A sincere journey of transformation that successfully balances politics and storytelling with heartwarming results.
In Smith’s novel, a young man finds that it’s time to grow up and change his reckless behavior after he loses his dear friend to AIDS.
David Mathews has come into a good-sized inheritance, including a Manhattan loft and a beach house in the Hamptons. But this sudden wealth doesn’t stop him from hustling—the sexual currency he’s grown accustomed to in New York. It was hustling that introduced him to the man who left him a fortune: Robert, a charming man who profiled David in his magazine and took him under his wing. One of David’s habits is imagining the characters in his memories as famous people, from Matt Dillon to Didi Conn; he does this instead of facing his real recollections, ever since he ran away from Arkansas as a teenager. David still grieves for Robert, who died of AIDS, but despite his proximity to the devastating disease, he still has unprotected sex. Indeed, it becomes David’s thrill and secret—one he continues to keep even after Robert appears to him as a ghost, acting as a chatty sidekick while David navigates the ups and downs of his life. When David’s estranged family calls him home to see his dying mother, Robert’s ghost comes along, for better or worse. Once there, David meets Chris, an artist who has stricter boundaries regarding safe sex. Before David’s mother dies, he learns a secret that brings his real memories back to him, and casts his sexual behavior in a different light. It will take the kindness of a transgender nurse, and Chris’ convictions as a gay man and an artist, for David to become the man that Robert always knew he was. The political landscape of the novel is commendably and easily woven into the characters’ interactions, while never overpowering the plot. Mentorship and love are beautifully illustrated in David’s relationships with both Robert and Chris. The appearance of Robert’s ghost allows readers to understand the complexities of David’s grief. The story is a bit slow to start, and each chapter is distractingly and confusingly accompanied by a dated list, which doesn’t match the chapter’s time frame. Also, although the characters are well-drawn, they aren’t a huge departure from LGBT characters readers may have met before. Overall, however, this is an ambitious novel that delivers redemption with humor and heart.
A sincere journey of transformation that successfully balances politics and storytelling with heartwarming results.Pub Date: May 21, 2014
ISBN: 978-0996023320
Page Count: 294
Publisher: PressLess, LLC
Review Posted Online: June 10, 2014
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
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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