An engaging, sometimes-chilling, and often melancholy tale of the pioneer spirit.
Frye’s novel tells the story of a post–Revolutionary War tenant farmer and his family who head west to Louisiana for a better future.
It’s the fall of 1798, and Sam Rolens’ father has just died. Sam wants to move his family to what he believes will be greener pastures, where good land is “free for the cost of a survey.” He’s the only one of his family members who initially wants to leave, but his wife, Lucetta, faces down her fears and is willing to make the journey. His brother, Elisha, is more resistant but not enough to go off on his own. And so, Sam, Lucetta, their four children—almost-grown Little Charlie, Eve Mary, Ewan, and the youngest, Raymond—and Elisha pack up their possessions and head first for White’s Fort in Tennessee, a waypoint for anticipative settlers, where they plan to wait out the winter and meet up with Burl Rolens, Sam and Elisha’s uncle. Burl has the experience to guide them through the hazardous journey, but before they can rendezvous, Burl must endure his own arduous trek from Natchez, in the Mississippi Territory, an ordeal depicted in the narrative’s grisliest chapters. Sam, a man of few words but many thoughts, has no idea of the toll that the move will take. Over the course of this novel, Frye effectively paints his protagonist as a devoted husband and father, but he’s also shown to be stubbornly convinced that he must stick to his original plan: “There ain’t no freedom without you got land and money.” In addition, he’s effectively depicted as searching for something more spiritual. But although he’s the most fully drawn character in this novel, Sam still remains a bit of a cipher in the end. Frye offers a liberal sprinkling of crude language, graphically violent action scenes, and substantial detail regarding day-to-day activities, which brings the gritty past to life.
An engaging, sometimes-chilling, and often melancholy tale of the pioneer spirit.Pub Date: May 15, 2020
ISBN: N/A
Page Count: -
Publisher: Bathcat Press
Review Posted Online: April 20, 2020
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
The emotions run high, the conversations run deep, and the relationships ebb and flow with grace.
When tragedy strikes, a mother and daughter forge a new life.
Morgan felt obligated to marry her high school sweetheart, Chris, when she got pregnant with their daughter, Clara. But she secretly got along much better with Chris’ thoughtful best friend, Jonah, who was dating her sister, Jenny. Now her life as a stay-at-home parent has left her feeling empty but not ungrateful for what she has. Jonah and Jenny eventually broke up, but years later they had a one-night stand and Jenny got pregnant with their son, Elijah. Now Jonah is back in town, engaged to Jenny, and working at the local high school as Clara’s teacher. Clara dreams of being an actress and has a crush on Miller, who plans to go to film school, but her father doesn't approve. It doesn’t help that Miller already has a jealous girlfriend who stalks him via text from college. But Clara and Morgan’s home life changes radically when Chris and Jenny are killed in an accident, revealing long-buried secrets and forcing Morgan to reevaluate the life she chose when early motherhood forced her hand. Feeling betrayed by the adults in her life, Clara marches forward, acting both responsible and rebellious as she navigates her teenage years without her father and her aunt, while Jonah and Morgan's relationship evolves in the wake of the accident. Front-loaded with drama, the story leaves plenty of room for the mother and daughter to unpack their feelings and decide what’s next.
The emotions run high, the conversations run deep, and the relationships ebb and flow with grace.Pub Date: Dec. 10, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-5420-1642-1
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Montlake Romance
Review Posted Online: Oct. 13, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 1, 2019
BOOK TO SCREEN
BOOK TO SCREEN
Still, a respectful and absorbing page-turner.
Hannah’s new novel is an homage to the extraordinary courage and endurance of Frenchwomen during World War II.
In 1995, an elderly unnamed widow is moving into an Oregon nursing home on the urging of her controlling son, Julien, a surgeon. This trajectory is interrupted when she receives an invitation to return to France to attend a ceremony honoring passeurs: people who aided the escape of others during the war. Cut to spring, 1940: Viann has said goodbye to husband Antoine, who's off to hold the Maginot line against invading Germans. She returns to tending her small farm, Le Jardin, in the Loire Valley, teaching at the local school and coping with daughter Sophie’s adolescent rebellion. Soon, that world is upended: The Germans march into Paris and refugees flee south, overrunning Viann’s land. Her long-estranged younger sister, Isabelle, who has been kicked out of multiple convent schools, is sent to Le Jardin by Julien, their father in Paris, a drunken, decidedly unpaternal Great War veteran. As the depredations increase in the occupied zone—food rationing, systematic looting, and the billeting of a German officer, Capt. Beck, at Le Jardin—Isabelle’s outspokenness is a liability. She joins the Resistance, volunteering for dangerous duty: shepherding downed Allied airmen across the Pyrenees to Spain. Code-named the Nightingale, Isabelle will rescue many before she's captured. Meanwhile, Viann’s journey from passive to active resistance is less dramatic but no less wrenching. Hannah vividly demonstrates how the Nazis, through starvation, intimidation and barbarity both casual and calculated, demoralized the French, engineering a community collapse that enabled the deportations and deaths of more than 70,000 Jews. Hannah’s proven storytelling skills are ideally suited to depicting such cataclysmic events, but her tendency to sentimentalize undermines the gravitas of this tale.
Still, a respectful and absorbing page-turner.Pub Date: Feb. 3, 2015
ISBN: 978-0-312-57722-3
Page Count: 448
Publisher: St. Martin's
Review Posted Online: Nov. 19, 2014
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2014
BOOK TO SCREEN
SEEN & HEARD
BOOK TO SCREEN
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