Exciting Indiana Jones-like adventure with a cast of real-life archaeologists, temple looters, smugglers, and art collectors, centering on a fabulous, long-lost treasure. As is often the case in archaeology, the discovery is serendipitous: in February 1987, huaqueros (temple robbers) poking around the old pyramid complex of Huaca Rajada in Peru stumble upon a horde of remarkable gold artifacts including masks, knives, beads, and nose rings. A police raid leads to the involvement of Peruvian archaeologist Walter Alva, director of the Bruning Museum. Alva soon realizes that the thieves have found a legendary cache sought for centuries: the burial chambers of the Lords of Sipan, rulers of the pre-Incan Moche (c. A.D. 100-700), an agrarian people with a taste for human sacrifice. Massive excavation leads to further spectacular finds, including mummies, skeletons (some the victims of live burial), and priceless scepters, ceramics, and figurines. Shootouts between huaqueros and police threaten Alva's operations, but a greater danger is the voracious international black market in pre-Columbian art. Kirkpatrick neatly interweaves Alva's story with that of the smuggling network, the latter affording an exciting glimpse of a sordid demimonde filled with flamboyant con men, unscrupulous museum directors, and art-hungry private collectors—most notably Nobel-winning physicist Murray Gell-Mann. A British smuggler squeals, US Customs strikes, the Santa Barbara Art Museum is caught with illegal treasures, Gell-Mann nobly returns his collection to Peru—and Kirkpatrick, without moralizing, makes a strong case for other collectors to do the same. Another story of true-life derring-do from Kirkpatrick (coauthor, Turning the Tide, 1991; A Cast of Killers, 1986), who once again blends offbeat characters, local color, and a lurking mystery into top-drawer nonfiction. (Eight pages of color photographs, 45 line drawings—not seen.)
Pub Date: Oct. 20, 1992
ISBN: 0-688-10396-0
Page Count: 256
Publisher: Morrow/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 1992
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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