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COWARDS

Name: COWARDS
Author: W.A. Burgess
ISBN: 0-312-15503-4

by W.A. Burgess ‧ RELEASE DATE: May 18, 1997

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The latest example of that now-certified genre—the drug addict's purported memoir—Burgess's debut shares some of the raw energy of Trainspotting (novel and movie), but none of Irvine Welsh's verbal spunk. With its Beavis and Butthead dialogue, this fictional account of druggies in Seattle includes some self-conscious interludes that suggest its author's literary pretensions, including his claim to be writing on a ``stolen'' typewriter. Mitchell Slaughter, a drummer with The Otis Process, ingests, along with the rest of the band, a steady diet of pills, acid, pot, heroin, meth, coke—you name it. The only rule: No hard drugs during rehearsal, and even that falls by the way as the band disintegrates. One performance indicates their m.o.: They like to expose themselves onstage and feel vindicated when they're busted for it. Their reputation for violent debauchery also keeps interested record execs leery about signing the band. Hence their status as truly transgressive artists. Their ``proclivity for unusual scenes and the chance for violence'' leads them to all sorts of cheap thrills, and they scorn anyone who's not bedecked with tattoos, piercings, and black clothes. In one particularly vulgar episode, a band member pukes on a priest after nodding out in church while musing on Jesus as the ultimate junkie. Of course, the how-to's of copping and shooting take up much of the book. Mitchell runs into a mysterious psychic, Etta, and she becomes his hope for salvation, especially when she splits after witnessing an especially nasty scene. When one band member dies from an overdose, they dump his body in a park so the cops won't search the house. Soon after, they're dropped from a proposed tour, and the band scatters in despair. Mitchell takes to the road in search of Etta. Careful not to romanticize drug use, Burgess nevertheless seems proud of his been-there, done-that authenticity. There's little else to distinguish this sordid debut.

Pub Date: May 18, 1997

ISBN: 0-312-15503-4

Page Count: 224

Publisher: St. Martin's

Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010

Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 1997

Categories:

GENERAL FICTION

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BETWEEN SISTERS

by Kristin Hannah ‧ RELEASE DATE: May 1, 2003

Briskly written soap with down-to-earth types, mostly without the lachrymose contrivances of Hannah’s previous titles...

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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

Categories:

GENERAL FICTION

- BOOK REVIEW
THE WOMEN
by Kristin Hannah

- BOOK REVIEW
THE FOUR WINDS
by Kristin Hannah

- BOOK REVIEW
THE GREAT ALONE
by Kristin Hannah

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THE ALCHEMIST

by Paulo Coelho & translated by Margaret Jull Costa ‧ RELEASE DATE: July 1, 1993

Coelho's placebo has racked up impressive sales in Brazil and Europe. Americans should flock to it like gulls.

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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.