A clever but unconvincing suspense novel from the author of four previous novels (Mainland, 1992, etc.). The son of a British father and an American mother, former presidential speechwriter Seymour ``Sam'' Gilchrist has settled in Provincetown, Mass., to write his story, ``a confession and an act of revenge.'' His father's death has freed him to pen this ``betrayal,'' and Gilchrist attributes his downfall to the feminine lure of Ruth Ritchie. Three years earlier, he left his marriage and his White House job to be with the Australian freelance journalist in London. Two years before that, Ritchie introduced him to Major Craig Marshall and a covert plan to topple the liberal British government that preceded Margaret Thatcher's. Ritchie and Marshall are convinced that Gilchrist is the only one who can tell this story and be believed. Gilchrist's father, Ronald Lefevre, headed the clandestine group known as Operation Monty Python, which disseminated lies about public figures believed to be responsible for the failure of strong government. Marshall's conviction that the group had gone too far caused him to leave the Army, and his life has since been slowly and quietly destroyed. At the same time, Gilchrist's personal motives are brought into question as he struggles to form a committed relationship with the elusive Ritchie and to confront his dying father. His loyalty to his mother was made clear when he took her surname after the divorce, but does Gilchrist hate his father enough to betray him? When Marshall is framed for a murder he didn't commit, Gilchrist's allegiance to his father and to Ruth, to England and the US, are tested. Although McCrum is an expert at both deceiving and enlightening the reader, the high stakes of both the political and filial dramas are never made plausible, and this intricate mystery falls flat.
Pub Date: June 2, 1994
ISBN: 0-679-42987-5
Page Count: 240
Publisher: Knopf
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 1994
A first novel, this is also a first person account of Scout's (Jean Louise) recall of the years that led to the ending of a mystery, the breaking of her brother Jem's elbow, the death of her father's enemy — and the close of childhood years. A widower, Atticus raises his children with legal dispassion and paternal intelligence, and is ably abetted by Calpurnia, the colored cook, while the Alabama town of Maycomb, in the 1930's, remains aloof to their divergence from its tribal patterns. Scout and Jem, with their summer-time companion, Dill, find their paths free from interference — but not from dangers; their curiosity about the imprisoned Boo, whose miserable past is incorporated in their play, results in a tentative friendliness; their fears of Atticus' lack of distinction is dissipated when he shoots a mad dog; his defense of a Negro accused of raping a white girl, Mayella Ewell, is followed with avid interest and turns the rabble whites against him. Scout is the means of averting an attack on Atticus but when he loses the case it is Boo who saves Jem and Scout by killing Mayella's father when he attempts to murder them. The shadows of a beginning for black-white understanding, the persistent fight that Scout carries on against school, Jem's emergence into adulthood, Calpurnia's quiet power, and all the incidents touching on the children's "growing outward" have an attractive starchiness that keeps this southern picture pert and provocative. There is much advance interest in this book; it has been selected by the Literary Guild and Reader's Digest; it should win many friends.
Pub Date: July 11, 1960
ISBN: 0060935464
Page Count: 323
Publisher: Lippincott
Review Posted Online: Oct. 7, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 1960
BOOK REVIEW
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
Coelho's placebo has racked up impressive sales in Brazil and Europe. Americans should flock to it like gulls.
Coelho is a Brazilian writer with four books to his credit. Following Diary of a Magus (1992—not reviewed) came this book, published in Brazil in 1988: it's an interdenominational, transcendental, inspirational fable—in other words, a bag of wind.
The story is about a youth empowered to follow his dream. Santiago is an Andalusian shepherd boy who learns through a dream of a treasure in the Egyptian pyramids. An old man, the king of Salem, the first of various spiritual guides, tells the boy that he has discovered his destiny: "to realize one's destiny is a person's only real obligation." So Santiago sells his sheep, sails to Tangier, is tricked out of his money, regains it through hard work, crosses the desert with a caravan, stops at an oasis long enough to fall in love, escapes from warring tribesmen by performing a miracle, reaches the pyramids, and eventually gets both the gold and the girl. Along the way he meets an Englishman who describes the Soul of the World; the desert woman Fatima, who teaches him the Language of the World; and an alchemist who says, "Listen to your heart" A message clings like ivy to every encounter; everyone, but everyone, has to put in their two cents' worth, from the crystal merchant to the camel driver ("concentrate always on the present, you'll be a happy man"). The absence of characterization and overall blandness suggest authorship by a committee of self-improvement pundits—a far cry from Saint- Exupery's The Little Prince: that flagship of the genre was a genuine charmer because it clearly derived from a quirky, individual sensibility.
Coelho's placebo has racked up impressive sales in Brazil and Europe. Americans should flock to it like gulls.Pub Date: July 1, 1993
ISBN: 0-06-250217-4
Page Count: 192
Publisher: N/A
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 1993
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
BOOK TO SCREEN
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