Like a familiar roller-coaster ride; readers may see where the story’s headed but that doesn’t make it any less exhilarating.
In Nudo’s (Phantom Reunions, 2005, etc.) thriller, three men need only do a small favor to win a big fortune; unforeseen consequences ensue.
Alex Neitzel’s annual trip with little brother Trevor to visit the spot where their sister killed herself takes an unexpected turn. Alex’s car dies, and the men, along with Trevor’s partner, Chad, are stranded. At a nearby cemetery, they help the elderly David Kendrick, who had collapsed. David thanks them with an offer of $50 each if they simply mail a letter for him, promising more money later for more favors. The next one, though, is a doozy—kill David’s wife, which he claims will be a mercy killing—but the pay is commensurate with the request, $5 million to split three ways. The guys seem reluctant but soon are on a trail of lies and murder, especially because $5 million goes a lot farther if it’s split just two ways or not at all. The author’s methodically paced (but never plodding) novel establishes its tone early. David is immediately unnerving. Alex seems like the levelheaded one of the trio, chauffeuring the couple, who are more interested in getting high than finding a way home. Plot twists abound. The initially likable protagonist, with his pregnant wife, Emily, at home, gets decidedly unlikable as the story progresses. But with each appalling act, the characters grow increasingly fascinating. There are so many shocks in Nudo’s book that readers are bound to guess at least some of the developments. But Nudo knows to keep the plot spiraling while allowing a startling event to resonate before the next one occurs.
Like a familiar roller-coaster ride; readers may see where the story’s headed but that doesn’t make it any less exhilarating.Pub Date: July 24, 2014
ISBN: 978-1-4997-0861-5
Page Count: 194
Publisher: CreateSpace
Review Posted Online: Aug. 24, 2015
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 1, 2015
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
BOOK REVIEW
Readers here get both: “Life was cruel. And hilarious all at once.”
A sprawling family saga with a zesty Mexican-American accent from Cisneros, author of, most recently, Woman Hollering Creek (1991).
Every summer, all three Reyes brothers drive with their wives and children from Chicago to Mexico City to visit their parents. Narrator Lala begins with a particularly dreadful trip during which “the Awful Grandmother” reveals a shameful secret from her favorite son’s past to humiliate her detested daughter-in-law. These are Lala’s parents, and Lala then rolls the narrative back, goaded by a scolding second voice whose identity we learn later, to tell us how a desolate, abandoned girl named Soledad became the Awful Grandmother. Soledad comes from a family of shawl-makers, and her most significant possession is a rebozo caramelo, a silk shawl whose striped design, when she unfurls it after her husband’s death, evokes “the past . . . the days to come. All swirling together like the stripes.” Wearing it years later to her parents’ 30th anniversary, Lala brings the fringe to her lips and tastes “cooked pumpkin familiar and comforting and good, reminding me I’m connected to so many people, so many.” Cisneros’ keen eye enlivens descriptions of everything from Chicago’s famed Maxwell Street flea market to Soledad’s sun-stroked house on Destiny Street. (The author riffs playfully throughout on the double meaning of destino, as either “destiny” or “destination”; it’s hard to imagine that the simultaneous Spanish-language edition will be as stylistically original as this casually bilingual text.) Melodrama abounds, and the narrator doesn’t disdain her tale’s links to Mexico’s famed telenovelas. In one of many entertaining footnotes, vehicles for historical and biographical background as well as the author’s opinions, she insists that those TV soap operas merely “[emulat] Mexican life.” The only way to cope is with a robust sense of humor. As Lala’s friend Viva says, “You’re the author of the telenovela of your life. Comedy or tragedy? Choose.”
Readers here get both: “Life was cruel. And hilarious all at once.”Pub Date: Sept. 30, 2002
ISBN: 0-679-43554-9
Page Count: 448
Publisher: Knopf
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2002
PERSPECTIVES
A love letter to the power of books and friendship.
Women become horseback librarians in 1930s Kentucky and face challenges from the landscape, the weather, and the men around them.
Alice thought marrying attractive American Bennett Van Cleve would be her ticket out of her stifling life in England. But when she and Bennett settle in Baileyville, Kentucky, she realizes that her life consists of nothing more than staying in their giant house all day and getting yelled at by his unpleasant father, who owns a coal mine. She’s just about to resign herself to a life of boredom when an opportunity presents itself in the form of a traveling horseback library—an initiative from Eleanor Roosevelt meant to counteract the devastating effects of the Depression by focusing on literacy and learning. Much to the dismay of her husband and father-in-law, Alice signs up and soon learns the ropes from the library’s leader, Margery. Margery doesn’t care what anyone thinks of her, rejects marriage, and would rather be on horseback than in a kitchen. And even though all this makes Margery a town pariah, Alice quickly grows to like her. Along with several other women (including one black woman, Sophia, whose employment causes controversy in a town that doesn’t believe black and white people should be allowed to use the same library), Margery and Alice supply magazines, Bible stories, and copies of books like Little Women to the largely poor residents who live in remote areas. Alice spends long days in terrible weather on horseback, but she finally feels happy in her new life in Kentucky, even as her marriage to Bennett is failing. But her powerful father-in-law doesn’t care for Alice’s job or Margery’s lifestyle, and he’ll stop at nothing to shut their library down. Basing her novel on the true story of the Pack Horse Library Project established by the Works Progress Administration in the 1930s, Moyes (Still Me, 2018, etc.) brings an often forgotten slice of history to life. She writes about Kentucky with lush descriptions of the landscape and tender respect for the townspeople, most of whom are poor, uneducated, and grateful for the chance to learn. Although Alice and Margery both have their own romances, the true power of the story is in the bonds between the women of the library. They may have different backgrounds, but their commitment to helping the people of Baileyville brings them together.
A love letter to the power of books and friendship.Pub Date: Oct. 8, 2019
ISBN: 978-0-399-56248-8
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Pamela Dorman/Viking
Review Posted Online: June 30, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2019
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
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