A clever, well-written trot through student life in 1960's Wisconsin. Henry Fitzgerald (``the Weird One''), half-owner of an exclusive resort—the Northern Lights Lodge in Iron County, Wisconsin—has always ``erred on the side of excessiveness.'' When he receives a letter from Claire Cohen, he feels compelled to tell his story, which, while a little precious at times, takes us into Madison and the usual assortment of student types. Claire, about whom Henry ``had a sense of inevitability,'' gets pregnant (not by Henry) and asks Henry for abortion money. Henry's lawyer brother warns him off Claire, but to no avail. Meanwhile, Claire decides against the abortion while Henry is getting to know Leonard Gent, a brilliant schizophrenic who preaches ``extemporaneously, ecstatically'' and seeing Airy, his fiancÇe. One thing leads to another, and before we know it the whole crew—including Claire's and Henry's mutual friend Norman O'Keefe—are all mixed together in a plot that doesn't work itself out until Claire goes to and returns from New York; Henry and Claire travel together in northern Wisconsin (``so silent and empty it might be controlled by a foreign power''); and Claire, in premature labor, gives birth to a stillborn child and ends up controlled by the diabolical Gent. The climax comes when Henry and O'Keefe decide to ``rescue'' Claire— only to end up in the hands of the police. Which is where the lawyer brother comes into play, of course, and the book ends with a whimper.... Still, Johnson pulls off this first novel, turning trite material into delightful muscular prose that makes him a writer to watch.
Pub Date: May 20, 1991
ISBN: 0-8128-4012-7
Page Count: 256
Publisher: N/A
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 1991
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
BOOK REVIEW
SEEN & HEARD
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