The 1912 maiden voyage of the Titanic—not played for the usual melodrama but used, half-successfully, as the backdrop for the coming-of-age story of a well-connected, uncertain young man. Harvard grad Morgan has plenty to be uncertain about. His early childhood was a blur of poverty, abandonment, and abuse—all ended when he was rescued, Dickens-style, by the family of his millionaire uncle-by-marriage (apparently J.P. Morgan himself). As a result, Morgan has grown up in great wealth but is still haunted by bygone scandal and loss. Now, having worked as an apprentice draughtsman at the London firm that designed the wondrous Titanic, Morgan is heading home to New York on the luxury liner—a floating metaphor (with its glamorous topdecks and steerage squalor below), for his layered identity. By the time disaster strikes, Morgan's world has already been upended. He has timidly attempted his first amour—only to find that the cool socialite he worships is engaged in a seemingly loveless affair with a middle-aged man-of-the-world (whom Morgan has seen as a surrogate father). Disturbed by the ill treatment of the ship's crew, he questions the values of his glittery, hypocritical circle—and frets over his lack of direction. So, when the shipwreck comes, it's a chance for Morgan to prove himself—and to see how certain social and moral attitudes play out in the face of crisis and death. Bainbridge doesn't always find the perfect balance between Morgan's introspective story (only intermittently affecting) and the familiar Titanic epic, and this lacks the gripping quality of her finest historical fictions (Young Adolf, 1979; The Birthday Boys, 1994). But her gift for lean yet resonant narration—vivid details and images, startling dialogue, telling anecdotes—remains one of modern fiction's marvels, and at its best this bildungsroman-at-sea (with more than a few echoes of Conrad) casts a dark, doomy spell.
Pub Date: Nov. 1, 1996
ISBN: 0-7867-0349-0
Page Count: 224
Publisher: N/A
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 1996
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
A first novel, this is also a first person account of Scout's (Jean Louise) recall of the years that led to the ending of a mystery, the breaking of her brother Jem's elbow, the death of her father's enemy — and the close of childhood years. A widower, Atticus raises his children with legal dispassion and paternal intelligence, and is ably abetted by Calpurnia, the colored cook, while the Alabama town of Maycomb, in the 1930's, remains aloof to their divergence from its tribal patterns. Scout and Jem, with their summer-time companion, Dill, find their paths free from interference — but not from dangers; their curiosity about the imprisoned Boo, whose miserable past is incorporated in their play, results in a tentative friendliness; their fears of Atticus' lack of distinction is dissipated when he shoots a mad dog; his defense of a Negro accused of raping a white girl, Mayella Ewell, is followed with avid interest and turns the rabble whites against him. Scout is the means of averting an attack on Atticus but when he loses the case it is Boo who saves Jem and Scout by killing Mayella's father when he attempts to murder them. The shadows of a beginning for black-white understanding, the persistent fight that Scout carries on against school, Jem's emergence into adulthood, Calpurnia's quiet power, and all the incidents touching on the children's "growing outward" have an attractive starchiness that keeps this southern picture pert and provocative. There is much advance interest in this book; it has been selected by the Literary Guild and Reader's Digest; it should win many friends.
Pub Date: July 11, 1960
ISBN: 0060935464
Page Count: 323
Publisher: Lippincott
Review Posted Online: Oct. 7, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 1960
BOOK REVIEW
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
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
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