An intelligent novelization of a notable life.
A dramatization of the life of Romanian princess Catherine Olympia Caradja.
Princess Catherine is born into her royal status in 1893. Her parents’ marriage was the result of a practical arrangement between two aristocratic families. Her father, Prince Radu Kretulesco, turns out to be a shiftless gold digger, and so her mother, Princess Irene Cantacuzene, decides to divorce the scoundrel. In a fit of stunning revenge, Radu kidnaps Catherine in Paris and stealthily deposits her at an orphanage in London under a false name, and he uses her as leverage to extract a ransom from Irene’s family. Catherine languishes in orphanages for 13 years before her paternal grandmother orchestrates a rescue and she’s finally sent back to her family in Bucharest. A Romanian orphanage is dedicated to her and named Catherine’s Crib, and the princess eventually manages its affairs. She marries a handsome young Romanian prince, gives birth to three daughters, and later suffers several miscarriages. Soon, the political turmoil of the Russian Revolution and World War I engulfs her world. During World War I, she sets up a hospital to combat the deadly spread of typhus (and contracts the disease herself), and she further endangers herself, during World War II, to help Allied prisoners of war by participating in the “largest prison breakout in military annals.” The oppressive Nazi occupation of Romania is eventually replaced by an equally tyrannical Soviet one, and the Communists destroy her family, usurp her wealth, and make her a fugitive in her own homeland. She has no choice but to attempt escape. Debut author Aavang—a friend of the real Princess Catherine—does a remarkable job researching her life and vividly provides fictional imaginings where historical records are empty. Although he unabashedly shows his affection for his protagonist, he avoids hagiographic excess. He also shows how Catherine keeps her sense of humor; for example, after she notices the year on a magazine she’s casually perusing, she comments: “This is the year I escaped from Paris and returned to Romania. How many people do you know have to escape first into and then out of their homeland?” Overall, Aavang’s prose is confident and elegant, and the fact that his subject’s story is cinematically enthralling gives him a notable advantage.
An intelligent novelization of a notable life.Pub Date: April 5, 2011
ISBN: 978-1-4567-1549-6
Page Count: 500
Publisher: AuthorHouse
Review Posted Online: Aug. 24, 2016
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
Wacky plot keeps the pages turning and enduring schmaltzy romantic sequences.
Sisters work together to solve a child-abandonment case.
Ellie and Julia Cates have never been close. Julia is shy and brainy; Ellie gets by on charm and looks. Their differences must be tossed aside when a traumatized young girl wanders in from the forest into their hometown in Washington. The sisters’ professional skills are put to the test. Julia is a world-renowned child psychologist who has lost her edge. She is reeling from a case that went publicly sour. Though she was cleared of all wrongdoing, Julia’s name was tarnished, forcing her to shutter her Beverly Hills practice. Ellie Barton is the local police chief in Rain Valley, who’s never faced a tougher case. This is her chance to prove she is more than just a fading homecoming queen, but a scarcity of clues and a reluctant victim make locating the girl’s parents nearly impossible. Ellie places an SOS call to her sister; she needs an expert to rehabilitate this wild-child who has been living outside of civilization for years. Confronted with her professional demons, Julia once again has the opportunity to display her talents and salvage her reputation. Hannah (The Things We Do for Love, 2004, etc.) is at her best when writing from the girl’s perspective. The feral wolf-child keeps the reader interested long after the other, transparent characters have grown tiresome. Hannah’s torturously over-written romance passages are stale, but there are surprises in store as the sisters set about unearthing Alice’s past and creating a home for her.
Wacky plot keeps the pages turning and enduring schmaltzy romantic sequences.Pub Date: March 1, 2006
ISBN: 0-345-46752-3
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Ballantine
Review Posted Online: June 24, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2005
A strict report, worthy of sympathy.
A violent surfacing of adolescence (which has little in common with Tarkington's earlier, broadly comic, Seventeen) has a compulsive impact.
"Nobody big except me" is the dream world of Holden Caulfield and his first person story is down to the basic, drab English of the pre-collegiate. For Holden is now being bounced from fancy prep, and, after a vicious evening with hall- and roommates, heads for New York to try to keep his latest failure from his parents. He tries to have a wild evening (all he does is pay the check), is terrorized by the hotel elevator man and his on-call whore, has a date with a girl he likes—and hates, sees his 10 year old sister, Phoebe. He also visits a sympathetic English teacher after trying on a drunken session, and when he keeps his date with Phoebe, who turns up with her suitcase to join him on his flight, he heads home to a hospital siege. This is tender and true, and impossible, in its picture of the old hells of young boys, the lonesomeness and tentative attempts to be mature and secure, the awful block between youth and being grown-up, the fright and sickness that humans and their behavior cause the challenging, the dramatization of the big bang. It is a sorry little worm's view of the off-beat of adult pressure, of contemporary strictures and conformity, of sentiment….
A strict report, worthy of sympathy.Pub Date: June 15, 1951
ISBN: 0316769177
Page Count: -
Publisher: Little, Brown
Review Posted Online: Nov. 2, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 1951
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