An entertaining and illuminating romp through interconnected and delightfully suspect organizations.
Curatolo (Campanilismo, 2013) mixes classic Mafia-fiction tropes with the twists and turns of the pharmaceutical industry in this thriller.
Jimmy Delvecchio and Frank Serono are finally on the top of the world—or close enough, anyway. As partners at the head of a successful pharmaceutical discovery company, focused on novel antibiotics, the two have managed to consistently stay on the cutting edge, despite competing with pharmaceutical giants. But although both of them are savvy in business and research, they also have their biases and baggage. Jimmy comes from a Mafia family, and although he paid his way out of the game by selling his online pharmacy, he can’t refuse when an uncle asks him for help in selling a truckload of stolen prescription drugs. Meanwhile, Frank’s life is much more conventional—until his temper gets the better of him and he goes on a crusade to debunk the snake oil salesmen hocking naturopathic “medicines” while flaunting bogus degrees. As Frank’s science blog draws attention and Jimmy nudges his uncle to sell the merchandise internationally, the two end up under fire from everyone from the mob to the government to herbal remedy schemers; they even turn on each other, and there’s no telling how they’ll get out of their many troubles. Although this novel is a follow-up to Curatolo’s Campanilismo, readers don’t need to worry about jumping in cold. There’s plenty of detail and characterization from the beginning, and there aren’t any characters or circumstances that readers are expected to know going in. Not only that, but the text relates the breadth of its subject matter in a concise way, leaving the reader with a much greater understanding of organized crime, the pharmaceutical industry, medical research and development, and the natural medicine industry than he or she did before. As a result, there’s plenty of exposition throughout, but it rarely slows down the pace of the story. Finally, the main characters are sharp and incisive, clearly demonstrating who they are and what they value in the world, making their conflicts and interactions with colorful supporting players all the more intriguing.
An entertaining and illuminating romp through interconnected and delightfully suspect organizations.Pub Date: June 5, 2018
ISBN: 978-0-9896566-2-7
Page Count: 282
Publisher: Bayberry Institute LLC
Review Posted Online: July 14, 2018
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
BOOK REVIEW
The phrase “tour de force” could have been invented for this audacious novel.
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
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
PROFILES
PERSPECTIVES
Dated sermonizing on career versus motherhood, and conflict driven by characters’ willed helplessness, sap this tale of...
Lifelong, conflicted friendship of two women is the premise of Hannah’s maudlin latest (Magic Hour, 2006, etc.), again set in Washington State.
Tallulah “Tully” Hart, father unknown, is the daughter of a hippie, Cloud, who makes only intermittent appearances in her life. Tully takes refuge with the family of her “best friend forever,” Kate Mularkey, who compares herself unfavorably with Tully, in regards to looks and charisma. In college, “TullyandKate” pledge the same sorority and major in communications. Tully has a life goal for them both: They will become network TV anchorwomen. Tully lands an internship at KCPO-TV in Seattle and finagles a producing job for Kate. Kate no longer wishes to follow Tully into broadcasting and is more drawn to fiction writing, but she hesitates to tell her overbearing friend. Meanwhile a love triangle blooms at KCPO: Hard-bitten, irresistibly handsome, former war correspondent Johnny is clearly smitten with Tully. Expecting rejection, Kate keeps her infatuation with Johnny secret. When Tully lands a reporting job with a Today-like show, her career shifts into hyperdrive. Johnny and Kate had started an affair once Tully moved to Manhattan, and when Kate gets pregnant with daughter Marah, they marry. Kate is content as a stay-at-home mom, but frets about being Johnny’s second choice and about her unrealized writing ambitions. Tully becomes Seattle’s answer to Oprah. She hires Johnny, which spells riches for him and Kate. But Kate’s buttons are fully depressed by pitched battles over slutwear and curfews with teenaged Marah, who idolizes her godmother Tully. In an improbable twist, Tully invites Kate and Marah to resolve their differences on her show, only to blindside Kate by accusing her, on live TV, of overprotecting Marah. The BFFs are sundered. Tully’s latest attempt to salvage Cloud fails: The incorrigible, now geriatric hippie absconds once more. Just as Kate develops a spine, she’s given some devastating news. Will the friends reconcile before it’s too late?
Dated sermonizing on career versus motherhood, and conflict driven by characters’ willed helplessness, sap this tale of poignancy.Pub Date: Feb. 1, 2008
ISBN: 978-0-312-36408-3
Page Count: 496
Publisher: St. Martin's
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 1, 2007
BOOK TO SCREEN
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