An absorbing, affecting coming-of-age tale.
Holtman’s debut novel tells the story of a Cherokee teenager who must rise above family heartbreak.
The story opens with the in-field experiences of 1st Lt. Joseph Walking Horse Manawa, nicknamed “Horse,” and Sgt. George Wheeler, both members of a U.S. Army Ranger unit during the Vietnam War. George saves Horse after enemy fire cuts the lieutenant down in an ambush. The disabled Horse is sent back home to the Cherokee community in Broken River, Oklahoma, where he adapts to using a wheelchair and needs help with nearly everything. He turns to his younger brother, Charles Soaring Hawk, a teenager who’s willing to help in the spirit of gadugi, or “one Cherokee helping another.” But Horse’s depression and postwar trauma prove too much for the ex-soldier to deal with, and he kills himself just before George arrives in Broken River to check on him. As Holtman’s narrative steadily unfolds, George involves himself in Hawk’s life on the reservation, his complicated relationship with his alcoholic father, his bitterness over Horse’s suicide, and his yearning for a better, different life. The last is at first barely articulated, but it grows stronger as the story progresses. The author’s secondary characters tend to be one-dimensional, but this matters very little, as the novel entirely belongs to George and Hawk and the prickly, multilayered relationship they develop as they ride out various crises. They include Hawk being bullied at school, and his search for work that he enjoys; there’s also a dramatic plot development involving his deadbeat mother that’s well-handled, despite feeling a bit tacked-on. The author tells the story in flat, unadorned prose that places the emphasis squarely on the plot, but he does a fairly skillful job of evoking Hawk’s world—a nearly hopeless place of alcoholism and disenfranchisement that sometimes feels impossible to escape. Likewise, George is a well-drawn, caring, emotional figure whose sense of obligation often makes him act the part of the hero. The novel’s themes of postwar trauma are enhanced by the simplicity of the story, making it a very effective read.
An absorbing, affecting coming-of-age tale.Pub Date: Sept. 20, 2016
ISBN: 978-1-5336-6166-1
Page Count: 328
Publisher: CreateSpace
Review Posted Online: Nov. 9, 2016
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
Wacky plot keeps the pages turning and enduring schmaltzy romantic sequences.
Sisters work together to solve a child-abandonment case.
Ellie and Julia Cates have never been close. Julia is shy and brainy; Ellie gets by on charm and looks. Their differences must be tossed aside when a traumatized young girl wanders in from the forest into their hometown in Washington. The sisters’ professional skills are put to the test. Julia is a world-renowned child psychologist who has lost her edge. She is reeling from a case that went publicly sour. Though she was cleared of all wrongdoing, Julia’s name was tarnished, forcing her to shutter her Beverly Hills practice. Ellie Barton is the local police chief in Rain Valley, who’s never faced a tougher case. This is her chance to prove she is more than just a fading homecoming queen, but a scarcity of clues and a reluctant victim make locating the girl’s parents nearly impossible. Ellie places an SOS call to her sister; she needs an expert to rehabilitate this wild-child who has been living outside of civilization for years. Confronted with her professional demons, Julia once again has the opportunity to display her talents and salvage her reputation. Hannah (The Things We Do for Love, 2004, etc.) is at her best when writing from the girl’s perspective. The feral wolf-child keeps the reader interested long after the other, transparent characters have grown tiresome. Hannah’s torturously over-written romance passages are stale, but there are surprises in store as the sisters set about unearthing Alice’s past and creating a home for her.
Wacky plot keeps the pages turning and enduring schmaltzy romantic sequences.Pub Date: March 1, 2006
ISBN: 0-345-46752-3
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Ballantine
Review Posted Online: June 24, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2005
A strict report, worthy of sympathy.
A violent surfacing of adolescence (which has little in common with Tarkington's earlier, broadly comic, Seventeen) has a compulsive impact.
"Nobody big except me" is the dream world of Holden Caulfield and his first person story is down to the basic, drab English of the pre-collegiate. For Holden is now being bounced from fancy prep, and, after a vicious evening with hall- and roommates, heads for New York to try to keep his latest failure from his parents. He tries to have a wild evening (all he does is pay the check), is terrorized by the hotel elevator man and his on-call whore, has a date with a girl he likes—and hates, sees his 10 year old sister, Phoebe. He also visits a sympathetic English teacher after trying on a drunken session, and when he keeps his date with Phoebe, who turns up with her suitcase to join him on his flight, he heads home to a hospital siege. This is tender and true, and impossible, in its picture of the old hells of young boys, the lonesomeness and tentative attempts to be mature and secure, the awful block between youth and being grown-up, the fright and sickness that humans and their behavior cause the challenging, the dramatization of the big bang. It is a sorry little worm's view of the off-beat of adult pressure, of contemporary strictures and conformity, of sentiment….
A strict report, worthy of sympathy.Pub Date: June 15, 1951
ISBN: 0316769177
Page Count: -
Publisher: Little, Brown
Review Posted Online: Nov. 2, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 1951
BOOK REVIEW
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
APPRECIATIONS
© Copyright 2024 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Follow
Popular in this Genre
We can’t wait for you to join Kirkus!
It’s free and takes less than 10 seconds!
Already have an account? Log in.
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
Welcome Back!
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
bookshelf
