A sensitive study of a woman choreographing her own recovery.
The art of falling isn’t hard to master, Penelope Sparrow discovers, when she wakes up in the hospital after a 14-story plunge that ended with her body colliding with Marty Kandelbaum’s car.
Remembering the fall is too dangerous. Remembering means facing the loss of Dmitri, the loss of dancing. Remembering means facing that she may have tried to commit suicide. Kandelbaum’s arrival is the first obstacle in Penny’s path toward self-wallowing. Determined to protect her from further harm, Kandelbaum brings fasnachts from his bakery, hoping food may begin the process of healing. A lifetime of being criticized for not having the stereotypical dancer’s body, however, has left Penny vigilant about every morsel that passes her lips. She doesn’t have an eating disorder, she tells herself; she simply must be careful. Her roommate at the hospital, Angela, has no such qualms. Battling cystic fibrosis, Angela embraces every pleasure life allows her. Dance critic Margaret MacArthur arrives soon after Marty. Unbeknownst to Penny, MacArthur has followed her career, and now she is certainly interested in the accident, but she is clearly also interested in something more. No matter how hard Penny tries not to recall or discuss why she fell, everything reminds her of Dmitri—their love, their partnership at Dance DeLaval, her joy in dancing his choreography—yet at the edges of her memory she sees the shadows of his rejection. While her mother and friends try to buffer Penny’s recovery, it is MacArthur’s blunt persistence that forces her to confront the damage exacted on her body and soul well before the fall. To see the truth, Penny will have to recognize the lies and rough condemnation of the dance world. Craft’s debut novel lovingly traces the aesthetics of movement and gently explores the shattering pain of despair.
A sensitive study of a woman choreographing her own recovery.Pub Date: Jan. 7, 2014
ISBN: 978-1-4022-8519-6
Page Count: 368
Publisher: Sourcebooks Landmark
Review Posted Online: Sept. 17, 2013
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 1, 2013
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
Dated sermonizing on career versus motherhood, and conflict driven by characters’ willed helplessness, sap this tale of...
Lifelong, conflicted friendship of two women is the premise of Hannah’s maudlin latest (Magic Hour, 2006, etc.), again set in Washington State.
Tallulah “Tully” Hart, father unknown, is the daughter of a hippie, Cloud, who makes only intermittent appearances in her life. Tully takes refuge with the family of her “best friend forever,” Kate Mularkey, who compares herself unfavorably with Tully, in regards to looks and charisma. In college, “TullyandKate” pledge the same sorority and major in communications. Tully has a life goal for them both: They will become network TV anchorwomen. Tully lands an internship at KCPO-TV in Seattle and finagles a producing job for Kate. Kate no longer wishes to follow Tully into broadcasting and is more drawn to fiction writing, but she hesitates to tell her overbearing friend. Meanwhile a love triangle blooms at KCPO: Hard-bitten, irresistibly handsome, former war correspondent Johnny is clearly smitten with Tully. Expecting rejection, Kate keeps her infatuation with Johnny secret. When Tully lands a reporting job with a Today-like show, her career shifts into hyperdrive. Johnny and Kate had started an affair once Tully moved to Manhattan, and when Kate gets pregnant with daughter Marah, they marry. Kate is content as a stay-at-home mom, but frets about being Johnny’s second choice and about her unrealized writing ambitions. Tully becomes Seattle’s answer to Oprah. She hires Johnny, which spells riches for him and Kate. But Kate’s buttons are fully depressed by pitched battles over slutwear and curfews with teenaged Marah, who idolizes her godmother Tully. In an improbable twist, Tully invites Kate and Marah to resolve their differences on her show, only to blindside Kate by accusing her, on live TV, of overprotecting Marah. The BFFs are sundered. Tully’s latest attempt to salvage Cloud fails: The incorrigible, now geriatric hippie absconds once more. Just as Kate develops a spine, she’s given some devastating news. Will the friends reconcile before it’s too late?
Dated sermonizing on career versus motherhood, and conflict driven by characters’ willed helplessness, sap this tale of poignancy.Pub Date: Feb. 1, 2008
ISBN: 978-0-312-36408-3
Page Count: 496
Publisher: St. Martin's
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 1, 2007
BOOK TO SCREEN
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