An uneven legal thriller with an appealing protagonist.
In this debut thriller, a former chemical-company employee is rehired to review a plant’s documents as they face impending lawsuits.
Bernie DeVittoria, four years after leaving her job at Renard Chemicals, leaves her Delaware home to examine files at the company’s Georgia plant. Her purpose there is hush-hush, but that doesn’t stop Renard’s employees from giving her the cold shoulder—or trying to spy on her. Soon, Bernie and her team of assistants face threats, and it becomes clear that some people at the plant are hiding something; at the same time, Bernie worries about her estranged, alcoholic husband, Carl. DeNapoli’s novel has three distinct acts: Bernie’s rehiring and her history with Carl; her time at the plant itself; and her visits with plaintiffs in a lawsuit to discuss possible settlements. The second act is the best and, fortunately, the longest; Bernie deals with an obnoxiously loud and abrasive company lawyer named Jo, recording devices at her office and hotel room and, later, increasingly aggressive managers, culminating in a physical assault. Bernie is a devout Christian who recites biblical passages and inspirational messages, often to herself; curiously, however, she doesn’t come across as overly moralistic, but the narrative itself sometimes does. At one point, for example, an orgy is described by one Renard employee as “the work of Satan.” The novel occasionally fluctuates between past and present tenses, and Bernie’s third-person perspective frequently shifts to first person and back again. Some well-drawn characters stand out, however, including security man Warren, as well as the Renard brothers, who seem to genuinely care about their company’s plant-growth products. Bernie, though, is the true highlight here—a kind, compassionate woman who’s in top form when she’s authoritative, as her young assistants quickly learn.
An uneven legal thriller with an appealing protagonist.Pub Date: Oct. 18, 2012
ISBN: 978-0615709284
Page Count: 560
Publisher: Sophia DeNapoli
Review Posted Online: Oct. 21, 2013
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
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
Coelho's placebo has racked up impressive sales in Brazil and Europe. Americans should flock to it like gulls.
Coelho is a Brazilian writer with four books to his credit. Following Diary of a Magus (1992—not reviewed) came this book, published in Brazil in 1988: it's an interdenominational, transcendental, inspirational fable—in other words, a bag of wind.
The story is about a youth empowered to follow his dream. Santiago is an Andalusian shepherd boy who learns through a dream of a treasure in the Egyptian pyramids. An old man, the king of Salem, the first of various spiritual guides, tells the boy that he has discovered his destiny: "to realize one's destiny is a person's only real obligation." So Santiago sells his sheep, sails to Tangier, is tricked out of his money, regains it through hard work, crosses the desert with a caravan, stops at an oasis long enough to fall in love, escapes from warring tribesmen by performing a miracle, reaches the pyramids, and eventually gets both the gold and the girl. Along the way he meets an Englishman who describes the Soul of the World; the desert woman Fatima, who teaches him the Language of the World; and an alchemist who says, "Listen to your heart" A message clings like ivy to every encounter; everyone, but everyone, has to put in their two cents' worth, from the crystal merchant to the camel driver ("concentrate always on the present, you'll be a happy man"). The absence of characterization and overall blandness suggest authorship by a committee of self-improvement pundits—a far cry from Saint- Exupery's The Little Prince: that flagship of the genre was a genuine charmer because it clearly derived from a quirky, individual sensibility.
Coelho's placebo has racked up impressive sales in Brazil and Europe. Americans should flock to it like gulls.Pub Date: July 1, 1993
ISBN: 0-06-250217-4
Page Count: 192
Publisher: N/A
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 1993
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
BOOK TO SCREEN
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