A bold and intriguing effort that ultimately misses the mark, though some readers may enjoy the originality of the storyline.
An old woman who can see the future worries for her grandson and an as-yet-unborn great-great-granddaughter—whom she connects with through their mutual gift—who are dealing with problems in their love lives.
The latest from Washington, D.C., resident Hickman (the author's Unexpected Interruptions won the Southeastern Virginia Arts Association's 2008 Literary Award for Best New African American Voice) concerns the 90-year-old widow of a sharecropper, Allene Small. Allene has lived a long, fulfilling life, helped along by a psychic gift, a deep faith in God and a connection to an ancestor who shared the gift and showed her how to use it to help the people she loves. This weekend, she will need to bring as much wisdom and guidance as possible to her grandson John as he navigates love and deception on a trip back from Manhattan to his small Southern hometown. Allene will also make a psychic connection for the first time with Alexandria, John’s yet-to-be-born granddaughter, who is just coming into the strength of her own gift in the future. Both John and Alexandria are in the midst of romances with the wrong people, and Allene must help them get on track with the people they were meant for, who will help them follow their dreams and fulfill their destinies. Hickman’s hook and story arc are interesting, with a number of plot twists and surprises. However, it takes a few chapters to understand who is who and what takes place when since the dual narratives progress simultaneously—John’s sometime in the 1970s, Alexandria’s in the present day—and aren’t quite clear at the start. Also, despite Hickman's attempts to explain some of the characters’ choices, readers may find many of them inconsistent or unrealistic. John’s visiting girlfriend, Madeline, is ludicrously villainous, and his would-be girlfriend, Elizabeth, is too virtuous, while his womanizing is somehow supposed to reflect his virility until he finds The One. At times, Alexandria seems either dishonest or wishy-washy. And we are never quite sure why Allene worries about the present when the future she sees indicates everything has already worked out.
A bold and intriguing effort that ultimately misses the mark, though some readers may enjoy the originality of the storyline.Pub Date: Oct. 29, 2013
ISBN: 978-0-7582-8723-6
Page Count: 336
Publisher: Dafina/Kensington
Review Posted Online: Oct. 20, 2013
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 1, 2013
Briskly written soap with down-to-earth types, mostly without the lachrymose contrivances of Hannah’s previous titles...
Sisters in and out of love.
Meghann Dontess is a high-powered matrimonial lawyer in Seattle who prefers sex with strangers to emotional intimacy: a strategy bound to backfire sooner or later, warns her tough-talking shrink. It’s advice Meghann decides to ignore, along with the memories of her difficult childhood, neglectful mother, and younger sister. Though she managed to reunite Claire with Sam Cavenaugh (her father but not Meghann’s) when her mother abandoned both girls long ago, Meghann still feels guilty that her sister’s life doesn’t measure up, at least on her terms. Never married, Claire ekes out a living running a country campground with her dad and is raising her six-year-old daughter on her own. When she falls in love for the first time with an up-and-coming country musician, Meghann is appalled: Bobby Austin is a three-time loser at marriage—how on earth can Claire be so blind? Bobby’s blunt explanation doesn’t exactly satisfy the concerned big sister, who busies herself planning Claire’s dream wedding anyway. And, to relieve the stress, she beds various guys she picks up in bars, including Dr. Joe Wyatt, a neurosurgeon turned homeless drifter after the demise of his beloved wife Diane (whom he euthanized). When Claire’s awful headache turns out to be a kind of brain tumor known among neurologists as a “terminator,” Joe rallies. Turns out that Claire had befriended his wife on her deathbed, and now in turn he must try to save her. Is it too late? Will Meghann find true love at last?
Briskly written soap with down-to-earth types, mostly without the lachrymose contrivances of Hannah’s previous titles (Distant Shores, 2002, etc.). Kudos for skipping the snifflefest this time around.Pub Date: May 1, 2003
ISBN: 0-345-45073-6
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Ballantine
Review Posted Online: June 24, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2003
Coelho's placebo has racked up impressive sales in Brazil and Europe. Americans should flock to it like gulls.
Coelho is a Brazilian writer with four books to his credit. Following Diary of a Magus (1992—not reviewed) came this book, published in Brazil in 1988: it's an interdenominational, transcendental, inspirational fable—in other words, a bag of wind.
The story is about a youth empowered to follow his dream. Santiago is an Andalusian shepherd boy who learns through a dream of a treasure in the Egyptian pyramids. An old man, the king of Salem, the first of various spiritual guides, tells the boy that he has discovered his destiny: "to realize one's destiny is a person's only real obligation." So Santiago sells his sheep, sails to Tangier, is tricked out of his money, regains it through hard work, crosses the desert with a caravan, stops at an oasis long enough to fall in love, escapes from warring tribesmen by performing a miracle, reaches the pyramids, and eventually gets both the gold and the girl. Along the way he meets an Englishman who describes the Soul of the World; the desert woman Fatima, who teaches him the Language of the World; and an alchemist who says, "Listen to your heart" A message clings like ivy to every encounter; everyone, but everyone, has to put in their two cents' worth, from the crystal merchant to the camel driver ("concentrate always on the present, you'll be a happy man"). The absence of characterization and overall blandness suggest authorship by a committee of self-improvement pundits—a far cry from Saint- Exupery's The Little Prince: that flagship of the genre was a genuine charmer because it clearly derived from a quirky, individual sensibility.
Coelho's placebo has racked up impressive sales in Brazil and Europe. Americans should flock to it like gulls.Pub Date: July 1, 1993
ISBN: 0-06-250217-4
Page Count: 192
Publisher: N/A
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 1993
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
BOOK TO SCREEN
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