A mobster confronts a family secret when his father passes away and leaves him in charge.
Nealon’s debut combines the politics and intrigue of a mob story with the ghostly touches of a supernatural horror tale. As heir to the family legacy, Vincenzo Attanasio inherits a unique problem when his father, the don, passes away: managing the three nonhuman entities bound to his family. The spirit Santo Seneschal has been with the family for generations, serving as assistant and confidant. Bereu, as Aspirate, helps out the family in more shadowy ways. Chiara, a creation of Bereu, is an immortal woman capable of taking whatever form is desired by the family member she serves. Though the three have served the Attanasios for generations, they don’t feel the same about their situation. While Santo Seneschal considers the family his duty and seems honored to serve, Chiara simply wants her freedom, and Bereu wants to destroy the family that kept him enslaved for so long. Unfortunately, as the Attanasio bloodline goes on, Bereu’s connection to them grows weaker and weaker until finally, with the don’s death, he is freed from bondage. Vincenzo and his children, now in terrible danger from a source they had always trusted, must learn Bereu’s plan and figure out how to stop him before the bodies start piling up. The premise is interesting, and the take on the typical mob story refreshing. It’s interesting, too, how the mob mentality comes across in the family’s relationships with their supernatural servants: Themes of duty and loyalty, as well as justice, are explored well via the conflict between Santo Seneschal and Bereu. The writing could use some revision, though, as when Chiara is first introduced: “Like Bereu Chiara wasn’t human. She wasn’t an ordinary mortal. She hadn’t been born and blessed with life that way.” At a more reasonable length and with some tightening of these repetitive, overexplanatory passages, the story could be sharper and more incisive. Additionally, Santo Senschal and Bereu need to have their back stories further explored; in this book, the present is everything.
An intriguing take on a ghostly mob story.
Pub Date: Feb. 23, 2014
ISBN: 978-1495949777
Page Count: 566
Publisher: CreateSpace
Review Posted Online: July 24, 2014
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
A first novel, this is also a first person account of Scout's (Jean Louise) recall of the years that led to the ending of a mystery, the breaking of her brother Jem's elbow, the death of her father's enemy — and the close of childhood years. A widower, Atticus raises his children with legal dispassion and paternal intelligence, and is ably abetted by Calpurnia, the colored cook, while the Alabama town of Maycomb, in the 1930's, remains aloof to their divergence from its tribal patterns. Scout and Jem, with their summer-time companion, Dill, find their paths free from interference — but not from dangers; their curiosity about the imprisoned Boo, whose miserable past is incorporated in their play, results in a tentative friendliness; their fears of Atticus' lack of distinction is dissipated when he shoots a mad dog; his defense of a Negro accused of raping a white girl, Mayella Ewell, is followed with avid interest and turns the rabble whites against him. Scout is the means of averting an attack on Atticus but when he loses the case it is Boo who saves Jem and Scout by killing Mayella's father when he attempts to murder them. The shadows of a beginning for black-white understanding, the persistent fight that Scout carries on against school, Jem's emergence into adulthood, Calpurnia's quiet power, and all the incidents touching on the children's "growing outward" have an attractive starchiness that keeps this southern picture pert and provocative. There is much advance interest in this book; it has been selected by the Literary Guild and Reader's Digest; it should win many friends.
Pub Date: July 11, 1960
ISBN: 0060935464
Page Count: 323
Publisher: Lippincott
Review Posted Online: Oct. 7, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 1960
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
Soft-focus story moves right along with few surprises. This time around, Hannah avoids the soap-opera complications of her...
Another middle-aged mom in a muddle.
After years of false starts and big hopes, Elizabeth’s ruggedly handsome husband Jack, a former football star, just landed a spot as a sportscaster on national news. He still loves her, even though much younger women are giving him come-hither looks. Heck, he doesn’t want to betray the love of his life after she helped him kick drugs and stuck by him even when he was a struggling has-been. And won’t it seem hypocritical if he fools around with his sexy assistant while he does in-depth reporting on a rape case involving a famous basketball center? Well, he fools around anyway. Elizabeth, nicknamed Birdie, knows nothing of this, but she withdraws from Jack when her hard-drinking, salt-of-the-earth father has a stroke and dies. Now no one will call her “sugar beet” ever again. Time to return home to Tennessee and contend with Anita, the sort-of-evil stepmother so trashy she wears pink puffy slippers all day long. Naturally, it turns out that Anita actually has a heart of gold and knows a few things about Birdie’s dead mother that were hushed up for years. Mom was an artist, just like Birdie, and an old scandal comes to light as Anita unrolls a vibrant canvas that portrays her secret lover. Perhaps, Birdie muses, her mother died of heartbreak, never having followed her true love or developed her talent. Has she, too, compromised everything she holds dear? Hoping to find out, Birdie joins a support group that promises to reconnect confused women with their passion. She and Jack separate, prompting a how-dare-you fit from their grown daughters. Will Birdie fly her empty nest? Will she go back to college for a degree in art? Will her brooding watercolors ever sell?
Soft-focus story moves right along with few surprises. This time around, Hannah avoids the soap-opera complications of her previous tales (Summer Island, 2001, etc.).Pub Date: July 1, 2002
ISBN: 0-345-45071-X
Page Count: 352
Publisher: Ballantine
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 15, 2002
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