the ``centaurs [who] showed him truth in fabulation.'' Despite the dire conclusions of some of these poems (as in his ekphrastic ``At the Worcester Museum''), Pinsky never takes the easy path of existential despair. He persists, with the stoicism of the samurai and the medieval knight, embracing austerity, but never denying life.
With a skilled craftsman's goodnatured showing off, he manages to relate an entire neighborhood and family history through the account of a maltreated piano's changing hands.Pub Date: April 1, 2000
ISBN: 0-374-17887-9
Page Count: 80
Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2000
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
As she seeks to repair bridges, Cat awakens anger and treachery in the hearts of those she once betrayed. Making amends,...
Before sobriety, Catherine "Cat" Coombs had it all: fun friends, an exciting job, and a love affair with alcohol. Until she blacked out one more time and woke up in a stranger’s bed.
By that time, “having it all” had already devolved into hiding the extent of her drinking from everyone she cared about, including herself. Luckily for Cat, the stranger turned out to be Jason Halliwell, a rather delicious television director marking three years, eight months, and 69 days of sobriety. Inspired by Jason—or rather, inspired by the prospect of a romantic relationship with this handsome hunk—Cat joins him at AA meetings and embarks on her own journey toward clarity. But sobriety won’t work until Cat commits to it for herself. Their relationship is tumultuous, as Cat falls off the wagon time and again. Along the way, Cat discovers that the cold man she grew up endlessly failing to please was not her real father, and with his death, her mother’s secret escapes. So she heads for Nantucket, where she meets her drunken dad and two half sisters—one boisterously welcoming and the other sulkily suspicious—and where she commits an unforgivable blunder. Years later, despairing of her persistent relapses, Jason has left Cat, taking their daughter with him. Finally, painfully, Cat gets clean. Green (Saving Grace, 2014, etc.) handles grim issues with a sure hand, balancing light romance with tense family drama. She unflinchingly documents Cat’s humiliations under the influence and then traces her commitment to sobriety. Simultaneously masking the motivations of those surrounding our heroine, Green sets up a surprising karmic lesson.
As she seeks to repair bridges, Cat awakens anger and treachery in the hearts of those she once betrayed. Making amends, like addiction, may endanger her future.Pub Date: June 23, 2015
ISBN: 978-1-250-04734-2
Page Count: 320
Publisher: St. Martin's
Review Posted Online: April 1, 2015
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 15, 2015
In his quest for easy moolah, Owen learns that the road to financial solvency can be rocky and fraught with work. Greene (Owen Foote, Soccer Star, 1998, etc.) touches upon the often-thorny issue of chores and allowances: Owen’s mom wants him to help out because he’s part of the family and not just for the money—while Owen wants the money without having to do tedious household chores. This universal dilemma leaves Owen without funds and eagerly searching for ways to make a quick buck. His madcap schemes range from original—a “free” toilet demonstration that costs 50 cents—to disastrous, as during the trial run of his children’s fishing video, Owen ends up hooking his ear instead of a trout. Enlisting the aid of his stalwart, if long-suffering, friend Joseph, the two form a dog-walking club that becomes vastly restricted in clientele after Owen has a close encounter with an incontinent, octogenarian canine. Ultimately, Owen learns a valuable lesson about work and money when an unselfish action is generously rewarded. These sudden riches motivate Owen to consider wiser investments for his money than plastic vomit. Greene’s crisp writing style and wry humor is on-target for young readers. Brief chapters revolving around a significant event or action and fast pacing are an effective draw for tentative readers. Weston’s (Space Guys!, p. 392, etc.) black-and-white illustrations, ranging in size from quarter- to full-page, deftly portray Owen’s humorous escapades. A wise, witty addition to Greene’s successful series. (Fiction. 8-10)
Pub Date: Sept. 18, 2000
ISBN: 0-618-02369-0
Page Count: 96
Publisher: Clarion Books
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 2000
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