Even Buckley fans might suspect that he’s begun to crank them out a little too quickly.
As before, Buckley (Boomsday, 2007, etc.) blurs the line distinguishing the historical, the plausible and the preposterous amid the political circus of anything-goes Washington.
The satiric scenario has plenty of potential, but sketchy characters and slapdash plotting result in a split decision. On a Supreme Court as divided as the country, President Donald Vanderdamp finds his first two nominees to fill a crucial vacancy rejected on the shakiest of grounds (one wrote a grade-school review of To Kill a Mockingbird and found parts of the movie “kind of boring”). With his popularity at an all-time low and with no intention of running for a second term, the president then dares the Senate to reject his third nominee, America’s most popular jurist, Pepper Cartwright of television’s highly rated Courtroom Six. After she sails through the confirmation process, both the new justice and the novel seem to lose their way. Instead of relying on the common sense and colloquial language that have made her such a hit as a TV personality, she tries her best to apply legal precedent befitting the Supreme Court, thus alienating many of her fellow justices and most of the public. She also becomes estranged from her husband, a reality-show producer, and involved with the chief justice, whose wife left him for a woman immediately after the court sanctioned gay marriage. After a politician-turned-TV-actor challenges for the presidency, the novel inevitably reaches its climax as the contested race is left to the court to decide. Yet questions remain: Why is the president so unpopular? (He vetoes every spending bill, which would surely enrage Congress, but shouldn’t upset the public.) Why does Pepper take all the heat for every split decision? (Four other justices vote with her, and the court had a history of 5-4 decisions before her arrival.) Why does Buckley think it’s enough to give his characters funny names (Blyster Forkmorgan, Esquire, et al.) rather than develop them?
Even Buckley fans might suspect that he’s begun to crank them out a little too quickly.Pub Date: Sept. 3, 2008
ISBN: 978-0-446-57982-7
Page Count: 292
Publisher: Twelve
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 2008
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Tennis pro, Vietnam vet, and intelligence operative Brad Smith, who first served in Dropshot (1990), quits an irritating job in Texas to head for Montana, where his unusual skills are needed to open a new tennis resort and locate a murderous nearby secret agent. Well, whom else would you call to clean out the spies plaguing a mysterious Air Force lab just a backhand away from a troubled tennis camp? The debt-ridden sports resort, just bought by Smith's old tennis and spying pal Ted Treacher, provides the perfect cover for Smith—the only tennis-playing spy in America capable of recognizing his old archenemy Sylvester, the Soviet spy responsible for the death of Smith's late Yugoslavian tennis- playing wife. Sylvester, operating with a completely new face fresh from the plastic surgeon, is in Big Sky country to snatch a bit of strategic-defense technology from the research lab whose powerful secret electromagnetic pulses have been giving the local children leukemia. Also neighboring the resort is a secret toxic- waste dump owned by a beautiful but ruthless capitalist hussy who wants to close down the country club so she can get her toxic wastes back. Smith has to sort out all these secrets while cleaning up the financial and managerial mess his chum has made of what should be a fabulous destination for rich tennis players. Sylvester shoots at him, a sadistic deputy shoots at him, and Ivan Lendl shoots at him. Bodies pop out of the golf course. Credibility crushed in straight sets 6-2, 6-0, 6-1.
Pub Date: June 20, 1991
ISBN: 0-312-85143-X
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Tor
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 15, 1991
For this traditional lullaby—“Hush-a-bye, don’t you cry./Go to sleepy, little baby./And when you wake, you’ll have cake/and all the pretty little horses”—Saport has taken her cues from the American South, where the song may have originated. The images she concocts are theatrical, with bakers and cakes streaming by, and a small boy atop a horse as it, and the rest of the horses, arching through the sky, pull an orange-colored carriage with a baker at the reins. The elegantly modulated pastels give an impression of twilight, while elements dusted in white and gold shine luminously, offering comfort. (Picture book/folklore. 2-4)
Pub Date: Sept. 20, 1999
ISBN: 0-395-93097-9
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Clarion Books
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 1999
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