by Corey Mesler Todd Dills ‧ RELEASE DATE: Dec. 31, 2019
An often endearing book about an ongoing search for meaning.
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In Dills’ (Triumph of the Ape, 2013, etc.) novel, a man wonders about the meaning of life while investigating his father’s disappearance.
In a prologue, Cash has just quit his job in the pit crew of Turner Bascombe, a famous, South Carolina–born automobile racer: “Reconsideration of life in the circuit…just wasn’t an option after all that had happened,” Cash thinks, and the novel looks back to when he was a fry cook at Henry’s Bar & Grill in North Carolina. One day, he received a vague phone message from a co-worker that his father, Ralph, was dead. He couldn’t believe it, and when he was unable to independently confirm the report, he packed up and drove to Chicago. At his father’s apartment, he found stacks of boxes and a cryptic note: “Son! In these boxes may you locate your ultimate salvation—or you might find nothing at all! Just a bunch of orange vests!” Cash decided to cut the vests into pieces and stitch the reflective bits into a suit. He puts it on and roams the streets, becoming known as “Shining Man”—performance artist and traffic scourge. Soon, a photographer takes pictures of him that end up in a local art gallery. Cash doesn’t find his missing father, but a second cryptic note from a mysterious figure (“Suited Man”) sends him to Birmingham, Alabama. There, he meets Turner Bascombe, who’s speeding down an interstate. He offers Cash a spot on his crew, so he moves to Charlotte, North Carolina, where interpersonal drama threatens to tear the team apart. Although the central mystery of Cash’s father’s disappearance results in an unsatisfactory payoff, it ably serves its purpose as a narrative engine, turning the novel into an enjoyable picaresque as Cash undertakes an interstate adventure. The protagonist is meditative and eloquent but also a little dopey at times; at one point, he ruminates on his reflective suit in a manner that may have readers scratching their heads: “’twas a quest for light that, ultimately, given the task’s clear physicality, its mindful mindlessness, blinded me to the possibility of knowledge, of candor, truth.” Cash styles himself a modern-day Henry David Thoreau, but he likes beer more than he does inquiry into life’s true essence. Indeed, his musings often feel like the nonsensical near profundities of a pickled philosopher—but this isn’t always a bad thing. Dills shows himself to be a terrific writer of revelry, and he engagingly depicts camaraderie among fellow artists and among low-wage workers—particularly bartenders and kitchen staff. Cash’s capacities for drink and introspection also don’t go unappreciated by others: “You have lived the lives that men lead, quiet desperation, man,” says Carl, a literary magazine editor. “Fucking Thoreau, dude. You’re the mass of men.” In the novel’s final act, the author highlights Cash’s paranoia as he uncovers the true identity of “Suited Man” and begins to piece together another ugly truth about a terrible accident at the racetrack that may not have been an accident after all.
An often endearing book about an ongoing search for meaning.Pub Date: Dec. 31, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-60489-234-5
Page Count: 327
Publisher: Livingston Press
Review Posted Online: Nov. 18, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 15, 2019
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
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by Hanya Yanagihara ‧ RELEASE DATE: March 10, 2015
The phrase “tour de force” could have been invented for this audacious novel.
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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
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by Carola Lovering ‧ RELEASE DATE: June 12, 2018
There are unforgettable beauties in this very sexy story.
Passion, friendship, heartbreak, and forgiveness ring true in Lovering's debut, the tale of a young woman's obsession with a man who's "good at being charming."
Long Island native Lucy Albright, starts her freshman year at Baird College in Southern California, intending to study English and journalism and become a travel writer. Stephen DeMarco, an upperclassman, is a political science major who plans to become a lawyer. Soon after they meet, Lucy tells Stephen an intensely personal story about the Unforgivable Thing, a betrayal that turned Lucy against her mother. Stephen pretends to listen to Lucy's painful disclosure, but all his thoughts are about her exposed black bra strap and her nipples pressing against her thin cotton T-shirt. It doesn't take Lucy long to realize Stephen's a "manipulative jerk" and she is "beyond pathetic" in her desire for him, but their lives are now intertwined. Their story takes seven years to unfold, but it's a fast-paced ride through hookups, breakups, and infidelities fueled by alcohol and cocaine and with oodles of sizzling sexual tension. "Lucy was an itch, a song stuck in your head or a movie you need to rewatch or a food you suddenly crave," Stephen says in one of his point-of-view chapters, which alternate with Lucy's. The ending is perfect, as Lucy figures out the dark secret Stephen has kept hidden and learns the difference between lustful addiction and mature love.
There are unforgettable beauties in this very sexy story.Pub Date: June 12, 2018
ISBN: 978-1-5011-6964-9
Page Count: 352
Publisher: Atria
Review Posted Online: March 19, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2018
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