A heartfelt, complex counter to all those #FloridaMan jokes.
Contemporary authors consider what it really means to be from Florida in this new anthology edited by Hinton (Pinkies, 2015).
A sinkhole opens up inside a cheap motel room ("Major Dissociation on Crescent Lake," by Jeff Parker). A woman ponders the seduction of Florida lightning in the context of her experiences with electroconvulsive therapy ("Lightning: An Essay in Flashes," by Amy Parker). A lonely retired loan officer explores the awkward universe opened up by online dating ("All Right, Now, Cupid," by Sohrab Homi Fracis). A mannequin takes the place of a wife—or maybe she is the wife ("Dummy Up," by Kristen Arnett)? In this collection of disparate stories, essays, and poems, there are a few themes, in addition to geography, that link things together. Loss, displacement, an impending sense of threat and danger—these are perhaps hallmarks of most of contemporary fiction—but there is also a certain ambivalence, a certain craving for that darkness, that the introduction at least would have us believe is specific to Florida. In a state where the weather and the wildlife have a better than average chance of killing you, maybe the awareness of mortality makes life just a little more precious, even when it’s still ragged around the edges. The protagonists, fictional and non, are often battered, lost, and struggling, but they fiercely hold on to their senses of self and to their senses of, and longing for, place. Most of the authors in the collection have impressive bios, and very few of them still live in Florida. This seems noteworthy because, in the literature of Florida, one of the most important elements seems to be the desire to leave—and the realization that one can never truly disassociate from these deep Southern roots. Florida may be gothic, depressed, on the verge of being swallowed up by the ocean—but for some, it’s still home.
A heartfelt, complex counter to all those #FloridaMan jokes.Pub Date: Nov. 7, 2017
ISBN: 978-1-941681-87-9
Page Count: 200
Publisher: Burrow Press
Review Posted Online: Aug. 19, 2017
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 2017
A masterly encapsulation of modern Russian history, this book more than fulfills the promise of Towles' stylish debut, Rules...
Sentenced to house arrest in Moscow's Metropol Hotel by a Bolshevik tribunal for writing a poem deemed to encourage revolt, Count Alexander Rostov nonetheless lives the fullest of lives, discovering the depths of his humanity.
Inside the elegant Metropol, located near the Kremlin and the Bolshoi, the Count slowly adjusts to circumstances as a "Former Person." He makes do with the attic room, to which he is banished after residing for years in a posh third-floor suite. A man of refined taste in wine, food, and literature, he strives to maintain a daily routine, exploring the nooks and crannies of the hotel, bonding with staff, accepting the advances of attractive women, and forming what proves to be a deeply meaningful relationship with a spirited young girl, Nina. "We are bound to find comfort from the notion that it takes generations for a way of life to fade," says the companionable narrator. For the Count, that way of life ultimately becomes less about aristocratic airs and privilege than generosity and devotion. Spread across four decades, this is in all ways a great novel, a nonstop pleasure brimming with charm, personal wisdom, and philosophic insight. Though Stalin and Khrushchev make their presences felt, Towles largely treats politics as a dark, distant shadow. The chill of the political events occurring outside the Metropol is certainly felt, but for the Count and his friends, the passage of time is "like the turn of a kaleidoscope." Not for nothing is Casablanca his favorite film. This is a book in which the cruelties of the age can't begin to erase the glories of real human connection and the memories it leaves behind.
A masterly encapsulation of modern Russian history, this book more than fulfills the promise of Towles' stylish debut, Rules of Civility(2011).Pub Date: Sept. 6, 2016
ISBN: 978-0-670-02619-7
Page Count: 480
Publisher: Viking
Review Posted Online: June 20, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 2016
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
"This soil," concludes the young narrator of this quiet chronicle of garrotted innocence, "is bad for all kinds of flowers. Certain seeds it will not nurture, certain fruit it will not bear." And among the exclusions of white rural Ohio, echoed by black respectability, is ugly, black, loveless, twelve-year-old Pecola. But in a world where blue-eyed gifts are clucked over and admired, and the Pecolas are simply not seen, there is always the possibility of the dream and wish—for blue eyes. Born of a mother who adjusted her life to the clarity and serenity of white households and "acquired virtues that were easy to maintain" and a father, Cholly, stunted by early rejections and humiliations, Pecola just might have been loved—for in raping his daughter Cholly did at least touch her. But "Love is never better than the lover," and with the death of her baby, the child herself, accepting absolutely the gift of blue eyes from a faith healer (whose perverse interest in little girls does not preclude understanding), inches over into madness. A skillful understated tribute to the fall of a sparrow for whose small tragedy there was no watching eye.
Pub Date: Oct. 29, 1970
ISBN: 0375411550
Page Count: -
Publisher: Holt Rinehart & Winston
Review Posted Online: Sept. 30, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 1, 1970
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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SEEN & HEARD
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