A bit thin compared to years past: heavy on realism and tales of simple theme. (Interestingly, there are only two...
A varied portrait of the modern short story as we know it today—at least as seen in these 20, presumably best, pieces from the past calendar year:
Miller, guest editor for 2001, says in her introduction that she took the B.A.S.S. job, in part, to “learn something about where the American short story [is], what was going on with it at this moment in its history, and in ours.” We’ll learn something too. The standouts here are Michael Chabon’s “Along a Frontage Road,” about a man’s trip to choose a pumpkin with his son that becomes, through its innocence, a prism revealing love and affection; and Leonard Michaels’s “Nachman from Los Angeles,” a tale as weirdly sad as it is funny, about a man asked to write a term paper on Metaphysics for one Prince Ali Massid of Persia. Jim Shepherd’s story of a homosexual love affair aboard the Hindenberg (“Love and Hydrogen”) is granted poignancy from the doom we know to be approaching. Jhumpa Lahiri’s “Nobody’s Business” is a love story complicated by telephone suitors trying to arrange their own marriages; and another tale of complex love (Doctorow’s “A House on the Plains”) sees a woman place an ad for a husband, then turn to malfeasance. Richard Ford, Arthur Miller, and Alice Munro contribute pleasing pieces, though these bits might not make the “Best of . . . ” in their own bodies of work. Akhil Sharma explores ideas of God through the tale of a family with a terribly injured son (“Surrounded by Sleep”), and mechanical engineer Karl Iagnemma explores love between mathematicians, if such is possible, in “Zilkowski’s Theorem,” where the refutation of one man’s theory is revenge for past betrayal and the opening of an even larger can of worms.
A bit thin compared to years past: heavy on realism and tales of simple theme. (Interestingly, there are only two duplications between this volume and the O. Henry’s [see Dark, above]: “Family Furnishings,” by Alice Munro, and “Seven,” by Edwidge Danticat.)Pub Date: Oct. 15, 2002
ISBN: 0-618-11749-0
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Houghton Mifflin
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2002
The phrase “tour de force” could have been invented for this audacious novel.
Four men who meet as college roommates move to New York and spend the next three decades gaining renown in their professions—as an architect, painter, actor and lawyer—and struggling with demons in their intertwined personal lives.
Yanagihara (The People in the Trees, 2013) takes the still-bold leap of writing about characters who don’t share her background; in addition to being male, JB is African-American, Malcolm has a black father and white mother, Willem is white, and “Jude’s race was undetermined”—deserted at birth, he was raised in a monastery and had an unspeakably traumatic childhood that’s revealed slowly over the course of the book. Two of them are gay, one straight and one bisexual. There isn’t a single significant female character, and for a long novel, there isn’t much plot. There aren’t even many markers of what’s happening in the outside world; Jude moves to a loft in SoHo as a young man, but we don’t see the neighborhood change from gritty artists’ enclave to glitzy tourist destination. What we get instead is an intensely interior look at the friends’ psyches and relationships, and it’s utterly enthralling. The four men think about work and creativity and success and failure; they cook for each other, compete with each other and jostle for each other’s affection. JB bases his entire artistic career on painting portraits of his friends, while Malcolm takes care of them by designing their apartments and houses. When Jude, as an adult, is adopted by his favorite Harvard law professor, his friends join him for Thanksgiving in Cambridge every year. And when Willem becomes a movie star, they all bask in his glow. Eventually, the tone darkens and the story narrows to focus on Jude as the pain of his past cuts deep into his carefully constructed life.
The phrase “tour de force” could have been invented for this audacious novel.Pub Date: March 10, 2015
ISBN: 978-0-385-53925-8
Page Count: 720
Publisher: Doubleday
Review Posted Online: Dec. 21, 2014
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2015
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
PROFILES
PERSPECTIVES
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
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