A colorful tale of the brutality of war and the fragility of trust.
Osherson’s historical novel chronicles a clash between Carthaginians and Romans more than 2,000 years ago.
The story opens with a battlefield at Cannae in August of 216 B.C.E. Assessing the upcoming battle are two men: the famed Carthaginian general Hannibal and his servant Nahatum, an orphaned child known as “The Wolf Boy” (“that’s what they’d called him when his guards caught him trying to steal from his tent two years ago back in Iberia”). Although their status in their society couldn’t be more different, these two men become inextricably linked over the course of the novel as they work to defeat the Romans in combat and through plundering. Osherson switches between the two characters’ third-person perspectives; Nahatum is shown to initially revere Hannibal: “Hannibal’s gray eyes blazed, as a lion when he spotted his prey. And the boy burned with desire to be a lion too, to make his master proud.” Although Hannibal is a formidable master with a voice, when angry, that’s like “a lash,” he trusts Nahatum. Things become complicated, though, when Solyphos, Hannibal’s scribe, teaches Nahatum how to read and write and he achieves a certain power among his fellow Carthaginians due to his literacy. The Carthaginians eventually succumb to suspicion, betrayal, and extraordinary violence, making readers question if their enemy is an outsider or within their own ranks. Osherson’s writing can be quite vivid, and at times, it tilts toward the surreal, as in a description of an imminent conflict: “Suddenly, the birds seemed to all sing at once, to bring the morning light with their calls….Those were signals. And then the trees all around seemed to uproot and hurl themselves down the hill.” Overall, the prose is best when it’s rooted in the natural world or specific details of the time period. That said, Osherson is occasionally prone to clichés, such as “the guards threw the boy into the tent like a sack of potatoes.” Still, the story’s clipped pace and the complexity of the two main characters make up for such minor flaws.
A colorful tale of the brutality of war and the fragility of trust.Pub Date: Feb. 25, 2021
ISBN: 978-1-951896-59-1
Page Count: 416
Publisher: Adelaide Books
Review Posted Online: June 23, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 2021
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
A vibrant tale of a remarkable woman.
Who was Shakespeare?
Move over, Earl of Oxford and Francis Bacon: There’s another contender for the true author of plays attributed to the bard of Stratford—Emilia Bassano, a clever, outspoken, educated woman who takes center stage in Picoult’s spirited novel. Of Italian heritage, from a family of court musicians, Emilia was a hidden Jew and the courtesan of a much older nobleman who vetted plays to be performed for Queen Elizabeth. She was well traveled—unlike Shakespeare, she visited Italy and Denmark, where, Picoult imagines, she may have met Rosencrantz and Guildenstern—and was familiar with court intrigue and English law. “Every gap in Shakespeare’s life or knowledge that has had to be explained away by scholars, she somehow fills,” Picoult writes. Encouraged by her lover, Emilia wrote plays and poetry, but 16th-century England was not ready for a female writer. Picoult interweaves Emilia’s story with that of her descendant Melina Green, an aspiring playwright, who encounters the same sexist barriers to making herself heard that Emilia faced. In alternating chapters, Picoult follows Melina’s frustrated efforts to get a play produced—a play about Emilia, who Melina is certain sold her work to Shakespeare. Melina’s play, By Any Other Name, “wasn’t meant to be a fiction; it was meant to be the resurrection of an erasure.” Picoult creates a richly detailed portrait of daily life in Elizabethan England, from sumptuous castles to seedy hovels. Melina’s story is less vivid: Where Emilia found support from the witty Christopher Marlowe, Melina has a fashion-loving gay roommate; where Emilia faces the ravages of repeated outbreaks of plague, for Melina, Covid-19 occurs largely offstage; where Emilia has a passionate affair with the adoring Earl of Southampton, Melina’s lover is an awkward New York Times theater critic. It’s Emilia’s story, and Picoult lovingly brings her to life.
A vibrant tale of a remarkable woman.Pub Date: Aug. 20, 2024
ISBN: 9780593497210
Page Count: 544
Publisher: Ballantine
Review Posted Online: June 15, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2024
A welcome literary resurrection that deserves a place alongside Wright’s best-known work.
A falsely accused Black man goes into hiding in this masterful novella by Wright (1908-1960), finally published in full.
Written in 1941 and '42, between Wright’s classics Native Son and Black Boy, this short novel concerns Fred Daniels, a modest laborer who’s arrested by police officers and bullied into signing a false confession that he killed the residents of a house near where he was working. In a brief unsupervised moment, he escapes through a manhole and goes into hiding in a sewer. A series of allegorical, surrealistic set pieces ensues as Fred explores the nether reaches of a church, a real estate firm, and a jewelry store. Each stop is an opportunity for Wright to explore themes of hope, greed, and exploitation; the real estate firm, Wright notes, “collected hundreds of thousands of dollars in rent from poor colored folks.” But Fred’s deepening existential crisis and growing distance from society keep the scenes from feeling like potted commentaries. As he wallpapers his underground warren with cash, mocking and invalidating the currency, he registers a surrealistic but engrossing protest against divisive social norms. The novel, rejected by Wright’s publisher, has only appeared as a substantially truncated short story until now, without the opening setup and with a different ending. Wright's take on racial injustice seems to have unsettled his publisher: A note reveals that an editor found reading about Fred’s treatment by the police “unbearable.” That may explain why Wright, in an essay included here, says its focus on race is “rather muted,” emphasizing broader existential themes. Regardless, as an afterword by Wright’s grandson Malcolm attests, the story now serves as an allegory both of Wright (he moved to France, an “exile beyond the reach of Jim Crow and American bigotry”) and American life. Today, it resonates deeply as a story about race and the struggle to envision a different, better world.
A welcome literary resurrection that deserves a place alongside Wright’s best-known work.Pub Date: April 20, 2021
ISBN: 978-1-59853-676-8
Page Count: 240
Publisher: Library of America
Review Posted Online: March 16, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2021
BOOK TO SCREEN
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