The story moves forward, but the journey is uninspired.
Samantha Collins is shocked when her grandfather leaves her his auto turbocharger empire; even worse, he expects her to get Collins Industries back on track with Dillon Montgomery, the man she’s secretly loved since she was 13.
Abe Collins was always a stubborn man, but on his deathbed, he can see a few things clearly: That he’s made some serious mistakes playing it safe; that his company is in trouble because of it; and that there’s no way he can trust his elder son, Evan, to put it right. That leaves Samantha, orphaned daughter of his younger son William, who died in a plane crash with his wife when Sam was a teen. Now she’s a bright young woman, and Abe knows she can turn the company around with help from Dillon Montgomery, a true automobile visionary and son of Abe’s secretary, Marlene. So Abe changes his will the day before he dies, leaving the company to Samantha and Dillon, expecting them to put their heads together and save Collins Industries. Of course, this move does not sit well with Evan and his family, and in fact, it’s uncomfortable for Sam and Dillon, too, since they shared an awkward encounter years ago, soon after Sam lost her parents. When the will is read, everyone is stunned, but Samantha does as he asks to honor him, and Dillon can’t find it in him to abandon Sam. As the two work together to adjust the technologies that will put Collins back on the map, they find that there are other reasons for the company’s decline, and they’ll have to dig deeper to get answers. Using an outside CPA and Dillon’s friend Roman to audit the books sheds light on some financial mysteries while also bringing a new chance at love for Dillon’s mom and possibly creating danger for them all, forcing Sam and Dillon to face their attraction head-on. Conceptually, this plot sounds interesting, and there are some compelling details to the story. However, poor pacing and otherwise lackluster storytelling hinder what could be an engaging book.
The story moves forward, but the journey is uninspired.Pub Date: June 18, 2013
ISBN: 978-0-312-68163-0
Page Count: 320
Publisher: St. Martin's Griffin
Review Posted Online: May 4, 2013
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 15, 2013
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
Heartfelt, yes, but pretty routine.
Life lessons.
Angie Malone, the youngest of a big, warm Italian-American family, returns to her Pacific Northwest hometown to wrestle with various midlife disappointments: her divorce, Papa’s death, a downturn in business at the family restaurant, and, above all, her childlessness. After several miscarriages, she, a successful ad exec, and husband Conlan, a reporter, befriended a pregnant young girl and planned to adopt her baby—and then the birth mother changed her mind. Angie and Conlan drifted apart and soon found they just didn’t love each other anymore. Metaphorically speaking, “her need for a child had been a high tide, an overwhelming force that drowned them. A year ago, she could have kicked to the surface but not now.” Sadder but wiser, Angie goes to work in the struggling family restaurant, bickering with Mama over updating the menu and replacing the ancient waitress. Soon, Angie befriends another young girl, Lauren Ribido, who’s eager to learn and desperately needs a job. Lauren’s family lives on the wrong side of the tracks, and her mother is a promiscuous alcoholic, but Angie knows nothing of this sad story and welcomes Lauren into the DeSaria family circle. The girl listens in, wide-eyed, as the sisters argue and make wisecracks and—gee-whiz—are actually nice to each other. Nothing at all like her relationship with her sluttish mother, who throws Lauren out when boyfriend David, en route to Stanford, gets her pregnant. Will Lauren, who’s just been accepted to USC, let Angie adopt her baby? Well, a bit of a twist at the end keeps things from becoming too predictable.
Heartfelt, yes, but pretty routine.Pub Date: July 1, 2004
ISBN: 0-345-46750-7
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Ballantine
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 15, 2004
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