A fast-moving historical tale of religious and class conflicts, told with a personal touch.
Loosely based on true events from the author’s ancestry, this historical novel tells the tale of Peppino, an upper-class troublemaker in a small Italian village who resents the restrictions of his highborn status and longs to fight for the common people.
In late-19th-century Italy, the village of Brancaleone is divided by an imaginary line that keeps the poor from fraternizing with the rich. Teenage Peppino resents this division, which prevents him, a baroness’ son, from being able to freely socialize with his peasant friend Emilio. He also resents the monsignor, the local head of the church; more corrupt than godly, he uses his position of power to manipulate the locals for his own gain. When Emilio enlists Peppino to help rescue local hero Nicola from being executed, Peppino finds his life finally veering off the narrow, upper-class path previously laid out for him. From fraternizing with outlaws, a stint at a monastery, being accused of murder and meeting Pope Leo XIII, Peppino’s journey leads to much personal growth—and a few startling revelations. Often, the novel doesn’t feel like a period piece, which is both good and bad. Much of the dialogue seems distractingly modern, yet Peppino’s conversations with a Hasidic Jew named Abramo provide interesting insight into the era’s attitudes toward religion. Coleman (Critical Transfer, 2013), who based the novel on his grandfather’s exploits, jumps quickly from one action-packed event to another in fast-paced storytelling that’s highly enjoyable. Despite Peppino’s fascinating interactions, the baroness proves to be the most compelling character. Her complex relationship with Peppino and the mixture of love and resentment they seem to share are more intriguing than many of Peppino’s exchanges with the more heroic characters of the story.
A fast-moving historical tale of religious and class conflicts, told with a personal touch.Pub Date: July 2, 2013
ISBN: 978-0988596313
Page Count: 274
Publisher: Seth Coleman
Review Posted Online: Sept. 13, 2013
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 2013
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
BOOK REVIEW
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
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
The phrase “tour de force” could have been invented for this audacious novel.
Four men who meet as college roommates move to New York and spend the next three decades gaining renown in their professions—as an architect, painter, actor and lawyer—and struggling with demons in their intertwined personal lives.
Yanagihara (The People in the Trees, 2013) takes the still-bold leap of writing about characters who don’t share her background; in addition to being male, JB is African-American, Malcolm has a black father and white mother, Willem is white, and “Jude’s race was undetermined”—deserted at birth, he was raised in a monastery and had an unspeakably traumatic childhood that’s revealed slowly over the course of the book. Two of them are gay, one straight and one bisexual. There isn’t a single significant female character, and for a long novel, there isn’t much plot. There aren’t even many markers of what’s happening in the outside world; Jude moves to a loft in SoHo as a young man, but we don’t see the neighborhood change from gritty artists’ enclave to glitzy tourist destination. What we get instead is an intensely interior look at the friends’ psyches and relationships, and it’s utterly enthralling. The four men think about work and creativity and success and failure; they cook for each other, compete with each other and jostle for each other’s affection. JB bases his entire artistic career on painting portraits of his friends, while Malcolm takes care of them by designing their apartments and houses. When Jude, as an adult, is adopted by his favorite Harvard law professor, his friends join him for Thanksgiving in Cambridge every year. And when Willem becomes a movie star, they all bask in his glow. Eventually, the tone darkens and the story narrows to focus on Jude as the pain of his past cuts deep into his carefully constructed life.
The phrase “tour de force” could have been invented for this audacious novel.Pub Date: March 10, 2015
ISBN: 978-0-385-53925-8
Page Count: 720
Publisher: Doubleday
Review Posted Online: Dec. 21, 2014
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2015
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
PROFILES
PERSPECTIVES
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