A story of Miami’s Cuban American community uses tropes of telenovelas to frame a rich portrait.
Is a woman’s shocking confession true, or just a fantasy from her favorite telenovela?
Mónica Campo is about to become a mom for the first time when, suddenly, it looks as if she might lose her own beloved, flamboyant mother, Mirta. The night before Mirta is scheduled for surgery for an aneurysm, mother and daughter watch a telenovela episode about a woman who bears her lover’s baby and never tells him. The next day Mirta, already sedated and afraid she might not wake up, says, “Mónica, your father is Juan.” But Monica’s father, or so she’s always thought, is Rolando Campo, an optician and solid family man, and she’s never heard of Juan. Mirta survives the surgery but her mental state is unsteady, and Mónica can’t be sure whether her confession is true or a sign her mom is losing her grip on reality. And Mónica has her own set of problems. She broke up with her longtime boyfriend, Manny, because he kept signing up for another hitch in the Army instead of making a home with her. Then she stumbled into a relationship with Robert, who’s steady and sweet and delighted she’s having his baby—but she’s not in love with him. Now, with Mirta’s illness, Manny is back. Mónica has never quite felt she knows where she belongs anyway, growing up in Miami as the daughter of Marielitos, the Cuban refugees who came to the U.S. en masse in the 1980s. Her parents have embraced their new home but feel the emotional pull of the one they left behind. As Mónica delves into the buried secrets her mother’s revelation brings to light, she learns much more than she ever imagined about her parents’ history and herself. This debut novel addresses serious family matters but bursts with humor as well, thanks to Mónica’s tart voice and her funny, fractious family.
A story of Miami’s Cuban American community uses tropes of telenovelas to frame a rich portrait.Pub Date: July 9, 2024
ISBN: 9781982157319
Page Count: 384
Publisher: Marysue Rucci Books
Review Posted Online: May 31, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 2024
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
Haig’s positive message will keep his fans happy.
A British widow travels to Ibiza and learns that it’s never too late to have a happy life.
In a world that seems to be getting more unstable by the moment, Haig’s novels are a steady ship in rough seas, offering a much-needed positive message. In works like the bestselling The Midnight Library (2020), he reminds us that finding out what you truly love and where you belong in the universe are the foundations of building a better existence. His latest book continues this upbeat messaging, albeit in a somewhat repetitive and facile way. Retired British schoolteacher Grace Winters discovers that an old acquaintance has died and left her a ramshackle home in Ibiza. A widow who lost her only child years earlier, Grace is at first reluctant to visit the house, because, at 72, she more or less believes her chance for happiness is over—but when she rouses herself to travel to the island, she discovers the opposite is true. A mystery surrounds her friend’s death involving a roguish islander, his activist daughter, an internationally famous DJ, and a strange glow in the sea that acts as a powerful life force and upends Grace’s ideas of how the cosmos works. Framed as a response to a former student’s email, the narrative follows Grace’s journey from skeptic (she was a math teacher, after all) to believer in the possibility of magic as she learns to move on from the past. Her transformation is the book’s main conflict, aside from a protest against an evil developer intent on destroying Ibiza’s natural beauty. The outcome is never in doubt, and though the story often feels stretched to the limit—this novel could have easily been a novella—the author’s insistence on the power of connection to change lives comes through loud and clear.
Haig’s positive message will keep his fans happy.Pub Date: Sept. 3, 2024
ISBN: 9780593489277
Page Count: 368
Publisher: Viking
Review Posted Online: Aug. 3, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 2024
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