Less a book than a blitzkrieg—the reader gets routed. But it's rollicking, inventive fun.
From rural Quebec, a sprawling, antic, alcohol-soaked family saga centered on a feud with the postman.
In the early 20th century, the final of a hockey tournament is tied in the waning moments when Billy Joe Pictou bears down on goalie Honoré Bouge (known to all as Monti). Monti stops the shot with his face—his teeth, actually—but Pictou, tripped, slides into the crease and knocks the goalie (and the puck clamped between his teeth) across the line and into the net. The referee, a local named Victor Bradley, signals that the goal counts, an injustice that will spur Monti through life and shape his family for generations. Soon the town's new postman—Bradley, his hand mangled by a bear trap sent by a politician he ridiculed—shows up at the tavern where Monti is helping out to slake his lunchtime thirst. Monti begins a campaign of harassment, first by ordering various heavy items (a set of encyclopedias, to start) to be delivered to his remote cabin, and later with more diabolical measures (he moves—hides—the cabin; he constructs a mailbox 30 feet high; he tricks Bradley out of his horse). The novel also follows Monti's grandson, François, a graduate student in Montreal whose work of towering genius (he says), a family history, is foundering on the rocks of chronic alcoholism. He takes a harrowing taxicab ride back home and—pursued by the beast of the title—tries to make sense of the family "curse" of drink, which he thinks must owe to some dark deed of Monti's. Bernard's novel is a shambling, shaggy-dog picaresque, full of slapstick and fresh, lively language and outlandishness.
Less a book than a blitzkrieg—the reader gets routed. But it's rollicking, inventive fun.Pub Date: April 2, 2024
ISBN: 9781771965552
Page Count: 600
Publisher: Biblioasis
Review Posted Online: Jan. 5, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 2024
Through palpable tension balanced with glimmers of hope, Hoover beautifully captures the heartbreak and joy of starting over.
The sequel to It Ends With Us (2016) shows the aftermath of domestic violence through the eyes of a single mother.
Lily Bloom is still running a flower shop; her abusive ex-husband, Ryle Kincaid, is still a surgeon. But now they’re co-parenting a daughter, Emerson, who's almost a year old. Lily won’t send Emerson to her father’s house overnight until she’s old enough to talk—“So she can tell me if something happens”—but she doesn’t want to fight for full custody lest it become an expensive legal drama or, worse, a physical fight. When Lily runs into Atlas Corrigan, a childhood friend who also came from an abusive family, she hopes their friendship can blossom into love. (For new readers, their history unfolds in heartfelt diary entries that Lily addresses to Finding Nemo star Ellen DeGeneres as she considers how Atlas was a calming presence during her turbulent childhood.) Atlas, who is single and running a restaurant, feels the same way. But even though she’s divorced, Lily isn’t exactly free. Behind Ryle’s veneer of civility are his jealousy and resentment. Lily has to plan her dates carefully to avoid a confrontation. Meanwhile, Atlas’ mother returns with shocking news. In between, Lily and Atlas steal away for romantic moments that are even sweeter for their authenticity as Lily struggles with child care, breastfeeding, and running a business while trying to find time for herself.
Through palpable tension balanced with glimmers of hope, Hoover beautifully captures the heartbreak and joy of starting over.Pub Date: Oct. 18, 2022
ISBN: 978-1-668-00122-6
Page Count: 352
Publisher: Atria
Review Posted Online: July 26, 2022
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 2022
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
A dramatic, vividly detailed reconstruction of a little-known aspect of the Vietnam War.
A young woman’s experience as a nurse in Vietnam casts a deep shadow over her life.
When we learn that the farewell party in the opening scene is for Frances “Frankie” McGrath’s older brother—“a golden boy, a wild child who could make the hardest heart soften”—who is leaving to serve in Vietnam in 1966, we feel pretty certain that poor Finley McGrath is marked for death. Still, it’s a surprise when the fateful doorbell rings less than 20 pages later. His death inspires his sister to enlist as an Army nurse, and this turn of events is just the beginning of a roller coaster of a plot that’s impressive and engrossing if at times a bit formulaic. Hannah renders the experiences of the young women who served in Vietnam in all-encompassing detail. The first half of the book, set in gore-drenched hospital wards, mildewed dorm rooms, and boozy officers’ clubs, is an exciting read, tracking the transformation of virginal, uptight Frankie into a crack surgical nurse and woman of the world. Her tensely platonic romance with a married surgeon ends when his broken, unbreathing body is airlifted out by helicopter; she throws her pent-up passion into a wild affair with a soldier who happens to be her dead brother’s best friend. In the second part of the book, after the war, Frankie seems to experience every possible bad break. A drawback of the story is that none of the secondary characters in her life are fully three-dimensional: Her dismissive, chauvinistic father and tight-lipped, pill-popping mother, her fellow nurses, and her various love interests are more plot devices than people. You’ll wish you could have gone to Vegas and placed a bet on the ending—while it’s against all the odds, you’ll see it coming from a mile away.
A dramatic, vividly detailed reconstruction of a little-known aspect of the Vietnam War.Pub Date: Feb. 6, 2024
ISBN: 9781250178633
Page Count: 480
Publisher: St. Martin's
Review Posted Online: Nov. 4, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2023
PERSPECTIVES
BOOK TO SCREEN
SEEN & HEARD
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