Prolific author Slavitt (Turkish Delights, 1993, etc.) deals up a delightful satire that punctures academia with a sure and measured hand. There are two Jack Smiths at the same East Coast university. One is a world-renowned historian; the other is a wastrel adjunct assistant professor with writer's block. Though there is certainly no confusing the two, they often receive each other's mail. When an invitation arrives from a religiously oriented foundation, offering the famous Jack Smith an opportunity to be a scholar in residence at its villa in Italy where he can research and write his book on the capture and execution of Mussolini, the missive is misdirected to his failure of a doppelgÑnger. This Jack Smith is being pursued by his ex-wife for back alimony and about to be dismissed by the college. He figures that a vacation on the Mediterranean is just the ticket he needs. When the historian suffers a heart problem and is sidelined for the semester, the other Jack Smith takes his place (and identity) and skips off to Europe. At the villa, he complains incessantly about the shabbiness of the accommodations and observes the pomposity of his fellow guests. He also delves into possible links between the villa and the death of Il Duce. Overcoming his writer's block, he begins a mystery that is only a thinly disguised version of his sojourn. When a poet, whom Smith had wished dead, disappears in a manner eerily akin to the plot of his novel, Smith fears suspicion will be cast upon him. Slavitt deftly takes readers on Smith's journey, a trip that will lead him to self-discovery, spiritual rebirth, success, and a recovery of his relationship with his estranged daughter. Witty and urbane, the book is sure to capture the minds, if not the hearts, of armchair travelers and those who enjoy dark humor with their literature.
Pub Date: Sept. 1, 1994
ISBN: 0-8071-1781-1
Page Count: 154
Publisher: Louisiana State Univ.
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 1994
A strict report, worthy of sympathy.
A violent surfacing of adolescence (which has little in common with Tarkington's earlier, broadly comic, Seventeen) has a compulsive impact.
"Nobody big except me" is the dream world of Holden Caulfield and his first person story is down to the basic, drab English of the pre-collegiate. For Holden is now being bounced from fancy prep, and, after a vicious evening with hall- and roommates, heads for New York to try to keep his latest failure from his parents. He tries to have a wild evening (all he does is pay the check), is terrorized by the hotel elevator man and his on-call whore, has a date with a girl he likes—and hates, sees his 10 year old sister, Phoebe. He also visits a sympathetic English teacher after trying on a drunken session, and when he keeps his date with Phoebe, who turns up with her suitcase to join him on his flight, he heads home to a hospital siege. This is tender and true, and impossible, in its picture of the old hells of young boys, the lonesomeness and tentative attempts to be mature and secure, the awful block between youth and being grown-up, the fright and sickness that humans and their behavior cause the challenging, the dramatization of the big bang. It is a sorry little worm's view of the off-beat of adult pressure, of contemporary strictures and conformity, of sentiment….
A strict report, worthy of sympathy.Pub Date: June 15, 1951
ISBN: 0316769177
Page Count: -
Publisher: Little, Brown
Review Posted Online: Nov. 2, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 1951
BOOK REVIEW
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
APPRECIATIONS
Genetically engineered dinosaurs run amok in Crichton's new, vastly entertaining science thriller. From the introduction alone—a classically Crichton-clear discussion of the implications of biotechnological research—it's evident that the Harvard M.D. has bounced back from the science-fantasy silliness of Sphere (1987) for another taut reworking of the Frankenstein theme, as in The Andromeda Strain and The Terminal Man. Here, Dr. Frankenstein is aging billionaire John Hammond, whose monster is a manmade ecosystem based on a Costa Rican island. Designed as the world's ultimate theme park, the ecosystem boasts climate and flora of the Jurassic Age and—most spectacularly—15 varieties of dinosaurs, created by elaborate genetic engineering that Crichton explains in fascinating detail, rich with dino-lore and complete with graphics. Into the park, for a safety check before its opening, comes the novel's band of characters—who, though well drawn, double as symbolic types in this unsubtle morality play. Among them are hero Alan Grant, noble paleontologist; Hammond, venal and obsessed; amoral dino-designer Henry Wu; Hammond's two innocent grandchildren; and mathematician Ian Malcolm, who in long diatribes serves as Crichton's mouthpiece to lament the folly of science. Upon arrival, the visitors tour the park; meanwhile, an industrial spy steals some dino embryos by shutting down the island's power—and its security grid, allowing the beasts to run loose. The bulk of the remaining narrative consists of dinos—ferocious T. Rex's, voracious velociraptors, venom-spitting dilophosaurs—stalking, ripping, and eating the cast in fast, furious, and suspenseful set-pieces as the ecosystem spins apart. And can Grant prevent the dinos from escaping to the mainland to create unchecked havoc? Though intrusive, the moralizing rarely slows this tornado-paced tale, a slick package of info-thrills that's Crichton's most clever since Congo (1980)—and easily the most exciting dinosaur novel ever written. A sure-fire best-seller.
Pub Date: Nov. 7, 1990
ISBN: 0394588169
Page Count: 424
Publisher: Knopf
Review Posted Online: Sept. 21, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 1990
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