Historical novelist Fleming (The Officer's Wives, 1981; Time and Tide, 1987, etc.) offers a melodramatic saga set against the backdrop of the First World War. American Polly Warden, an incipient feminist and active pacifist, turns down marriage to a millionaire to go off to Paris in 1917, seeking nobility in the ravages of war. As a nurse in a French hospital, she becomes romantically involved with a disillusioned young surgeon, in large part as defense against the horrifying reality of the front lines. After the doctor's tragic death, his very rich father tries to use Polly's pacifist background as part of a secret plan to surrender his country to Germany (there was a great internal struggle about whether to continue the war effort in France in the months just prior to the arrival of the American forces). Instead, she ends up working as a counteragent on behalf of Clemenceau (sacrificing much of her reputation in the process), then becomes an ambulance driver, first for the British, later for the Americans. All of this intertwines her life with that of General Malvern Hill Bliss, who has been rescued from incipient alcoholism and self-destruction (brought on by the loss of his wife and son in the Philippines) by ``Black Jack'' Pershing and put in charge of the Lafayette Division, one of the first American units in Europe. Bliss, aided in no small part by the insights of the beautiful Englishwoman Anita Sinclair, sees through the politics and hypocrisy of British and French commanders who want to misuse American forces, but he's powerless to do much about it. As the war reaches its bloody climax, he can only send his men to die needlessly. An intriguing enough story of an emerging new world (and most especially of a new and modern-style woman), but even Fleming fans will have to be willing to plow through an abundance of pedestrian and (especially in matters sexual) awkward prose.
Pub Date: May 1, 1992
ISBN: 0-06-017983-X
Page Count: 612
Publisher: HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 1992
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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
The best-selling author of tearjerkers like Angel Falls (2000) serves up yet another mountain of mush, topped off with...
Talk-show queen takes tumble as millions jeer.
Nora Bridges is a wildly popular radio spokesperson for family-first virtues, but her loyal listeners don't know that she walked out on her husband and teenaged daughters years ago and didn't look back. Now that a former lover has sold racy pix of naked Nora and horny himself to a national tabloid, her estranged daughter Ruby, an unsuccessful stand-up comic in Los Angeles, has been approached to pen a tell-all. Greedy for the fat fee she's been promised, Ruby agrees and heads for the San Juan Islands, eager to get reacquainted with the mom she plans to betray. Once in the family homestead, nasty Ruby alternately sulks and glares at her mother, who is temporarily wheelchair-bound as a result of a post-scandal car crash. Uncaring, Ruby begins writing her side of the story when she's not strolling on the beach with former sweetheart Dean Sloan, the son of wealthy socialites who basically ignored him and his gay brother Eric. Eric, now dying of cancer and also in a wheelchair, has returned to the island. This dismal threesome catch up on old times, recalling their childhood idylls on the island. After Ruby's perfect big sister Caroline shows up, there's another round of heartfelt talk. Nora gradually reveals the truth about her unloving husband and her late father's alcoholism, which led her to seek the approval of others at the cost of her own peace of mind. And so on. Ruby is aghast to discover that she doesn't know everything after all, but Dean offers her subdued comfort. Happy endings await almost everyone—except for readers of this nobly preachy snifflefest.
The best-selling author of tearjerkers like Angel Falls (2000) serves up yet another mountain of mush, topped off with syrupy platitudes about life and love.Pub Date: March 1, 2001
ISBN: 0-609-60737-5
Page Count: 336
Publisher: Crown
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2001
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