SOMEWHERE SOUTH OF HERE

Name: SOMEWHERE SOUTH OF HERE
Author: William Kowalski
ISBN: 0-06-019356-5

by William Kowalski ‧ RELEASE DATE: April 10, 2001

Likable characters, though the quick plotting, in this coming-of-ager part two, could have been sacrificed for a little more...

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An amiable if slight continuation of the author's debut novel (Eddie's Bastard, 1999) brings hero Billy Mann to Santa Fe in search of the mother who abandoned him.

At 20, Billy decides to leave his hometown of Mannville: the grandfather who raised him has died, the general store is closing down and leaving him jobless, while the gnawing desire to track down his mother has not faded with time. When only a few weeks old, Billy was placed on the doorstep of his father's ancestral home with the note "Eddie's bastard" attached. Eddie however, never returned from Vietnam, and all Billy has of his mother is the name Eliza McMeel, a.k.a. Sky, and a 20-year-old address. So off he goes to Santa Fe, leaving Mildred, Grandpa's prim girlfriend, in charge of the homestead. In short order, he finds his mother's house, now abandoned, and discovers from his new crazy neighbor, El Perrero (Billy rents the house across the street), that Sky's daughter Sophia works at a bar downtown. Also working there is Consuelo, a singer with 11 guardian angels and a history of tightrope-walking. Consuelo moves in with Billy, the two of them befriend Ralph, a classics scholar at the college Billy is supposed to be attending, and Billy makes a connection with Sophia, not letting on they're related. He does find Sky, dying from a long battle with cancer. Mildred, meanwhile, has turned the Mannville mansion into a refuge for pregnant girls and asks Billy to come home to help her—an invitation that comes not a moment too soon. Consuelo has moved to Los Angeles, and El Perrero, in a Vietnam flashback, has snapped and begun honing his sniper skills on Ralph.

Likable characters, though the quick plotting, in this coming-of-ager part two, could have been sacrificed for a little more depth and self-reflection.

Pub Date: April 10, 2001

ISBN: 0-06-019356-5

Page Count: 288

Publisher: HarperCollins

Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 15, 2001

Categories:

GENERAL FICTION

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EPIC GAME
by William Kowalski

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THE GOOD NEIGHBOR
by William Kowalski

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THE ADVENTURES OF FLASH JACKSON
by William Kowalski

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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.