In this romance, emotional damage is no match for the power of kindness.
A child’s fingers slip away from Abbie Sinclair’s frantic rescue attempts, drowning into the mud, while her lover, Werner, is captured and left to die due to corporate greed in Peru.
The trauma leaves her suffocating in confused, guilty nightmares, unable to resume her work as a documentary filmmaker. Why did Werner continue to film instead of helping her rescue the child? Why did she allow herself to be dragged to safety? Her best friend, Celeste, sends Abbie to recuperate with her relatives in the genteel poverty of Stargazey Point, S.C. The three octogenarian Crispin siblings, of course, need Abbie as much as she needs them. Marnie’s mysterious past gives her the strength to manage her sister, Millie, who refuses to give up on their dilapidated house. Their brother, Beau, obsessively sculpts wood and helps Cabot Reynolds—the small town’s prodigal son—restore his uncle’s carousel. Abbie meets darkly handsome Cab at dinner her first night with the Crispins. Suspicious of Abbie’s motives, Cab reluctantly squires her about town. Things turn sentimental at this point, with a flock of neglected, impoverished—and in some cases abused—children, who desperately need Abbie’s attention, and an old Gullah woman, whose second sight penetrates to the very core of every troubled soul. Noble’s (Beach Colors, 2012) sophomore novel unfortunately does little with the intriguing threads of Abbie’s haunted past, instead weaving her troubling tale into a standard romance. From Cab’s flight from a materialistic fiancee and heartless corporate exploitation to Beau’s mysterious reluctance to show his art, the troubles in Stargazey Point evoke little surprise. Even the careful restoration of the carousel becomes a metaphor for the simple notion that helping others is the key to healing the self.
In this romance, emotional damage is no match for the power of kindness.Pub Date: July 9, 2013
ISBN: 978-0-06-225834-2
Page Count: 384
Publisher: Morrow/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: June 19, 2013
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 2013
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
Briskly written soap with down-to-earth types, mostly without the lachrymose contrivances of Hannah’s previous titles...
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
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