A pleasing, well-judged blend of genres with a good resolution.
In this middle-grade chapter book, private detective Goldilocks takes the case of a man whose missing grandparents have been replaced by bears.
After her father dies, 10-year-old Goldilocks inherits the family business: a private detective agency, which she runs with her cat, Charlotte, in the town of Lick Skillet. Money is tight, the rent is overdue, and she must do her best to avoid the wild-haired Tom the Kid-Snatcher, who rounds up kids without parents for the local orphanage. (He even occasionally kidnaps children who aren’t orphans: “He was that kind of kid-snatcher.”) Goldilocks advertises her detecting services, and her first client is a man named Frank Sims who wants her to find his missing grandparents—and figure out why bears are now living in their house. She’s glad to take the case, but her client’s grandparents live in the nearby Black Forest, which is notoriously full of scary creatures, and she’ll have to pass near the orphanage, besides. In order to avoid some dangers, including Tom, Goldilocks leaves the safe forest path; luckily, she meets Patty, an orphanage escapee who lives in the forest. The girls become friends and partners, solving the mystery and alerting authorities to the orphans’ mistreatment. Trine (Willy Maykit in Space, 2015, etc.) skillfully mixes fairy tales and detective fiction with a coming-of-age story about braving danger to prove oneself. Such elements could easily become rather dark, and Trine does touch on serious issues (including Goldilocks’ money problems), but moments of humor help to lighten the story. For example, Tom’s horse-drawn jail, the Patty Wagon, is named after his most recent captive: “With any luck he’d soon change the name to the Goldie Wagon.” The girl-power message is also appealing. Baykovska (The Nasty Princess, 2018, etc.) provides lighthearted, cartoonish black-and-white pencil illustrations for each chapter head; these offer nice details, such as the fact that Tom bears some resemblance to Struwwelpeter, a character from a well-known 1845 children’s book.
A pleasing, well-judged blend of genres with a good resolution.Pub Date: Aug. 31, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-73395-892-9
Page Count: 114
Publisher: Time Tunnel Media
Review Posted Online: June 24, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 2019
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
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There are unforgettable beauties in this very sexy story.
Passion, friendship, heartbreak, and forgiveness ring true in Lovering's debut, the tale of a young woman's obsession with a man who's "good at being charming."
Long Island native Lucy Albright, starts her freshman year at Baird College in Southern California, intending to study English and journalism and become a travel writer. Stephen DeMarco, an upperclassman, is a political science major who plans to become a lawyer. Soon after they meet, Lucy tells Stephen an intensely personal story about the Unforgivable Thing, a betrayal that turned Lucy against her mother. Stephen pretends to listen to Lucy's painful disclosure, but all his thoughts are about her exposed black bra strap and her nipples pressing against her thin cotton T-shirt. It doesn't take Lucy long to realize Stephen's a "manipulative jerk" and she is "beyond pathetic" in her desire for him, but their lives are now intertwined. Their story takes seven years to unfold, but it's a fast-paced ride through hookups, breakups, and infidelities fueled by alcohol and cocaine and with oodles of sizzling sexual tension. "Lucy was an itch, a song stuck in your head or a movie you need to rewatch or a food you suddenly crave," Stephen says in one of his point-of-view chapters, which alternate with Lucy's. The ending is perfect, as Lucy figures out the dark secret Stephen has kept hidden and learns the difference between lustful addiction and mature love.
There are unforgettable beauties in this very sexy story.Pub Date: June 12, 2018
ISBN: 978-1-5011-6964-9
Page Count: 352
Publisher: Atria
Review Posted Online: March 19, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2018
BOOK REVIEW
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The phrase “tour de force” could have been invented for this audacious novel.
Four men who meet as college roommates move to New York and spend the next three decades gaining renown in their professions—as an architect, painter, actor and lawyer—and struggling with demons in their intertwined personal lives.
Yanagihara (The People in the Trees, 2013) takes the still-bold leap of writing about characters who don’t share her background; in addition to being male, JB is African-American, Malcolm has a black father and white mother, Willem is white, and “Jude’s race was undetermined”—deserted at birth, he was raised in a monastery and had an unspeakably traumatic childhood that’s revealed slowly over the course of the book. Two of them are gay, one straight and one bisexual. There isn’t a single significant female character, and for a long novel, there isn’t much plot. There aren’t even many markers of what’s happening in the outside world; Jude moves to a loft in SoHo as a young man, but we don’t see the neighborhood change from gritty artists’ enclave to glitzy tourist destination. What we get instead is an intensely interior look at the friends’ psyches and relationships, and it’s utterly enthralling. The four men think about work and creativity and success and failure; they cook for each other, compete with each other and jostle for each other’s affection. JB bases his entire artistic career on painting portraits of his friends, while Malcolm takes care of them by designing their apartments and houses. When Jude, as an adult, is adopted by his favorite Harvard law professor, his friends join him for Thanksgiving in Cambridge every year. And when Willem becomes a movie star, they all bask in his glow. Eventually, the tone darkens and the story narrows to focus on Jude as the pain of his past cuts deep into his carefully constructed life.
The phrase “tour de force” could have been invented for this audacious novel.Pub Date: March 10, 2015
ISBN: 978-0-385-53925-8
Page Count: 720
Publisher: Doubleday
Review Posted Online: Dec. 21, 2014
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2015
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