Gummer has found rich territory for satire, but he never decides if his take should be wacky or more nuanced.
Suburban Little League fields become a metaphor for adult squabbles in this comic novel.
Ben, the hero of Gummer’s fiction debut, is an unlikely candidate for the role of inspirational coach of a Little League squad in suburban northern California. Unlike his late father, who guided plenty of young athletes in the town of Palace Valley, Ben extracted himself from baseball as a child and instead became a builder of fine furniture in New York City, where he lived with his wife, Jili, and three kids. But after Jili’s mother falls ill, the brood heads back west, and Ben has to confront dad’s legacy and the memory of teenage slights. Much of the book is structured around comic set pieces built around stereotypical characters: the alluring mom who may be trying to put Ben in a compromising position, the hotheaded Little League coach who runs his team like Patton and the star pitcher who’s full of attitude and disdain. Such archetypes would be more tolerable if the novel didn’t shift so erratically between sincerity and broad comedy. Ben has enough intellect and emotional depth to make him more than just a sputtering dolt when he’s left to take the reins of a team, and the back story of Ben and Jili’s efforts to keep their family together in the midst of a big move and a death in the family are well drawn. But though the novel initially seems to aspire to become a seriocomic study of suburbia in the mode of Tom Perrotta, it ultimately collapses into fluffier, family-movie fare. Unlikely, shticky predicaments abound, such as the appearance of a big-name pop star in Ben’s studio, and a subplot involving a shocking confession by a famous ballplayer goes nowhere. Worse, in Palace Valley, people nurse their high-school wounds to an absurd degree, which makes the climatic conflict between Ben and the bullying coach feel forced and cartoonish. The closing chapters hit plenty of feel-good buttons, but they’re too carefully machined to have much of an effect.
Gummer has found rich territory for satire, but he never decides if his take should be wacky or more nuanced.Pub Date: April 12, 2011
ISBN: 978-1-4516-0917-2
Page Count: 224
Publisher: N/A
Review Posted Online: April 4, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2011
BOOK REVIEW
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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