A sly, observant report from a rarefied world that’s sure to be another big hit.
Grazer, author of the novel-turned-TV series The Starter Wife (2005), limns two modern American archetypes, the real-estate mogul and his bored socialite wife, doing battle on the moneyed playing field of Manhattan.
Jacks and Cynthia began with visions of an artistic life (she was a ballerina, he a struggling painter), but when she got pregnant, he lost himself in his father’s real-estate empire. Twenty-five years later, at the anniversary gala for a few hundred of their closest friends and enemies, Jacks shows up late, and livid Cynthia smiles for the cameras. The next day, after seeing a photo in the Post of Jacks embracing his latest girlfriend, morning news anchor Lara, Cynthia tells him she wants a divorce, and Jacks moves into the guest quarters. There is little love left between them, but the real estate they share—now that’s something to fight for. They both want the penthouse, and Cynthia is willing to prolong the divorce for years to get it. So Jacks comes up with a scheme straight out of a screwball comedy to pay a handsome young bartender to woo his wife. Meanwhile, Cynthia is becoming an independent woman for the first time since her marriage. With the help of her Zorba-like therapist and straight-talking lesbian daughter, she takes over the directorship of a ballet company. Her experiences reinforce what she already suspected: The life of a socialite isn’t all it’s cracked up to be. Jacks, an amusing caricature of a powerful man with an ego of glass (he’s also terrified of his geriatric father), can’t seem to lure Lara into marriage; he’s found the one woman in Manhattan who would rather cover news on the frontlines in Afghanistan than marry a billionaire. Too much of everything is not quite enough for happiness, Grazer cogently demonstrates, but before she gets too serious, romance redeems everyone.
A sly, observant report from a rarefied world that’s sure to be another big hit.Pub Date: June 1, 2009
ISBN: 978-0-7432-9199-6
Page Count: 384
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 15, 2009
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
Wacky plot keeps the pages turning and enduring schmaltzy romantic sequences.
Sisters work together to solve a child-abandonment case.
Ellie and Julia Cates have never been close. Julia is shy and brainy; Ellie gets by on charm and looks. Their differences must be tossed aside when a traumatized young girl wanders in from the forest into their hometown in Washington. The sisters’ professional skills are put to the test. Julia is a world-renowned child psychologist who has lost her edge. She is reeling from a case that went publicly sour. Though she was cleared of all wrongdoing, Julia’s name was tarnished, forcing her to shutter her Beverly Hills practice. Ellie Barton is the local police chief in Rain Valley, who’s never faced a tougher case. This is her chance to prove she is more than just a fading homecoming queen, but a scarcity of clues and a reluctant victim make locating the girl’s parents nearly impossible. Ellie places an SOS call to her sister; she needs an expert to rehabilitate this wild-child who has been living outside of civilization for years. Confronted with her professional demons, Julia once again has the opportunity to display her talents and salvage her reputation. Hannah (The Things We Do for Love, 2004, etc.) is at her best when writing from the girl’s perspective. The feral wolf-child keeps the reader interested long after the other, transparent characters have grown tiresome. Hannah’s torturously over-written romance passages are stale, but there are surprises in store as the sisters set about unearthing Alice’s past and creating a home for her.
Wacky plot keeps the pages turning and enduring schmaltzy romantic sequences.Pub Date: March 1, 2006
ISBN: 0-345-46752-3
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Ballantine
Review Posted Online: June 24, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2005
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