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SINS OF OUR FATHERS

Name: SINS OF OUR FATHERS
Author: Shawn Lawrence Otto
ISBN: 978-1-57131-109-2

by Shawn Lawrence Otto ‧ RELEASE DATE: Nov. 18, 2014

Ethnic animosities make for an awkward fit with standard-issue midlife floundering.

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A white banker tries to thwart a Native American entrepreneur while handling his midlife crisis in this first novel set in rural Minnesota.

When John "JW" White met upper-crust Carol Ingersoll, he was a teenage horse trainer; after they married, he worked his way up to head the local bank. They had a good marriage until their son died in a car accident. As the novel opens, a year after the family's tragedy, JW is advising a group of bankers on how to secure Native Americans' deposits while denying them loans. After his slick presentation, he stops at an Indian-owned casino but finds that he can’t leave: He’s addicted to gambling. The unraveling that began with his son's death has led JW to a temporary separation from Carol and their daughter, Julie, and now his gambling losses lead him to be evicted from his apartment. Can things get worse? You bet. His ruthless boss, Frank Jorgenson, fears a charismatic young Ojibwe, Johnny Eagle, is building his own bank, threatening the collapse of theirs. Jorgenson’s instruction is terse: Stop him. He's discovered that JW embezzled money from the bank and is suspending him until he delivers. JW isn't used to playing rough, but he’ll do anything to reunite his family, so he rents a trailer across from Eagle’s house on the reservation, which he bugs. Soon he's working for Eagle’s wild rice operation and teaching his troubled teenage son horsemanship. These naturalistic scenes anchor the story. But will the fundamentally decent JW switch his allegiance to the virtuous Eagle? Here Otto is much less sure-footed. Unable to convey the bland JW’s spiritual struggle, which should have been the heart of the matter, he serves up instead a creaky plot involving safe-cracking, two shootings and two cases of arson.

Ethnic animosities make for an awkward fit with standard-issue midlife floundering.

Pub Date: Nov. 18, 2014

ISBN: 978-1-57131-109-2

Page Count: 352

Publisher: Milkweed

Review Posted Online: Oct. 6, 2014

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 2014

Categories:

GENERAL FICTION

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BETWEEN SISTERS

by Kristin Hannah ‧ RELEASE DATE: May 1, 2003

Briskly written soap with down-to-earth types, mostly without the lachrymose contrivances of Hannah’s previous titles...

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Sisters in and out of love.

Meghann Dontess is a high-powered matrimonial lawyer in Seattle who prefers sex with strangers to emotional intimacy: a strategy bound to backfire sooner or later, warns her tough-talking shrink. It’s advice Meghann decides to ignore, along with the memories of her difficult childhood, neglectful mother, and younger sister. Though she managed to reunite Claire with Sam Cavenaugh (her father but not Meghann’s) when her mother abandoned both girls long ago, Meghann still feels guilty that her sister’s life doesn’t measure up, at least on her terms. Never married, Claire ekes out a living running a country campground with her dad and is raising her six-year-old daughter on her own. When she falls in love for the first time with an up-and-coming country musician, Meghann is appalled: Bobby Austin is a three-time loser at marriage—how on earth can Claire be so blind? Bobby’s blunt explanation doesn’t exactly satisfy the concerned big sister, who busies herself planning Claire’s dream wedding anyway. And, to relieve the stress, she beds various guys she picks up in bars, including Dr. Joe Wyatt, a neurosurgeon turned homeless drifter after the demise of his beloved wife Diane (whom he euthanized). When Claire’s awful headache turns out to be a kind of brain tumor known among neurologists as a “terminator,” Joe rallies. Turns out that Claire had befriended his wife on her deathbed, and now in turn he must try to save her. Is it too late? Will Meghann find true love at last?

Briskly written soap with down-to-earth types, mostly without the lachrymose contrivances of Hannah’s previous titles (Distant Shores, 2002, etc.). Kudos for skipping the snifflefest this time around.

Pub Date: May 1, 2003

ISBN: 0-345-45073-6

Page Count: 400

Publisher: Ballantine

Review Posted Online: June 24, 2010

Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2003

Categories:

GENERAL FICTION

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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.