Sure to be snatched up by fans.
Gaelic gabber Keyes (Sushi for Beginners, 2003, etc.) provides a treat for fans: a book divided among essays and stories, the former tastier than the latter.
The nonfiction pieces that take up half of Keyes’s latest (flip the book over to read the fiction taking up the rest) are written with grace and good humor, giving even the most seemingly trivial of experiences a goodly going-over, and all of it with at least one brilliant turn of phrase per page. Keyes is at her best when writing on travel, as in “Stack’n’fly,” in which she does her determined best to puncture the myth that it’s better to travel than to arrive: “It is NOT better to travel. To travel is AWFUL and to arrive is LOVELY.” Elsewhere, readers are treated to her many loves (Kit Kats, 16 hours of sleep a day, being sick in bed so that somebody has to take care of her) and many hates (exercise, sun-tanning, her fellow Irishmen’s need when traveling to be the life of the party). The author includes a hilarious account of her travels to Russia: “Flight to St. Petersburg. The plane was disappointingly normal. Seat belts and the like.” It’s not all chocolate and lazing about, however. She revisits in one nonfiction piece a look at her own years-long struggle with alcoholism, recounting it with honesty and a refreshing lack of pathos. Things fare less well on the fiction side, where the stories seem more like forced attempts to capture the self-deprecating good humor of her magazine pieces. This is especially true of “A Moment of Grace,” a story about a forlorn angel’s attempt to commit all the seven deadly sins. It’s all easy enough to read, even the one about the alien and English girl bopping about L.A., but can seem like sloppy seconds.
Sure to be snatched up by fans.Pub Date: Oct. 1, 2005
ISBN: 0-06-078703-1
Page Count: 224
Publisher: Avon/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2005
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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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