An intriguing mix of fable, philosophy and witty fun.
From the mysterious Swede behind the pseudonym Davys, a lively fourth book of sophisticated Aesopian fables set in a city much like those of the modern West, except for the fact that it's populated by walking, talking stuffed animals.
Like its predecessors, the final volume of the Mollisan Town quartet (it began in 2007 with Amberville, followed by Lanceheim and Tourquai) is set in a specific district, in this case the seedy, down-at-the-heels Yok. The book consists of four long stories. In “Sors,” the brutish restaurateur/racketeer Dragon Aguado Molina throws barriers in the way of the dashing but dim Fox Antonio Ortega, who, hopelessly smitten, seeks the hand of the dragon’s daughter, Beatrice Cockatoo. In “Pertiny,” long-suffering Erik Gecko, brewery worker and abused younger brother, tries to help his siblings and tormentors, Leopold Leopard and Rasmus Panther, chase their dream of TV-newsreader stardom—and gropes toward finding a way out for himself. “Corbod” features a dissatisfied rock guitarist, Mike Chimpanzee, and a genie who enjoins him to come up with three wishes. While Mike struggles to come up with suitably nonmaterialistic items, the two ("Cloud" and "Mr. Rock Star Ape," as they refer to each other) bicker. The entertaining “Mindie,” told in overlapping documents and testimonies, features Vincent Hare, a brooding self-styled philosopher who's achingly aware that time is always slipping away: “I’m in a bit of a hurry,” he says again and again. Davys makes ingenious use both of traditional folktales and of his conceit, and the book is charming, but at times it does feel a bit like a grab bag.
An intriguing mix of fable, philosophy and witty fun.Pub Date: July 31, 2012
ISBN: 978-0-06-179747-7
Page Count: 352
Publisher: Harper/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: July 21, 2012
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2012
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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
SEEN & HEARD
APPRECIATIONS
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