A coming-of-age tale that bridges cultural gaps with sincerity and laughs.
In this debut novel, a white suburban teenager runs a car detailing service in 1960s California, finding among his employees a mentor in a charismatic, Southern black man.
Steven Reilly’s home life is a struggle—his mother is all but rendered inert by mental illness, while his taskmaster father demands that, despite his young age, he pay rent to continue living at home. Steven takes over a company his older brother started, cleaning cars for dealerships around smoggy Los Angeles. To help him run the business, he hires Herb Jackson, a middle-aged African-American from the Deep South, wise in the ways of the world and eager for a job. A strange relationship develops with Steven as employer and Herb as adviser, drawing the younger man out of his shell while introducing him to the other cultures of the eclectic characters who join the business. They range from the geriatric polish-expert Speedy Dave to the potbellied West Virginian Andrew Calhoun, who brings his entire Appalachian clan, from his two sons to his mother-in-law, to work when necessary. But Herb, while principled, is far from perfect, and his gambling problem will soon lead the members of the car wash’s patchwork family into conflict with the dangerous, ascot-wearing, slick-haired bookie called “The Roach.” Heinz’s tale is presented in the form of a memoir, with its colorful cast of characters based on equally outlandish individuals from the author’s past and many of its events pulled from his own experiences dealing with cars. Motor enthusiasts will find many classic vehicles to wax nostalgic over, while the conversations that happen within these autos among Steven, Herb, and the others, complete with tall tales about chasing “poosy,” are always entertaining. The book’s commitment to rendering all the dialects of the wildly different characters is surprisingly smooth though somewhat problematic: accents are only affected by players who are lower-class or unconventionally educated. Race is a hot topic, particularly as it concerns Steven’s evolving awareness of the concept. But it does feel slightly underdeveloped, as the novel itself admits that the civil rights movement is just starting to make waves on the West Coast at the time the story is set.
A coming-of-age tale that bridges cultural gaps with sincerity and laughs.Pub Date: June 14, 2017
ISBN: 978-1-5246-9614-6
Page Count: 192
Publisher: AuthorHouse
Review Posted Online: July 13, 2017
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
Heartfelt, yes, but pretty routine.
Life lessons.
Angie Malone, the youngest of a big, warm Italian-American family, returns to her Pacific Northwest hometown to wrestle with various midlife disappointments: her divorce, Papa’s death, a downturn in business at the family restaurant, and, above all, her childlessness. After several miscarriages, she, a successful ad exec, and husband Conlan, a reporter, befriended a pregnant young girl and planned to adopt her baby—and then the birth mother changed her mind. Angie and Conlan drifted apart and soon found they just didn’t love each other anymore. Metaphorically speaking, “her need for a child had been a high tide, an overwhelming force that drowned them. A year ago, she could have kicked to the surface but not now.” Sadder but wiser, Angie goes to work in the struggling family restaurant, bickering with Mama over updating the menu and replacing the ancient waitress. Soon, Angie befriends another young girl, Lauren Ribido, who’s eager to learn and desperately needs a job. Lauren’s family lives on the wrong side of the tracks, and her mother is a promiscuous alcoholic, but Angie knows nothing of this sad story and welcomes Lauren into the DeSaria family circle. The girl listens in, wide-eyed, as the sisters argue and make wisecracks and—gee-whiz—are actually nice to each other. Nothing at all like her relationship with her sluttish mother, who throws Lauren out when boyfriend David, en route to Stanford, gets her pregnant. Will Lauren, who’s just been accepted to USC, let Angie adopt her baby? Well, a bit of a twist at the end keeps things from becoming too predictable.
Heartfelt, yes, but pretty routine.Pub Date: July 1, 2004
ISBN: 0-345-46750-7
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Ballantine
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 15, 2004
Less bleak than the subject matter might warrant—Hannah’s default outlook is sunny—but still, a wrenching depiction of war’s...
The traumatic homecoming of a wounded warrior.
The daughter of alcoholics who left her orphaned at 17, Jolene “Jo” Zarkades found her first stable family in the military: She’s served over two decades, first in the army, later with the National Guard. A helicopter pilot stationed near Seattle, Jo copes as competently at home, raising two daughters, Betsy and Lulu, while trying to dismiss her husband Michael’s increasing emotional distance. Jo’s mettle is sorely tested when Michael informs her flatly that he no longer loves her. Four-year-old Lulu clamors for attention while preteen Betsy, mean-girl-in-training, dismisses as dweeby her former best friend, Seth, son of Jo’s confidante and fellow pilot, Tami. Amid these challenges comes the ultimate one: Jo and Tami are deployed to Iraq. Michael, with the help of his mother, has to take over the household duties, and he rapidly learns that parenting is much harder than his wife made it look. As Michael prepares to defend a PTSD-afflicted veteran charged with Murder I for killing his wife during a dissociative blackout, he begins to understand what Jolene is facing and to revisit his true feelings for her. When her helicopter is shot down under insurgent fire, Jo rescues Tami from the wreck, but a young crewman is killed. Tami remains in a coma and Jo, whose leg has been amputated, returns home to a difficult rehabilitation on several fronts. Her nightmares in which she relives the crash and other horrors she witnessed, and her pain, have turned Jo into a person her daughters now fear (which in the case of bratty Betsy may not be such a bad thing). Jo can't forgive Michael for his rash words. Worse, she is beginning to remind Michael more and more of his homicide client. Characterization can be cursory: Michael’s earlier callousness, left largely unexplained, undercuts the pathos of his later change of heart.
Less bleak than the subject matter might warrant—Hannah’s default outlook is sunny—but still, a wrenching depiction of war’s aftermath.Pub Date: Jan. 31, 2012
ISBN: 978-0-312-57720-9
Page Count: 400
Publisher: St. Martin's
Review Posted Online: Dec. 18, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2012
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