A readable if off-balance slice of history in which breadth comes at the expense of depth.
The destinies of the four McCosh sisters and their childhood friends in the aftermath of World War I form the foundation of a multiperspective saga embracing fidelity and fertility, empire, belief, and parental love.
This new hymn to a bygone British era of heroism, engineering skills, and middle-class quirks by de Bernières (Notwithstanding, 2016, etc.) opens in colonial Ceylon (renamed Sri Lanka) in 1925, where handsome war hero and flying ace Daniel Pitt has settled with his wife, Rosie, now pregnant with their second child. But this happy marriage is doomed, leaving Daniel eternally questing for love and access to his children. Back in London, Rosie’s sisters, the McCoshes, are forming their futures, too. Ottilie decides to set aside an unrequited passion; Sophie marries her chaplain and opens a school; and Christabel strikes up “an unconventional friendship with a green-eyed artist who comported herself like a man.” These figures are but the core characters in a sprawling cast which also includes two of Daniel’s mistresses (one Ceylonese who bears him a son and one Irish), neither of whom he can marry since Rosie will never divorce him. And there’s more. The McCosh family gardener, Oily Wragge (yes), offers a working-class perspective as both soldier and engineer, and Daniel ends up fathering additional illegitimate children, although that’s nothing compared to the laundry list of mistresses and offspring revealed in Mr. McCosh’s will. Class, punitive marriages (and wives), war—the themes are many and sometimes debatable in this economical yet ambitious narrative that stretches from the scarred setting of the interwar phase to a resumption of conflict and loss in World War II. De Bernières unsettlingly alternates a light comic tone with more serious material and also often slips into clichéd, sentimental characterization. As a result, only the last of the story’s heartaches penetrates deeply.
A readable if off-balance slice of history in which breadth comes at the expense of depth.Pub Date: Aug. 7, 2018
ISBN: 978-1-524-74788-6
Page Count: 288
Publisher: Pantheon
Review Posted Online: May 27, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 2018
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Jonathan Livingston Kitty, it’s not.
A lonely postman learns that he’s about to die—and reflects on life as he bargains with a Hawaiian-shirt–wearing devil.
The 30-year-old first-person narrator in filmmaker/novelist Kawamura’s slim novel is, by his own admission, “boring…a monotone guy,” so unimaginative that, when he learns he has a brain tumor, the bucket list he writes down is dull enough that “even the cat looked disgusted with me.” Luckily—or maybe not—a friendly devil, dubbed Aloha, pops onto the scene, and he’s willing to make a deal: an extra day of life in exchange for being allowed to remove something pleasant from the world. The first thing excised is phones, which goes well enough. (The narrator is pleasantly surprised to find that “people seemed to have no problem finding something to fill up their free time.”) But deals with the devil do have a way of getting complicated. This leads to shallow musings (“Sometimes, when you rewatch a film after not having seen it for a long time, it makes a totally different impression on you than it did the first time you saw it. Of course, the movie hasn’t changed; it’s you who’s changed") written in prose so awkward, it’s possibly satire (“Tears dripped down onto the letter like warm, salty drops of rain”). Even the postman’s beloved cat, who gains the power of speech, ends up being prim and annoying. The narrator ponders feelings about a lost love, his late mother, and his estranged father in a way that some readers might find moving at times. But for many, whatever made this book a bestseller in Japan is going to be lost in translation.
Jonathan Livingston Kitty, it’s not.Pub Date: March 12, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-250-29405-0
Page Count: 176
Publisher: Flatiron Books
Review Posted Online: Feb. 16, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2019
A thoughtful and pensive tale with intelligent characters and a satisfying romance.
A promise to his best friend leads an Army serviceman to a family in need and a chance at true love in this novel.
Beckett Gentry is surprised when his Army buddy Ryan MacKenzie gives him a letter from Ryan’s sister, Ella. Abandoned by his mother, Beckett grew up in a series of foster homes. He is wary of attachments until he reads Ella’s letter. A single mother, Ella lives with her twins, Maisie and Colt, at Solitude, the resort she operates in Telluride, Colorado. They begin a correspondence, although Beckett can only identify himself by his call sign, Chaos. After Ryan’s death during a mission, Beckett travels to Telluride as his friend had requested. He bonds with the twins while falling deeply in love with Ella. Reluctant to reveal details of Ryan’s death and risk causing her pain, Beckett declines to disclose to Ella that he is Chaos. Maisie needs treatment for neuroblastoma, and Beckett formally adopts the twins as a sign of his commitment to support Ella and her children. He and Ella pursue a romance, but when an insurance investigator questions the adoption, Beckett is faced with revealing the truth about the letters and Ryan’s death, risking losing the family he loves. Yarros’ (Wilder, 2016, etc.) novel is a deeply felt and emotionally nuanced contemporary romance bolstered by well-drawn characters and strong, confident storytelling. Beckett and Ella are sympathetic protagonists whose past experiences leave them cautious when it comes to love. Beckett never knew the security of a stable home life. Ella impulsively married her high school boyfriend, but the marriage ended when he discovered she was pregnant. The author is especially adept at developing the characters through subtle but significant details, like Beckett’s aversion to swearing. Beckett and Ella’s romance unfolds slowly in chapters that alternate between their first-person viewpoints. The letters they exchanged are pivotal to their connection, and almost every chapter opens with one. Yarros’ writing is crisp and sharp, with passages that are poetic without being florid. For example, in a letter to Beckett, Ella writes of motherhood: “But I’m not the center of their universe. I’m more like their gravity.” While the love story is the book’s focus, the subplot involving Maisie’s illness is equally well-developed, and the link between Beckett and the twins is heartfelt and sincere.
A thoughtful and pensive tale with intelligent characters and a satisfying romance.Pub Date: Feb. 26, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-64063-533-3
Page Count: 432
Publisher: Entangled: Amara
Review Posted Online: Jan. 2, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 15, 2019
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
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