Art lectures override the stirrings of a young man’s first love in this uneven romance.
A college student masters drawing and learns to love in this debut novel.
Ingo Carmel, 17, moves to Rochester, New York, from Madrid to attend college in 1966. Focused on art, he quickly bonds with fellow student Shelley James, who is auditing the same drawing class. Slightly older at age 22, she embodies the spirit of the era to Ingo: “Shelley was one of those sixties denizens acutely aware of the rumblings under the social fabric of American life.” They quickly become involved, with Ingo often losing himself in romantic reveries that cause him to reflect on a lecture from a class and draw parallels between artistic techniques and navigating new relationship terrain. A free spirit, Shelley drifts off before committing to Ingo and eventually lands in New York City. She invites Ingo, who has lined up a summer position painting scenery for the Delacorte Theater in Central Park, to move in with her. Much of the summer is spent experimenting with all types of drugs, particularly hallucinogens: “For Shelley, nothing mattered more than pumping a maximum out of right now.” Finally, the distraction from his art and Shelley’s noncommittal attitude drive Ingo to return to Madrid. He then redirects his passion and is admitted to the Riverrun Academy of Art outside of Detroit. He flies there through New York, giving him one last chance to cross paths with Shelley and reevaluate whether he made the right choice. Mahdavi’s ambitious narrative offers an imaginative premise and many rich details about artists, their inspirations, and the ’60s. Unfortunately, the story becomes dominated by dry drawing theories, including waxing for two pages about whether an HB or 2B pencil would be the right choice for a sketch. The novel is sometimes more art textbook than romance. Ingo’s thoughts are always consumed by art rather than love, and the prevalence of internal monologues results in little dialogue between the two lovers. Their relationship lacks enough context and emotion to invest readers in their romantic arc and whether it succeeds.
Art lectures override the stirrings of a young man’s first love in this uneven romance.Pub Date: N/A
ISBN: N/A
Page Count: -
Publisher: Kurti Publishing
Review Posted Online: July 2, 2019
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
BOOK REVIEW
A tasty, if not always tasteful, tale of supernatural mayhem that fans of King and Crichton alike will enjoy.
Are we not men? We are—well, ask Bigfoot, as Brooks does in this delightful yarn, following on his bestseller World War Z(2006).
A zombie apocalypse is one thing. A volcanic eruption is quite another, for, as the journalist who does a framing voice-over narration for Brooks’ latest puts it, when Mount Rainier popped its cork, “it was the psychological aspect, the hyperbole-fueled hysteria that had ended up killing the most people.” Maybe, but the sasquatches whom the volcano displaced contributed to the statistics, too, if only out of self-defense. Brooks places the epicenter of the Bigfoot war in a high-tech hideaway populated by the kind of people you might find in a Jurassic Park franchise: the schmo who doesn’t know how to do much of anything but tries anyway, the well-intentioned bleeding heart, the know-it-all intellectual who turns out to know the wrong things, the immigrant with a tough backstory and an instinct for survival. Indeed, the novel does double duty as a survival manual, packed full of good advice—for instance, try not to get wounded, for “injury turns you from a giver to a taker. Taking up our resources, our time to care for you.” Brooks presents a case for making room for Bigfoot in the world while peppering his narrative with timely social criticism about bad behavior on the human side of the conflict: The explosion of Rainier might have been better forecast had the president not slashed the budget of the U.S. Geological Survey, leading to “immediate suspension of the National Volcano Early Warning System,” and there’s always someone around looking to monetize the natural disaster and the sasquatch-y onslaught that follows. Brooks is a pro at building suspense even if it plays out in some rather spectacularly yucky episodes, one involving a short spear that takes its name from “the sucking sound of pulling it out of the dead man’s heart and lungs.” Grossness aside, it puts you right there on the scene.
A tasty, if not always tasteful, tale of supernatural mayhem that fans of King and Crichton alike will enjoy.Pub Date: June 16, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-9848-2678-7
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Del Rey/Ballantine
Review Posted Online: Feb. 9, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2020
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK TO SCREEN
Amateurish, with a twist savvy readers will see coming from a mile away.
A woman accused of shooting her husband six times in the face refuses to speak.
"Alicia Berenson was thirty-three years old when she killed her husband. They had been married for seven years. They were both artists—Alicia was a painter, and Gabriel was a well-known fashion photographer." Michaelides' debut is narrated in the voice of psychotherapist Theo Faber, who applies for a job at the institution where Alicia is incarcerated because he's fascinated with her case and believes he will be able to get her to talk. The narration of the increasingly unrealistic events that follow is interwoven with excerpts from Alicia's diary. Ah, yes, the old interwoven diary trick. When you read Alicia's diary you'll conclude the woman could well have been a novelist instead of a painter because it contains page after page of detailed dialogue, scenes, and conversations quite unlike those in any journal you've ever seen. " 'What's the matter?' 'I can't talk about it on the phone, I need to see you.' 'It's just—I'm not sure I can make it up to Cambridge at the minute.' 'I'll come to you. This afternoon. Okay?' Something in Paul's voice made me agree without thinking about it. He sounded desperate. 'Okay. Are you sure you can't tell me about it now?' 'I'll see you later.' Paul hung up." Wouldn't all this appear in a diary as "Paul wouldn't tell me what was wrong"? An even more improbable entry is the one that pins the tail on the killer. While much of the book is clumsy, contrived, and silly, it is while reading passages of the diary that one may actually find oneself laughing out loud.
Amateurish, with a twist savvy readers will see coming from a mile away.Pub Date: Feb. 5, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-250-30169-7
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Celadon Books
Review Posted Online: Nov. 3, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 15, 2018
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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