Intelligent mix of historical and modern-day vampirism, with the ninth return of Saberhagen's revisionist, sharing-and-caring Prince Vlad Dracula (SÇance for a Vampire, 1994, etc), the most honorable of the undead. The wry punning title focuses on both the wonderful new guillotine devised for safer, more humane beheadings during the French Revolution and the vampire's traditional neckjob. In 1996, newlyweds Phillip and June Radcliffe are kidnapped by ``Mr. Graves'' (Vlad) and beautiful Constantia (a sexy fifteen?—no, closer to four hundred) and locked up in a desert hideout where they must review a five-hour tape that recounts the history of vampirism during the heyday of the French blade. The two are told they've been sequestered for their own good. But is this Graves a lunatic? Gradually, they begin to grasp the hidden message in the tape. In 1792, an American ancestor, also named Phillip Radcliffe, was sent by George Washington to deliver a message to Tom Paine in Paris. There, he happened to perform a good deed for Vlad, who swore on his honor that he would protect Phillip. At the same time, Vlad's archenemy, his younger brother, Radu, who had been buried decapitated over a hundred years earlier, managed to get his head back on and has once more set out to destroy Vlad. Vlad can't kill Radu because of an oath he gave his father that he would protect his brother. Phillip is arrested by revolutionaries and is sentenced to death. Radu sets a trap for Vlad that depends on Vlad trying to save Phillip. The modern Phillip manages to escape the desert hideout and in fleeing attracts Radu. In both ages, Phillip is bait for the brothers' lethal Machiavellian traps. Meanwhile, we are given much background on the development of the guillotine, as well as on wax-casting for a museum of celebrities in Paris. Neat, sober Saberhagen and immensely engaging.
Pub Date: Oct. 1, 1996
ISBN: 0-312-85799-3
Page Count: 352
Publisher: Tor
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 1996
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
More of the same: Sparks has his recipe, and not a bit of it is missing here. It’s the literary equivalent of high fructose...
Sparks (The Longest Ride, 2013, etc.) serves up another heaping helping of sentimental Southern bodice-rippage.
Gone are the blondes of yore, but otherwise the Sparks-ian formula is the same: a decent fellow from a good family who’s gone through some rough patches falls in love with a decent girl from a good family who’s gone through some rough patches—and is still suffering the consequences. The guy is innately intelligent but too quick to throw a punch, the girl beautiful and scary smart. If you hold a fatalistic worldview, then you’ll know that a love between them can end only in tears. If you hold a Sparks-ian one, then true love will prevail, though not without a fight. Voilà: plug in the character names, and off the story goes. In this case, Colin Hancock is the misunderstood lad who’s decided to reform his hard-knuckle ways but just can’t keep himself from connecting fist to face from time to time. Maria Sanchez is the dedicated lawyer in harm’s way—and not just because her boss is a masher. Simple enough. All Colin has to do is punch the partner’s lights out: “The sexual harassment was bad enough, but Ken was a bully as well, and Colin knew from his own experience that people like that didn’t stop abusing their power unless someone made them. Or put the fear of God into them.” No? No, because bound up in Maria’s story, wrinkled with the doings of an equally comely sister, there’s a stalker and a closet full of skeletons. Add Colin’s back story, and there’s a perfect couple in need of constant therapy, as well as a menacing cop. Get Colin and Maria to smooching, and the plot thickens as the storylines entangle. Forget about love—can they survive the evil that awaits them out in the kudzu-choked woods?
More of the same: Sparks has his recipe, and not a bit of it is missing here. It’s the literary equivalent of high fructose corn syrup, stickily sweet but irresistible.Pub Date: Oct. 13, 2015
ISBN: 978-1-4555-2061-9
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Grand Central Publishing
Review Posted Online: Sept. 30, 2015
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 2015
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