A roving, authentic bildungsroman with a unique lead.
Ehrlich’s novel traces a teenage girl’s travels Westward during the Civil War.
Seven months after Abraham Lincoln’s death, 16-year-old Tennessean Ellis Cady finds herself at her aunt and uncle’s Missouri ranch trying to find her father. After her beloved twin brother, Earl, was killed in the war, and her mother, family, and friends can’t be found, Ellis is adrift. Although appreciative of the ranch she can call home, Ellis flounders in grief and longs to ride her horse, Ace, on the Western trails instead of working at the ranch. Continuing her search for her father, Ellis, who’s an author, travels with Ace to St. Louis to meet with Lucas Bilford, her great friend, mentor, and editor. In St. Louis, the teen, who has passed as a boy to ride and fight in the war, meets Jimmie and Joe, trick riders of Levi Jack’s Wild West Show, and she considers joining them as a trick rider. A shady businessman hires them to deliver post and packages following the Pony Express’s closure, and they all take on the lucrative, possibly dangerous work. While working delivering packages, Ellis longs to travel Westward to honor her late twin, who’d always wanted to explore new Western territories on horseback. Ehrlich’s novel movingly depicts a family and country devasted by war as well as the difficulties of building a country in a forbidding environment (“The railroads’ll be built, it’ll get easier to get there, but the land—the land will retaliate. You mark my words”). The sensory details, including fireside meals on the trails, add color to the storytelling, and the author succeeds in integrating issues of identity—especially gender and sexuality—into a work that’s timeless. Most of all, this tale provides a nuanced depiction of a unique protagonist’s growth from girlhood to adulthood.
A roving, authentic bildungsroman with a unique lead.Pub Date: June 24, 2024
ISBN: 9798985997422
Page Count: 321
Publisher: Bay Feather Books
Review Posted Online: July 3, 2024
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
BOOK REVIEW
A sweet bedtime story.
A boy and his stuffed bear head into the woods.
Having captured readers’ attention with Born a Crime (2016), his bestselling memoir of growing up in South Africa, comedian and television host Noah has written a parable about decision-making. As he puts it in a brief prologue, “It’s about disagreements and difference—but it’s also about how we bridge those gaps and find what matters most, whether we’re parents or kids, neighbors, gnomes, or political adversaries. It’s a picture book, but it’s not a children’s book. Rather, it is a book for kids to share with parents and for parents to share with kids.” With plentiful illustrations by Hahn and in language aimed at young listeners, it tells the story of a small boy so impatient to start his Saturday adventures that he rebels against the rules of his household and heads out without brushing his teeth or making his bed, despite the reminders of his stuffed bear, Walter. “We can’t just run away,” protests the bear. “Your mother will miss you. And where will we sleep? And who will make us waffles?” “We’ll build our own house,” the boy responds. “And we’ll grow our own waffles!” From there, the pair go on their walkabout, encountering a garden gnome, a pair of snails, and a gang of animated coins who have lessons to offer about making choices. Though the author suggests in the introduction that adult readers might enjoy the book on their own, those looking for a follow-up to the memoir or a foray into adult fiction should be warned that this is not that book.
A sweet bedtime story.Pub Date: Oct. 8, 2024
ISBN: 9780593729960
Page Count: 128
Publisher: One World/Random House
Review Posted Online: July 4, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2024
BOOK REVIEW
A dramatic, vividly detailed reconstruction of a little-known aspect of the Vietnam War.
A young woman’s experience as a nurse in Vietnam casts a deep shadow over her life.
When we learn that the farewell party in the opening scene is for Frances “Frankie” McGrath’s older brother—“a golden boy, a wild child who could make the hardest heart soften”—who is leaving to serve in Vietnam in 1966, we feel pretty certain that poor Finley McGrath is marked for death. Still, it’s a surprise when the fateful doorbell rings less than 20 pages later. His death inspires his sister to enlist as an Army nurse, and this turn of events is just the beginning of a roller coaster of a plot that’s impressive and engrossing if at times a bit formulaic. Hannah renders the experiences of the young women who served in Vietnam in all-encompassing detail. The first half of the book, set in gore-drenched hospital wards, mildewed dorm rooms, and boozy officers’ clubs, is an exciting read, tracking the transformation of virginal, uptight Frankie into a crack surgical nurse and woman of the world. Her tensely platonic romance with a married surgeon ends when his broken, unbreathing body is airlifted out by helicopter; she throws her pent-up passion into a wild affair with a soldier who happens to be her dead brother’s best friend. In the second part of the book, after the war, Frankie seems to experience every possible bad break. A drawback of the story is that none of the secondary characters in her life are fully three-dimensional: Her dismissive, chauvinistic father and tight-lipped, pill-popping mother, her fellow nurses, and her various love interests are more plot devices than people. You’ll wish you could have gone to Vegas and placed a bet on the ending—while it’s against all the odds, you’ll see it coming from a mile away.
A dramatic, vividly detailed reconstruction of a little-known aspect of the Vietnam War.Pub Date: Feb. 6, 2024
ISBN: 9781250178633
Page Count: 480
Publisher: St. Martin's
Review Posted Online: Nov. 4, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2023
PERSPECTIVES
BOOK TO SCREEN
SEEN & HEARD
© Copyright 2024 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Follow
Popular in this Genre
We can’t wait for you to join Kirkus!
It’s free and takes less than 10 seconds!
Already have an account? Log in.
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
Welcome Back!
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
