The most imaginative and outrageous in the series thus far. It would be a crime and a sin, and just plain un-neighborly, to...
An exuberant superabundance of plot distinguishes this fourth installment of the popular author’s ongoing Moosepath Chronicles (Daniel Plainway, 2000, etc.).
Once again, kindly bachelor Tobias Walton and his strapping “gentleman’s gentleman” Sundry Moss find themselves on the road in the general vicinity of Portland, Maine, and points thereabouts, reencountering old acquaintances (among them Cordelia Underwood, eponymous heroine of the initial Moosepath Chronicle), and pausing for fascinating intrigues at Fern Farm, where the enigma of a depressed pig named Hercules masks an even more unusual family scandal. Meanwhile, Moosepathian Joseph Thump, having learned that the celebrated “ascensionist” Dorothea Roberto is pursued by dastardly villains, travels with fellow clubmen Eagleton and Ephram from crime boss Fuzz Hadley’s Portland waterfront to a hobo “shantytown,” thence toward the hamlet of Dresden Mills, where rural mailwoman Deborah Pilican (a.k.a. bestselling novelist Rudolpha Limington Harold, among other pseudonyms) lives out a real romantic fantasy, and where a conflagration in the nearby town of Iceboro brings most of Reid’s remarkably busy characters coincidentally together. In the series’ now-familiar manner, subplots keep springing surprises (there’s a doozy involving Thump’s mirror image, tavernkeeper Thaddeus Sharp, the latter’s plucky son Timothy, and Tim’s waiflike friend Mailon); charming absurdities multiply exponentially (don’t miss the episode in which a boisterous drunk throws a piano out a second-story window, or the explanation for Hercules’ seeming drunken state); and (Groucho-) Marxist near–non sequiturs (“I once knew a cow that had a very refined sense of humor,” etc.). Good prevails, lovers are united, the social fabric is deftly mended, and all ends well, with Mr. Walton prepared to head for Halifax, and further delightfully implausible Dickensian adventures.
The most imaginative and outrageous in the series thus far. It would be a crime and a sin, and just plain un-neighborly, to miss it.Pub Date: July 14, 2003
ISBN: 0-670-03225-5
Page Count: 352
Publisher: Viking
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 1, 2003
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
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
© Copyright 2026 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Follow
Popular in this Genre
We can’t wait for you to join Kirkus!
It’s free and takes less than 10 seconds!
Already have an account? Log in.
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
Welcome Back!
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
