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FAMILY AND OTHER ACCIDENTS

Name: FAMILY AND OTHER ACCIDENTS
Author: Shari Goldhagen
ISBN: 0-385-51597-9

by Shari Goldhagen ‧ RELEASE DATE: April 18, 2006

The pervasive emphasis on kindness and responsibility is what gives this book its value.

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This sharply realistic debut novel traces the lives of Jack and Connor Reed, brothers growing up in Shaker Heights, Ohio.

The two are orphaned when Jack is a fledgling lawyer of 25 and Connor a shy, likable boy of 15. This narrative sticks relentlessly to the issues of private life—Jack’s relationships with women, Connor’s near-fatal leukemia, both men’s marriages and children—and follows their careers only insofar as they contribute to stress, vanity or economic stability. Although everyone involved is depicted as being exceptionally bright, no one seems to have a stray thought to spare for art, science, religion, philosophy or the public good. An unwavering focus on daily life, of the dog-to-the-vet, trip-to-the-convenience-store variety, makes the characters’ lives seem real, but also pedestrian. The story’s merit is neither on the level of events, which are relatively unexciting, nor of language. Goldhagen's style is merely a means to an end, clear, serviceable and occasionally cliché-ridden, as when she describes Jack’s second wife as having “dewy skin and eyes blue and faceted as cut sapphires.” When she strays from familiar locutions, however, the results are hardly more successful, as when one character reflects, “There were annoying hangnails of boredom itching to be chewed.” Where the author excels is at the level of moral choice: Her characters struggle toward a sense of what it means to be an adult, one who takes responsibility for another's well-being. When Connor is diagnosed with leukemia, for example, his relationship with his wife Laine becomes mired in conflict. Nevertheless, when Connor insists on taking a shower despite his doctor’s warning that the heat could cause him to faint, Laine sits protectively “watching him through the beveled glass.”

The pervasive emphasis on kindness and responsibility is what gives this book its value.

Pub Date: April 18, 2006

ISBN: 0-385-51597-9

Page Count: 288

Publisher: Doubleday

Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 2006

Categories:

GENERAL FICTION

- BOOK REVIEW
100 DAYS OF CAKE
by Shari Goldhagen

- BOOK REVIEW
IN SOME OTHER WORLD, MAYBE
by Shari Goldhagen

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SUMMER ISLAND

by Kristin Hannah ‧ RELEASE DATE: March 1, 2001

The best-selling author of tearjerkers like Angel Falls (2000) serves up yet another mountain of mush, topped off with...

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Talk-show queen takes tumble as millions jeer.

Nora Bridges is a wildly popular radio spokesperson for family-first virtues, but her loyal listeners don't know that she walked out on her husband and teenaged daughters years ago and didn't look back. Now that a former lover has sold racy pix of naked Nora and horny himself to a national tabloid, her estranged daughter Ruby, an unsuccessful stand-up comic in Los Angeles, has been approached to pen a tell-all. Greedy for the fat fee she's been promised, Ruby agrees and heads for the San Juan Islands, eager to get reacquainted with the mom she plans to betray. Once in the family homestead, nasty Ruby alternately sulks and glares at her mother, who is temporarily wheelchair-bound as a result of a post-scandal car crash. Uncaring, Ruby begins writing her side of the story when she's not strolling on the beach with former sweetheart Dean Sloan, the son of wealthy socialites who basically ignored him and his gay brother Eric. Eric, now dying of cancer and also in a wheelchair, has returned to the island. This dismal threesome catch up on old times, recalling their childhood idylls on the island. After Ruby's perfect big sister Caroline shows up, there's another round of heartfelt talk. Nora gradually reveals the truth about her unloving husband and her late father's alcoholism, which led her to seek the approval of others at the cost of her own peace of mind. And so on. Ruby is aghast to discover that she doesn't know everything after all, but Dean offers her subdued comfort. Happy endings await almost everyone—except for readers of this nobly preachy snifflefest.

The best-selling author of tearjerkers like Angel Falls (2000) serves up yet another mountain of mush, topped off with syrupy platitudes about life and love.

Pub Date: March 1, 2001

ISBN: 0-609-60737-5

Page Count: 336

Publisher: Crown

Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2001

Categories:

GENERAL FICTION

- BOOK REVIEW
THE WOMEN
by Kristin Hannah

- BOOK REVIEW
THE FOUR WINDS
by Kristin Hannah

- BOOK REVIEW
THE GREAT ALONE
by Kristin Hannah

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TO KILL A MOCKINGBIRD

by Harper Lee ‧ RELEASE DATE: July 11, 1960

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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.