As everyone knows, McPhee is a man of many parts and interests and this is an assortment of his casuals which take place here and there. From a week's Travels in Georgia with two experienced ecologists inventorying the area's wildlife—opossums snakes, a nighthawk and a canebrake, a weasel (which they roast)—to the title piece in which he and his family spend a day at Loch Ness wondering whether they'll sight that monster who might be a serpent or just a worm. Other stops in Scotland include a distillery with its very special Josie's Well and a ten-mile pilgrimage from Birnam Wood to Dunsinane. His sports pieces include canoeing, basketball, tennis (Rod Laver on the court); the most exciting is Ruidoso in New Mexico where there's an All-American Futurity for a $766,000 purse attended by all the Texas cowboy millionaires, their abdomens sparkling with platters of silver, and one plain man from Arkansas who hopes his unknown Calcutta Deck will bring it home. Outclassing all of them, there's his own applied game of Monopoly in the Atlantic City where it originated—and the present day Search for Marvin Gardens in the one-time exclusive resort's deep and complex decay, rubble, dogs, rooming houses. This is an inspired piece. Occasional reading—McPhee is one of the most unobtrusively instructive and pleasurable writers around.
Pub Date: June 23, 1975
ISBN: 0374514984
Page Count: 324
Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux
Review Posted Online: Oct. 12, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 1, 1975
This is not the Nutcracker sweet, as passed on by Tchaikovsky and Marius Petipa. No, this is the original Hoffmann tale of 1816, in which the froth of Christmas revelry occasionally parts to let the dark underside of childhood fantasies and fears peek through. The boundaries between dream and reality fade, just as Godfather Drosselmeier, the Nutcracker's creator, is seen as alternately sinister and jolly. And Italian artist Roberto Innocenti gives an errily realistic air to Marie's dreams, in richly detailed illustrations touched by a mysterious light. A beautiful version of this classic tale, which will captivate adults and children alike. (Nutcracker; $35.00; Oct. 28, 1996; 136 pp.; 0-15-100227-4)
Pub Date: Oct. 28, 1996
ISBN: 0-15-100227-4
Page Count: 136
Publisher: Harcourt
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 1996
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
An extravaganza in Bemelmans' inimitable vein, but written almost dead pan, with sly, amusing, sometimes biting undertones, breaking through. For Bemelmans was "the man who came to cocktails". And his hostess was Lady Mendl (Elsie de Wolfe), arbiter of American decorating taste over a generation. Lady Mendl was an incredible person,- self-made in proper American tradition on the one hand, for she had been haunted by the poverty of her childhood, and the years of struggle up from its ugliness,- until she became synonymous with the exotic, exquisite, worshipper at beauty's whrine. Bemelmans draws a portrait in extremes, through apt descriptions, through hilarious anecdote, through surprisingly sympathetic and understanding bits of appreciation. The scene shifts from Hollywood to the home she loved the best in Versailles. One meets in passing a vast roster of famous figures of the international and artistic set. And always one feels Bemelmans, slightly offstage, observing, recording, commenting, illustrated.
Pub Date: Feb. 23, 1955
ISBN: 0670717797
Page Count: -
Publisher: Viking
Review Posted Online: Oct. 25, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 1955
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