A purposeful and absorbing exploration across dark and rocky terrain.
A headstrong teenager becomes a slave in this debut novel.
As a 6-year-old, Repentance lost her little brother to the overlords. Ten years later, on the day of her buttoning ceremony (an arranged marriage), she refuses her betrothed. She vows never to have children of her own who can be taken away. Instead, she forfeits her freedom. Her decision seems irrational. It shames her family and condemns her betrothed, Sober. The two of them are enslaved. They are taken from their village’s foggy swamps to the ice city of the overlords. Here, Repentance learns the true cost of her defiance. She has become property—a human possession to be done with as the overlords see fit. Slaves who try to escape are punished with death and their families taken as compensation. Sober is beaten; Repentance is sold to a brothel. She despairs for herself but even more for her sister should Repentance continue to buck the overlords. More than ever, her situation seems hopeless. And then she catches the eye of the old king. Apokedak crafts a rounded fantasy world—from the village with its superstitions and traditions to the city with its magical cloths. But for all of its exotic settings, this book is concerned primarily with slavery. Human dignity is the prevalent theme. Iniquities flourish, and Repentance, though a strong-willed protagonist, is faced with a disheartening truth: that fighting against the system will not always make things better. The story in this sense is a difficult read. But its subject matter is leavened by clear prose and well-drawn minor characters. Repentance finds something genuine in the people she meets. She questions her choices and, through the strength of others, finds hope, of sorts, even in situations where none should exist. This may not be enough to sustain some readers, but the author has paced events nicely. As Sober comes back into Repentance’s life, the plot both tightens and unravels. By the third act, readers should hope, fear, and thrill to the prospect of a happy ending.
A purposeful and absorbing exploration across dark and rocky terrain.Pub Date: July 21, 2017
ISBN: 978-1-947446-00-7
Page Count: 398
Publisher: Paraklesis Press
Review Posted Online: May 18, 2018
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
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
BOOK REVIEW
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
Soft-focus story moves right along with few surprises. This time around, Hannah avoids the soap-opera complications of her...
Another middle-aged mom in a muddle.
After years of false starts and big hopes, Elizabeth’s ruggedly handsome husband Jack, a former football star, just landed a spot as a sportscaster on national news. He still loves her, even though much younger women are giving him come-hither looks. Heck, he doesn’t want to betray the love of his life after she helped him kick drugs and stuck by him even when he was a struggling has-been. And won’t it seem hypocritical if he fools around with his sexy assistant while he does in-depth reporting on a rape case involving a famous basketball center? Well, he fools around anyway. Elizabeth, nicknamed Birdie, knows nothing of this, but she withdraws from Jack when her hard-drinking, salt-of-the-earth father has a stroke and dies. Now no one will call her “sugar beet” ever again. Time to return home to Tennessee and contend with Anita, the sort-of-evil stepmother so trashy she wears pink puffy slippers all day long. Naturally, it turns out that Anita actually has a heart of gold and knows a few things about Birdie’s dead mother that were hushed up for years. Mom was an artist, just like Birdie, and an old scandal comes to light as Anita unrolls a vibrant canvas that portrays her secret lover. Perhaps, Birdie muses, her mother died of heartbreak, never having followed her true love or developed her talent. Has she, too, compromised everything she holds dear? Hoping to find out, Birdie joins a support group that promises to reconnect confused women with their passion. She and Jack separate, prompting a how-dare-you fit from their grown daughters. Will Birdie fly her empty nest? Will she go back to college for a degree in art? Will her brooding watercolors ever sell?
Soft-focus story moves right along with few surprises. This time around, Hannah avoids the soap-opera complications of her previous tales (Summer Island, 2001, etc.).Pub Date: July 1, 2002
ISBN: 0-345-45071-X
Page Count: 352
Publisher: Ballantine
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 15, 2002
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