A harrowing saga that pits corporate pusillanimity against dogged courage under the most difficult circumstances.
A struggle to save California retirees from a massive wildfire leads to allegations of misconduct by an elder-care corporation in Belden and Gullixson’s gripping exposé.
The authors (journalism professor Belden and former Santa Rosa Press Democrat editorial director Gullixson) recap the 2017 Tubbs Fire in California’s Napa and Sonoma Counties, one of a group of wildfires that killed 44 people and destroyed thousands of homes and businesses. They focus on the ordeal of two adjacent retirement communities in Santa Rosa—the Varenna apartment complex and the Villa Capri assisted living facility—both owned by a company called Oakmont Senior Living. The two residences were uniquely vulnerable to the fire that swept down on them on the night of October 8, fed by bone-dry weather and tropical storm–force winds. Both were full of aged, incapacitated people, many of them stranded on upper floors and unable to climb down stairs when the power went out and elevators shut down, and many of them suffering from dementia. Worse, the authors contend, evacuation efforts by Oakmont managers were slow and confused, company buses went unused because keys were lost, and, after managers and staff drove some residents to safety, they failed to return for the rest because of miscommunications and roadblocks. It therefore fell to family members, who raced to the residences, to improvise evacuations. Later chapters cover the ensuing lawsuits and investigations of Oakmont, which was accused of negligence, elder abuse, and having no evacuation plan and an inadequately trained staff. There’s cowardice in this dramatic narrative, but at heart it’s about ordinary people displaying extraordinary grace under extreme pressure, all conveyed in intense, atmospheric prose (“The wind howled as it pushed smoke inside, and embers blew through the open window, landing on the curtains, carpet and decor. It was then, through the dim, spectral light, R. J. saw a figure lying in bed”). The result is a moving re-creation of a nightmarish disaster that tested the character of all those in its path.
A harrowing saga that pits corporate pusillanimity against dogged courage under the most difficult circumstances.Pub Date: Jan. 10, 2024
ISBN: 9781642939361
Page Count: 464
Publisher: Permuted Press
Review Posted Online: Feb. 28, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 15, 2024
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
PERSPECTIVES
It’s not Shakespeare, not by a long shot. But at least it’s not James Franco.
A noted actor turns to verse: “Poems are a Saturday in the middle of the week.”
McConaughey, author of the gracefully written memoir Greenlights, has been writing poems since his teens, closing with one “written in an Australian bathtub” that reads just as a poem by an 18-year-old (Rimbaud excepted) should read: “Ignorant minds of the fortunate man / Blind of the fate shaping every land.” McConaughey is fearless in his commitment to the rhyme, no matter how slight the result (“Oops, took a quick peek at the sky before I got my glasses, / now I can’t see shit, sure hope this passes”). And, sad to say, the slight is what is most on display throughout, punctuated by some odd koanlike aperçus: “Eating all we can / at the all-we-can-eat buffet, / gives us a 3.8 education / and a 4.2 GPA.” “Never give up your right to do the next right thing. This is how we find our way home.” “Memory never forgets. Even though we do.” The prayer portion of the program is deeply felt, but it’s just as sentimental; only when he writes of life-changing events—a court appearance to file a restraining order against a stalker, his decision to quit smoking weed—do we catch a glimpse of the effortlessly fluent, effortlessly charming McConaughey as exemplified by the David Wooderson (“alright, alright, alright”) of Dazed and Confused. The rest is mostly a soufflé in verse. McConaughey’s heart is very clearly in the right place, but on the whole the book suggests an old saw: Don’t give up your day job.
It’s not Shakespeare, not by a long shot. But at least it’s not James Franco.Pub Date: Sept. 16, 2025
ISBN: 9781984862105
Page Count: 208
Publisher: Crown
Review Posted Online: Aug. 15, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2025
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
SEEN & HEARD
A blissfully vicarious, heartfelt glimpse into the life of a Manhattan burlesque dancer.
A former New York City dancer reflects on her zesty heyday in the 1970s.
Discovered on a Manhattan street in 2020 and introduced on Stanton’s Humans of New York Instagram page, Johnson, then 76, shares her dynamic history as a “fiercely independent” Black burlesque dancer who used the stage name Tanqueray and became a celebrated fixture in midtown adult theaters. “I was the only black girl making white girl money,” she boasts, telling a vibrant story about sex and struggle in a bygone era. Frank and unapologetic, Johnson vividly captures aspects of her former life as a stage seductress shimmying to blues tracks during 18-minute sets or sewing lingerie for plus-sized dancers. Though her work was far from the Broadway shows she dreamed about, it eventually became all about the nightly hustle to simply survive. Her anecdotes are humorous, heartfelt, and supremely captivating, recounted with the passion of a true survivor and the acerbic wit of a weathered, street-wise New Yorker. She shares stories of growing up in an abusive household in Albany in the 1940s, a teenage pregnancy, and prison time for robbery as nonchalantly as she recalls selling rhinestone G-strings to prostitutes to make them sparkle in the headlights of passing cars. Complemented by an array of revealing personal photographs, the narrative alternates between heartfelt nostalgia about the seedier side of Manhattan’s go-go scene and funny quips about her unconventional stage performances. Encounters with a variety of hardworking dancers, drag queens, and pimps, plus an account of the complexities of a first love with a drug-addled hustler, fill out the memoir with personality and candor. With a narrative assist from Stanton, the result is a consistently titillating and often moving story of human struggle as well as an insider glimpse into the days when Times Square was considered the Big Apple’s gloriously unpolished underbelly. The book also includes Yee’s lush watercolor illustrations.
A blissfully vicarious, heartfelt glimpse into the life of a Manhattan burlesque dancer.Pub Date: July 12, 2022
ISBN: 978-1-250-27827-2
Page Count: 192
Publisher: St. Martin's
Review Posted Online: July 27, 2022
© Copyright 2025 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
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